Co-sleeping is working out great for us. I actually don't know how I could do it any other way. Here is how a typical night goes:
When mom and dad are ready for bed they get into bed with Cedric. I feed him while laying down next to him and eventually he's had enough, sometimes he needs a diaper change, then he usually just wants to suck on his pacifier. We turn out the lights and baby seems to understand that this is night time and it's time to sleep. Eventually he falls asleep next to me, when he's reached the deep, limp stage of sleep, I move him over the the Arm's Reach Co-sleeper and then I'm able to fall asleep without him next to me. Lately he's been sleeping for four or five hours and then will wake wanting to eat again. I hear him wiggle and fuss a little, then I bring him back into bed with me and we both fall asleep in bed again, usually he stays dry through a good portion of the night.
He may wake again 1-3 hours later for more food, then possibly one more time, then he usually gives some signals that he thinks bed time should be over. Bored baby! :) Then I resign to getting out of bed, sometimes as early as 6 am, sometimes as late at 9:30 am. Then he pees a bunch over the next couple hours, sometimes we go through 4 or 5 diaper changes in the early morning hours. It might be a good time to practice some ECing.
If baby was in another room, or even across the room, I don't know how I would do it. I often don't even get out of bed all night long, which means falling back to sleep doesn't take long. I'm enjoying some pretty awesome sleep considering I have a two-month-old. Some nights are better than others, about a week ago he woke up every two hours, but for the most part we get a good four to five hour stretch before he wakes so frequently. Naps seem a bit more sporadic, sometimes lasting 20 mins and sometimes lasting three hours. Sometimes he'll have 2 or 3 naps and sometime more like 5 or 6. He has a new cry which I'm starting to associate with, "I'm tired, but need help falling asleep." Usually just a little bit of rocking will send him to dream land, then I can set him down and he'll be out for a while, but yesterday, I actually got into bed with him and had to lay there for a while before he was out. I figure using different methods is a good idea anyway. If it weren't so darn hot, I'd just let him sleep in one of our carriers. But I'm too worried he'd overheat during a long nap. If it were up to me, the temp would constantly be between 50 and 70 degrees. I'd gladly give up perfect 70s weather if it also got rid of 80s 90s and 100s.
A five-hour stretch of sleep is technically "sleeping through the night." I think we need a new definition of sleeping through the night. I think it would paint a more accurate vision for parents. I definitely will not be telling people my son sleeps through the night until we get an 8 hour stretch in there. And that could take years.
Sunday, July 31, 2011
Friday, July 29, 2011
I'm a Name Snob
I have to admit it. I would never say anything to any parent's face about what they named their child, but sometimes when I hear what some people named their baby I think, "wow they sure didn't search far to find that name." I am very against popular names. Even my husband has said upon hearing a name, "that's boring!"
We named our son Cedric Demetrius. Which I think is an uncommon, awesome-sounding, bad ass name that is still recognized as a name. I'm also against inventing names randomly, though less so than giving your baby a name that three other people in his kindergarten class will have. I was going for pronouncable, but unique. I won't say any names, so as not to offend anyone, but if your baby's name is in the top 100 names for the year he was born, I probably rolled my eyes when I heard it.
Which makes me just a little terrible, but I said nothing to your face, did I?
I also hate nick names, I really do, though I recognize that this is totally my problem, and I realize that many people have nick names, and I call many of you by your nick names, but I really don't like them.
Why name a kid something only to call him something else? I just don't get it. And I was pretty amazed at the number of people who, after hearing I named my son Cedric, asked, "so do you have any nick names?" What the hell is wrong with Cedric? He will be called Cedric. I didn't name him Cedric to call him Ced, or Ceddy, or CD, or ANYTHING else. I will be that annoying mom who corrects you when you try to bastardize his name. It's a freaking two syllable name, it's not hard to say. Also, just so you know, my name is Andrea, not Andi. The only people who call me Andi are those who know my mother better than me. Yes, my own mother tried to give me a nick name as a child, and I didn't take it, I preferred Andrea. Why name me Andrea, to only call me Andi? I tend to let this one go, because the sheer amount of people who call me Andi is too much correcting, and I've let it go on for so many years now, that it would be weird for me to bring it up. Chances are if you call me Andi, we aren't very close.
I'm also not a fan of giving the mother's maiden name as a middle name, even though this is exactly what my mother-in-law did. A last name shouldn't be a middle name, but I won't try to pass legislation forbidding it. One of another weird naming quirk of mine.
Briefly, other things that bother me:
Naming your child after someone still alive, especially yourself.
Giving your child a hyphenated last name.
Giving your child the last name of her father who skipped town after he found out he knocked you up.
Giving your child no middle name.
Giving your child more than one middle name.
There, I had to get that off my chest. I promise I won't confront anyone directly, and I will call your child by what you want me to call them. And what you name your child doesn't reflect how good of a parent you are. :)
We named our son Cedric Demetrius. Which I think is an uncommon, awesome-sounding, bad ass name that is still recognized as a name. I'm also against inventing names randomly, though less so than giving your baby a name that three other people in his kindergarten class will have. I was going for pronouncable, but unique. I won't say any names, so as not to offend anyone, but if your baby's name is in the top 100 names for the year he was born, I probably rolled my eyes when I heard it.
