Bottle Woes Solved

Well, made better at least. But first, here's the bottle back story.

Little Miss did great with the bottle from practically day one. Because she dropped 10% of her body weight in her first 24 hours, we supplemented with formula for a day or two until I was able to pump enough to supplement with breast milk. This turned out to be a blessing and disguise because she easily switched back and forth between bottle and breast. This made it possible for My Love to give her the 6 am feeding so I could sleep for 4 or 5 hours. That was bliss in those early weeks.

We continued to give her bottles at least once or twice a week until about 3 months when Little Miss was having feeding problems and I didn't want one more variable in the list. I stopped pumping as much because I realized that all the milk in my freezer was no good because of her dairy allergy. Furthermore, I didn't know if any new milk I pumped would also be bad if I found out we were dealing with more than one food allergy. It just became easier to breastfeed and not worry about what I had eaten when I pumped whatever was in that bottle. The few times I tried to give her a full bottle in the third and fourth months, she had fought it. I knew we were in for a struggle but since it was easier to just breast feed her, I let it go.

Then we started giving Little Miss Zantac for her reflux. I started pumping 2-3 ounces at a time and making several 1/2 ounce bottles with the medicine in them. At first she wasn't a big fan of these small bottles but she soon realized that if she sucked them down, she got to the breast sooner. I thought, great, she's taking bottles really well again. A few weeks ago however, all that changed. She stopped taking those small bottles. She wasn't taking bottles at church or when we went out for date night. Uh oh, now I'm in trouble. Little Miss would rather just skip a feeding than take a bottle.

Then I had an epiphany. We had been given lots of Nuk latex nipples in the hospital. We had been using these all along. I realized late one night after a failed bottle attempt that those nipples we had been using since the beginning were newborn nipples...with newborn flow. Little Miss is no longer a newborn and her appetite is no longer that of a newborn. I had heard about not giving a breastfed baby a large or fast flow nipple too soon, especially from the beginning. I hadn't thought however, about how frustrated she must be getting just a trickle from the bottle when she can nurse quite efficiently now.

So last night when it was time to give her a bottle, I tried the regular flow nipples. She fussed for a few minutes and then... she sucked down 4.5 ounces. That's the most she's taken from a bottle in about 2 months. Granted, this was only one time but at least it gives me hope that we are not doomed to breast or nothing until we wean. I'm hoping to breastfeed until a year so with just over 6 months to go, I'm glad to think that being apart for more than a few hours is still a possibility.

Schedule at 5 months

I thought I'd share where we were a few weeks ago at 5 months and what we are doing differently in the last week or two. At five months, we were pretty much still on a 3 hour schedule with a dream feed.

8:15 nurse
9:15 nap (60 min. after waking)
11:15-11:30 nurse (she was napping really well and long so I often let her sleep a few extra minutes)
12:30 nap
2:15 nurse
3:15-3:30 nap (watching for sleep cues)
5-5:15 nurse (often waking around 4:30 or 4:45)
6-6:30 nap
7:45 wake if still sleeping
8 nurse
8:30 bedtime
10-11 dream feed

I realized that I was almost always waking her for the second and third feeds of the day. She really can go longer than 3 hours in the earlier part of the day. I also had been thinking about dropping the dream feed for many weeks but different things kept coming up. Then she started waking in the night and I thought perhaps either the fourth nap or the dream feed were causing sleep disruption in the night. Over the last several days we have moved to this schedule. Unfortunately, she had two vaccines Monday and has been teething as well but I decided to push ahead and hopefully get it all over at once.

8:15 nurse
9:20 nap
11:45 nurse
12:50 nap
3 nurse
4-4:30 nap (watching for sleep cues; the length of this nap is still variable depending on earlier naps and errands, etc)
6 nurse
8 nurse
8:30 bedtime

I have to admit that dropping the dream feed has been bittersweet. I loved that time snuggling her while she slept and I do miss it a bit. The last two nights I haven't fed her but I've gone in to kiss her one last time. Both nights she has stirred and cried for a minute or two just after I've left her room so tonight I'm not going to go in. It is also nice, however, to put her in bed at 8:30 and be able to do whatever I want with the rest of the night without needing to worry about stopping to feed her one last time.