Which makes me just a little terrible, but I said nothing to your face, did I?
I also hate nick names, I really do, though I recognize that this is totally my problem, and I realize that many people have nick names, and I call many of you by your nick names, but I really don't like them.
Why name a kid something only to call him something else? I just don't get it. And I was pretty amazed at the number of people who, after hearing I named my son Cedric, asked, "so do you have any nick names?" What the hell is wrong with Cedric? He will be called Cedric. I didn't name him Cedric to call him Ced, or Ceddy, or CD, or ANYTHING else. I will be that annoying mom who corrects you when you try to bastardize his name. It's a freaking two syllable name, it's not hard to say. Also, just so you know, my name is Andrea, not Andi. The only people who call me Andi are those who know my mother better than me. Yes, my own mother tried to give me a nick name as a child, and I didn't take it, I preferred Andrea. Why name me Andrea, to only call me Andi? I tend to let this one go, because the sheer amount of people who call me Andi is too much correcting, and I've let it go on for so many years now, that it would be weird for me to bring it up. Chances are if you call me Andi, we aren't very close.
I'm also not a fan of giving the mother's maiden name as a middle name, even though this is exactly what my mother-in-law did. A last name shouldn't be a middle name, but I won't try to pass legislation forbidding it. One of another weird naming quirk of mine.
Briefly, other things that bother me:
Naming your child after someone still alive, especially yourself.
Giving your child a hyphenated last name.
Giving your child the last name of her father who skipped town after he found out he knocked you up.
Giving your child no middle name.
Giving your child more than one middle name.
There, I had to get that off my chest. I promise I won't confront anyone directly, and I will call your child by what you want me to call them. And what you name your child doesn't reflect how good of a parent you are. :)
Wednesday, July 27, 2011
EC and Cloth Diapering so far
I've been trying to keep a very open mind. I said I might try EC at birth or a few months after birth. I wanted to stay flexible to make sure I didn't give up on it so easily. Well, at birth was impossible for me, I was so crazy and sleep deprived. But that was OK, even in countries where EC is the norm the average age of starting is usually 2 to 6 months.
Still I did not want to see diapering and caring for my child's elimination needs as an icky chore that baby has no control over.
The first thing we noticed was that in the hospital Cedric would pee every time we took off his diaper. Babies naturally like to eliminate when naked. So, I've been trying to let him, instead of immediately slapping another diaper on him. This has led to some hilarious peeings where he has gotten his hair full of pee when I'm not paying enough attention. Bath time! :)
So if he has pooped his diaper, but no pee (or if the diaper is not completely soaked), I'll wait at the changing table, with a cloth or diaper ready to catch the pee and when and if he does pee, I give a cueing noise ("Psssssssss....."). And then I put a clean diaper on him. I can usually tell when he's close to peeing because his penis will move around and his scrotum will contract. But sometimes he doesn't and after a few minutes I just put a diaper on.
We also have some naked baby time and if I notice him peeing, I give a cueing noise. Cleaning up a baby that has peed or pooped on to a cloth beneath them is so much easier that completely diapering one. Technically he is still peeing into cloth diapers, but the process is different and a pee-soaked diaper is not against his skin. He seems to really love naked time, so hopefully this will lead to a love of being dry later.
I sometimes have to remind myself that I am not doing EC to achieve anything, I am doing it for the journey. I am doing it to be more responsive to my baby. Even if he's still in diapers at age two, it was not all for nothing. I am doing it to make diapering possibly more pleasant and to keep his skin drier. Results should not be dwelled on; there are always diapers. It does not have to be an all or nothing deal.
For, now I'm going to continue doing what I'm doing until I think he's sturdy enough to sit on a potty, or I notice any other changes. He definitely pees less frequently already, and poops less frequently too. I am excited about the future of EC and everything else.
People warned me that this would be hard, but so far, it really isn't. I might get pee on me more frequently, but that's really not a huge deal. It's only hard if you obsess over the future and the results; let's live in the moment. :)
Still I did not want to see diapering and caring for my child's elimination needs as an icky chore that baby has no control over.
The first thing we noticed was that in the hospital Cedric would pee every time we took off his diaper. Babies naturally like to eliminate when naked. So, I've been trying to let him, instead of immediately slapping another diaper on him. This has led to some hilarious peeings where he has gotten his hair full of pee when I'm not paying enough attention. Bath time! :)
So if he has pooped his diaper, but no pee (or if the diaper is not completely soaked), I'll wait at the changing table, with a cloth or diaper ready to catch the pee and when and if he does pee, I give a cueing noise ("Psssssssss....."). And then I put a clean diaper on him. I can usually tell when he's close to peeing because his penis will move around and his scrotum will contract. But sometimes he doesn't and after a few minutes I just put a diaper on.