Last night, she fussed for a few minutes around midnight and then woke up crying around 2:30. I knew from her cry that she was in pain but I wasn't sure if she was hungry as well. I gave her Tylenol, put a little Orajel on her gums, and tried for a few minutes to settle her back down. When she clearly wasn't going to fall back asleep, I decided to nurse her for a few minutes. She was still awake when I put her down about 8 minutes later but she went back to sleep relatively easily after I left her. I think it was just the teething that woke her so tonight I gave her some Motrin before bed to try to cover that preemptively.

5 months already!?!

I can't believe it's been five months since Little Miss joined our family. I'm absolutely loving motherhood and feel so incredibly blessed. For those of you who don't know, it took us 18 seemingly endless months to get pregnant with our little bundle of joy and though the first several months of pregnancy went quite smoothly, the last few were a real challenge. Sunday was Little Miss' dedication at church (the pic was taken after church) and the next day she turned 5 months on the nose. We seem to be in a good groove with her schedule and life is good.

Little Miss is the happiest, smiley-est baby around. Everyone always comments on how content and sociable she is. Several people have told us we should get her into modeling because her smile and her temperament are perfect for it. We are contemplating entering her in some photo contests and seeing if it goes anywhere.

Sleep Issues: I think, fingers crossed, we have turned the corner on her sleep difficulties. Her nap difficulties got better little by little just before she turned 4 months old. It started with her sleeping through the occasional nap with 5-10 minutes of crying in the middle. She then began only crying about 5 minutes. Now she will occasionally cry 45 minutes to an hour in but rarely cries very hard or very long.

Only about a week after the naps returned to being consistently good though, she started waking up in the night again. Up until then, I could count on half a hand the times she had woken in the night since 6 weeks when she had started sleeping through the night. It was right before Mother's Day and right around when she turned 4 months. I had read on Chronicles of a Babywise Mom that 4 month sleep problems are rather common so I wasn't too surprised. I knew she was learning how to roll from back to tummy and that she was practicing when she should have been sleeping. I also knew that she was really taking an interest in the world and had been much more distracted while nursing making full feeds more difficult during the day and I thought she might even be going through a growth spurt to boot.

I assumed that it was a hunger problem and sure enough, she took a full feed. That continued for a few nights until I questioned whether she was going to get used to feeding in the night and therefore if I was setting a new routine in a different direction than I wanted to go. I tried letting her cry for 5-10 minutes and then soothing her without feeding her, but she really was hungry so I ended up feeding her. Then one night she slept through. Then another night she would sleep until 6 (normal wake up is 8). Then she would go back to 4:30. There was even one or two nights she woke up twice to eat. She had a cold during this time so I really didn't want to do cry it out while she was sick so I kept feeding her when she woke and she kept eating. I actually didn't mind waking up all that much as I would just watch her nurse so peacefully and think about how fast she is growing up. My baby won't always be a baby so I'm doing my best to cherish every moment.

There was one night last week that I finally decided to let her cry. She cried for over an hour. I only checked on her once in that time as letting her see me only makes matters worse. I finally decided she really was hungry and wasn't going to fall back asleep so I fed her. That was a rough night. The next night she slept through till 8. She has slept through the night the last several nights though so I think we may be over the hump. Only time will tell.

Dairy Allergy and Reflux: At 2 months, I went off dairy (after mucousy, bloody stools) and Little Miss started eating better without fussing so much. At 3.5 months, she was fussy again and spitting up more and acting like she was in pain while eating. We put her on Zantac hoping it was reflux and not more food allergies. She got better (around that time her naps got better too). Around 4.5 months, she started fussing while eating and spitting up again. I called the doc and they upper her Zantac dosage so it is more in line with her current weight. Overall, she seems more comfortable but still has times when she struggles while she's nursing. I'm praying she's not allergic to anything else because selfishly I don't want to have to cut anything else out of my diet.

Naps, Teething, and Other Updates

Naps are still a struggle. I thought for a while that things were getting better and to some degree I still do. There are now some naps that Little Miss is making it all the way through with no to minimal trouble. There are, however, still many for which she is only sleeping 35-50 minutes before waking. Unfortunately, I've had very little success getting her to fall back asleep as well. Sometimes she'll fall back asleep in my arms and then wake up as soon as her head hits the bed so I usually just get her up and keep her mellow until the next feeding time. She also woke at 5:15 this morning; I think her teeth were bothering her and once she was awake she wanted to be fed. She then fell back asleep until normal wake up time at 8.

That leads me to the next update...teething. I'm pretty sure Little Miss is so fussy and often inconsolable due to some serious teething pain. She doesn't like the cold teether or cold wet wash cloths. She occasionally likes the vibrating strawberry teether. So far, chewing on her own fist or mommy's finger seem to be her favorite. Her worst time of day is late afternoon and often I resort to Tylenol or Motrin at this hour. I picked up some Baby Orajel today to see if that helps as well.

Last night and tonight are the first nights in a long time (that I can remember actually) that Little Miss cried at bedtime. She is usually falling asleep just before bedtime when I change her diaper, put on PJs, and go nurse her. She almost falls asleep at the breast and then fusses some during our goodnight song. She has fallen asleep only to wake a few minutes later screaming. When I go check on her, I hold her for a minute, put her down, pat her and she falls asleep.

She continues to keep doing great at tummy time and is able to do up to 5 or 6 minutes. Occasionally she still rolls over from tummy to back. She loves to coo and giggle and "talk" with whomever will listen. Her eyes are getting darker but they're definitely not brown yet. She had a growth spurt a few days ago and is officially in 3-6 month clothing now. That's pretty much what's going on around here.

Holding My Breath

I'm holding my breath and hoping that the trend continues. As mentioned recently in this post, Little Miss has been having some major nap trouble. She has been waking up between 45 minutes and an hour into each nap (which I'd like to be 1.5 to 2 hours) for the last 5 weeks. Today, she slept perfectly for her first nap, fussed mildly for her third nap, and needed only a little bit of help from me in the middle of her second nap. This last nap of the day she woke up an hour in but three out of four is a huge improvement over none.

Dairy Free for Me

It's official - Little Miss is allergic to dairy. After being dairy free for two weeks, I had some cheese Monday and the next day, Little Miss had tons of mucous and specks of blood in her stool. She was also more fussy during nursing. I really would like to keep breastfeeding until her first birthday so I'm saying goodbye to all milk products. I will miss my cheese and my ice cream but it is well worth it to keep Little Miss healthy. Most children outgrow dairy allergy by two or three years old though so hopefully it won't be an issue for her forever.

Amazingly, I too have had a major change since going off of dairy. My insulin needs have dropped by about 40%. I'm not quite sure what to make of that but obviously my body has issues with milk protein as well. Within 48 hours of stopping dairy, I kept going low over and over again. After about two days of stuffing my face to keep up with the lows, my genius husband suggested I change my basal rates on my insulin pump. Duh? Why didn't I think of that? The only thing that changed was the dairy.

I'm kind of hoping that maybe God will use this to heal my diabetes. Medically/scientifically it makes no sense but I know God can use whatever means he desires to heal people and I'll take it. Healing from diabetes is something I have always prayed for but honestly most of the time I don't really think it will happen in this lifetime. I know I should have more faith but it is one of those, "God, I believe. Forgive my unbelief" type things. I want to believe and I know he can heal me; I just don't always think he will. For now though, I know that Little Miss needs me off of dairy and if that is the case, then so be it. If it helps my health, all the better.

We've Got a Roller

Little Miss is officially rolling. On Tuesday, I had her doing tummy time on the changing mat and she looked like she was trying to roll. She couldn't get too far because our changing mat has raised sides so I put her down on her activity gym mat. I propped her up on her arms and over she went.

She proceeded to roll over and over and over again. I kept putting her on her tummy and she kept rolling. She even did it for the video camera a few times. I called My Love and he got to tell everyone at work about his girl's first real milestone. Then I called my mom even though she was on her way over and she was thrilled too.

By the time my mom got here and Little Miss was awake again, she wouldn't do it. When daddy got home we tried again. No luck. Fortunately I had the video to prove it. We tried again Wednesday and Thursday to no avail. Finally this morning, she finally rolled again a few times. Silly girl had me thinking maybe she had already forgotten.

Has it reall been 3 months already?

Little Miss will be 3 months old tomorrow. I can't believe it. I stopped swaddling her last weekend, daddy found her first tooth coming through and she is finally pooping less than 8 times a day. My little girl is growing up too fast.

I decided yesterday that I needed to capture her in time so we had an impromptu photo session. She is just the most adorable little girl in the whole world. These days, Little Miss is often found babbling up a storm, showing off a cute new cloth diaper cover, or lifting her head to look around during tummy time.

Naps have still been a bit rough, but since clever daddy found that achy tooth at least we know what's bothering her. I've found that if I go in and rub her gums and let her suck on my finger for a few minutes when she wakes up at the hour mark, she will usually drift back off for another hour or so. It's not ideal to have to go in during the middle of every nap, but if the kid is in pain she will get the extra loving she needs. She's still sleeping great at night and hopefully when teething is less of an issue we can get her back to a full nap without our help in the middle.

UPDATE: It wasn't a tooth that daddy found. After a trip to the dentist (I knew it wasn't a "normal" tooth), we were told it was a dental lamina cyst. She has several other smaller ones too. They are benign cysts found in newborns and they will resolve on their own, thank you Papa. I was really worried she'd have to have some procedure to get rid of it. She is definitely teething though but no signs of real teeth yet.

Nap Time Troubles

Little Miss will be 12 weeks old this Thursday and I'm trying to fine tune her schedule. She was doing great on a 3 hour schedule for quite a while but she started having nap trouble about 2 weeks ago. I'm trying to figure out if she needs shorter or longer naps, more or less time between feeds, or something else.

Here is what we have been doing.

6:30 am - nurse and right back to bed
9:30 am - nurse
10:30 am - nap
12:00 pm - nurse
1:00 pm - nap
3:00 pm - nurse
4:00 pm - nap
6:00 pm - nurse
6-9 pm - usually fussy, sometimes nap, sometimes not
9:00 pm - nurse, bedtime routine, down for the night

Like I said, this was working beautifully for quite some time and then she started waking exactly one hour into each of her naps. I thought it was the 45 minute intruder that they talk about in Preparation for Parenting (more on that another time). I thought maybe she was waking up hungry so I tried feeding her when she woke. Sometimes she was hungry but often times she wasn't. I would often pick her up only to have her fall right back to sleep in my arms.

Seeing this, I next tried leaving her in the crib but patting, shushing, or singing to her. Sometimes this worked but other times it just made her more upset that I wouldn't pick her up. When it was apparent that she was just getting more worked up by seeing me, I started letting her cry it out. That doesn't seem to be working either. Over the weekend at my parents' house, Little Miss seemed to not be feeling well so when she woke up after an hour, I just let her finish her nap in my arms. When I do that, she sleeps until the next scheduled feeding time.

I am feeling unsure of myself and I'm not quite sure how to proceed. I think I've come to the conclusion that she wakes up at the end of her first sleep cycle and doesn't know how to settle herself back down for the rest of the nap. She isn't hungry, seeing me makes her cry harder, and holding her for the second hour of every nap is not something I want to do regularly.

I know her ideal wake time is close to 60 minutes. For a while, it seemed to have lengthened to 65 or 70 minutes but it now is back to right around 60 minutes again. There is a great post over at Chronicles of a Babywise Mom about Optimal Waketime Lengths. I'm not sure if this changing waketime length issue has anything to do with the middle of the nap waking issues we're having.

So today we are trying something new. For the next week we are going to try this and see how it goes.

7:00 am - wake up and nurse
8:30 am - nap
9:30 am - nurse
10:30 am - nap
1:00 pm - nurse
2:30 pm - nap
4:00 pm - nurse
5:00 pm - nap
7:00 pm - nurse
8:30 pm - nap
9:30 pm - nurse
10:00 pm - bedtime

This morning went very well with Little Miss sleeping solidly for the first two naps. We are on nap number three right now and she has been fussing on and off from 45 minutes in until now (an hour in). Hopefully she'll adjust in the next day or two and naps will be a bit smoother for a while at least.

The Birth of Little Miss

This is the long version so don't say I didn't warn you.

On December 20th I started having really bad back pain and contractions about 6 minutes apart. I was 35 weeks and 1 day. We headed to the hospital (this was our 4th visit to labor and delivery) and had to wait an hour for a room to open up all while having what I thought was back labor since Little Miss was breech and contractions every 5-6 minutes. I finally got into a room and settled. They checked me and I was still only 1 cm dilated and 20% effaced, only slightly more than the week before.

After a few hours of continued pain and monitoring, they figured out I had a kidney infection which was actually causing all the back pain and probably the contractions too. Sometime in the middle of the night they started me on antibiotics and magnesium and gave me something for the pain. I knew then I was going to be there at least for a few days on the IV antibiotics. I ended up getting "magged out" over the next 24 hours and having a terrible experience the following night with a less than sympathetic nurse. They lowered my magnesium and I felt much better within a few hours.

From then on, they were able to keep me relatively comfortable with the magnesium and Tylenol for the back pain. Over the weekend (Saturday was Christmas), we got mixed messages about whether they would try to wean me off the mag and send me home to cook the Little Miss a bit longer or if they would be keeping me until delivery. It was the day after Christmas that I hit 36 weeks and breathed a little easier. I was getting several different opinions though of how she might do, particularly with breathing, because of my diabetes along with the fact that she was measuring HUGE...already full term size before 36 weeks.

At one point they tried to wean me off of the mag and I started having more uncomfortable contractions within an hour or so and that idea was given up. They decided to “humor me” and do an amnio Wednesday to see if her lungs were ready. The night they did the amnio she measured in at 9 lbs 2 oz by Dr. T's measurements and he said there was no chance her lungs would be fine yet with her size and my diabetes. He also said that if I were to go full term she would make the papers because she would be 13 pounds. The next morning the preliminary amnio results came in saying the lungs were mature so we waited to hear from Dr. J (the one we liked better) when the c section would be scheduled. We found out just before lunch that Little Miss was going to be born that evening and called the family.

Dr. J scheduled the c section for 7 pm so they didn't let me eat from lunch on. In the intervening hours, I showered, we cleaned up our hospital room, and tried unsuccessfully to rest. We were super excited and a little nervous. I went really low twice in the hour and a half prior to the section and they had to give me IV dextrose since I couldn't eat anything and both his family and my family were all in the room and I felt a little overwhelmed. They finally said the OR was ready and came to wheel me back around 7:15. The hall outside was filled with more family.

When My Love and I got back to the OR they had him put on a white suit, cap, booties, and mask. It was rather comical watching my 6' 5” husband trying to cram himself and his size 15 feet into the sterile garb. He ended up wearing the booties over his socks because his shoes didn't fit. We had to wait for Dr. T who was assisting because he was stuck in traffic. They finally took me in to get the epidural started and before I knew it, they were opening me up. I was a little out of it from whatever they gave me but I perked up when I heard that one of her legs had been delivered. Then she was out and I waited for that first cry. It was beautiful.

I kept asking how she was and after what seemed like forever, they said she was great and asked My Love to go cut the cord. She was born at 8:05 pm weighing 7 lbs 11 oz and 19.5 inches long. She had a beautiful full head of dark brown hair and the longest fingers and toes.

I was really uncomfortable though as they were still working on me and they said because of having been on the magnesium and her breech position my uterus was really soft and having a hard time contracting down so they gave me pitocin and something else to help with that. I wanted something for pain but not until after I saw her. The nurse finally brought her over and then Ricky came and held her up for me. We took a few pictures and then they were out the door to the nursery. They gave me something more for the pain and I dozed while they finished stitching me up. Dr. J did a fantastic job with dermabond and steri strips on the outside and it looks amazing.

I continued to doze in recovery and asked for my mom and more pain meds. She helped me test my blood sugar (118) and eventually My Love came in with Little Miss. They ended up being totally full on the post-partum side of the floor so they took me back to my room on the L and D side. As soon as I was settled in bed, I wanted to try to nurse and Little Miss did great even though it had been about 2 hours since the delivery (longer than I would have liked but it turned out fine). The rest of the night was a blur but I will never forget those first hours with my precious baby girl.

A New Normal

A lot has happened since I last blogged. Most significantly, this...


Little Miss was born Dec. 30, 2010 at 8:05 pm. She weighed 7 pounds 11 ounces and was 19 and a half inches long. I'll post the birth story another time but now that she is here, I feel like I have lots to share with the world.

My life changed forever the day she was born. My days are now filled with diapers and spit up and nap times, car seats, lullabies, and cooing. I am a wife and a mom and I am content. As I have added yet another role to my list, I am finding my "new normal" and trying to keep being Papa's Girl at the top of the list.