We also have some naked baby time and if I notice him peeing, I give a cueing noise. Cleaning up a baby that has peed or pooped on to a cloth beneath them is so much easier that completely diapering one. Technically he is still peeing into cloth diapers, but the process is different and a pee-soaked diaper is not against his skin. He seems to really love naked time, so hopefully this will lead to a love of being dry later.
I sometimes have to remind myself that I am not doing EC to achieve anything, I am doing it for the journey. I am doing it to be more responsive to my baby. Even if he's still in diapers at age two, it was not all for nothing. I am doing it to make diapering possibly more pleasant and to keep his skin drier. Results should not be dwelled on; there are always diapers. It does not have to be an all or nothing deal.
For, now I'm going to continue doing what I'm doing until I think he's sturdy enough to sit on a potty, or I notice any other changes. He definitely pees less frequently already, and poops less frequently too. I am excited about the future of EC and everything else.
People warned me that this would be hard, but so far, it really isn't. I might get pee on me more frequently, but that's really not a huge deal. It's only hard if you obsess over the future and the results; let's live in the moment. :)
Saturday, July 23, 2011
Moods and Body After Birth.
I think I can sum up the mood of the first six weeks as complete insanity slowly turning into mild insanity. Now that I'm nearly 8 weeks post partum, I feel pretty good.
I remember holding my son when he was just a few days old and thinking about all the things in the world that could harm him. When they are that fragile and little, you just don't see how anyone could possibly survive to become an adult. Certainly, I thought, I would not make it with him. He was healthy and growing well, but it was the outside world that scared me. I have never felt more vulnerable. I also was so afraid of abusing him, even though I am far from an abusive person, I needed lots of reassurance from Brent that I wasn't going to hurt him. "Promise me we will never hurt him," I would say. As if some outside force was going to turn me into a cruel person without me realizing it.
I had to constantly remind myself to live in the moment. To enjoy holding him and feeding him. To be content to sit at home and watch him sleep. To try to not worry about getting sleep or returning to work (which seemed an impossibility for a while). To just be, and be happy. It worked sometimes, and other times I was deeply depressed. And when I get depressed I am super critical of the actions of others. Every phone all that wasn't returned to me, every email that never got a reply back felt awful and I asked Brent what was wrong with everyone. But I've lived long enough to know that if it seems like everyone else has a problem, it's probably me with the problem. So then it became, "am I a total freak that no one wants to be around?" This is the voice of depression. When the depression lifted, the unanswered emails didn't bother me as much, they didn't become a referendum on my likeability. "People are busy this summer." Maybe that is delusional too, but it feels better than "I'm a freak!"
So I would say that I got the post partum depression, but that I coped with it alright. And it only lasted hours or a couple days, not the clinical diagnosis of two weeks, most of the time. Plus my therapist helps a lot. I kept off of meds for the prenatal depression, I can keep off of them for the post natal. And now, maybe finally, I can get back to feeling like myself. Which brings me to the body.
I hated pregnancy. The first month wasn't too bad, I had a couple bad headaches and some dizziness, but that's it. Then I had nausea for the next two months. My nausea wasn't severe, but it was moderate, and lasted 24 hours a day, 7 days a week, for a good 6 weeks, and wasn't really completely gone until week 15. I never threw up, but only because I hate throwing up so much that I did everything I could to prevent it, there were definitely some close calls and dry heaves. And then when the nausea went away I had headaches for a month. Then months 5, 6, and 7 weren't too bad accept that my heartburn was still going strong and I was swelling and needing to sleep a bunch, then month 8 is when I really started to feel like I did not own my body at all, that something awful was controlling it and I felt trapped. This feeling only intensified in the ninth month, the last couple weeks before he was born I was even starting to feel resentful. I wanted the pregnancy to end, I wanted my body back. I did not bond with my unborn baby. I did not like that he had to grow inside of me, I wanted a baby, not a pregnancy! I was super impatient and extremely crabby the last week. I was so happy that he came a week early. I felt like he listened to me and said, "OK mom, I guess I can get born now if it will make you feel better."
I'm still happy to not be pregnant. So happy. My uterus is off limits for two years. I want two years of having my body back. And because I so badly felt like I didn't have my body during pregnancy, I now feel this intense connection to my body. I've never loved my body more. I feel so in control of it now. My shoes fit again and my waist is slowly shrinking. I feel like it took the pregnancy to make me appreciate this body. For nine months I had to give up control of my body over to this alien growing inside of me. Pregnancy effects everything, they don't tell you that, it changes EVERYTHING in your body. But you get it back, slightly changed, slightly deformed, but you get it back. Except not your boobs, your boobs still belong to the alien, but you learn to love giving them to him.
I remember holding my son when he was just a few days old and thinking about all the things in the world that could harm him. When they are that fragile and little, you just don't see how anyone could possibly survive to become an adult. Certainly, I thought, I would not make it with him. He was healthy and growing well, but it was the outside world that scared me. I have never felt more vulnerable. I also was so afraid of abusing him, even though I am far from an abusive person, I needed lots of reassurance from Brent that I wasn't going to hurt him. "Promise me we will never hurt him," I would say. As if some outside force was going to turn me into a cruel person without me realizing it.
I had to constantly remind myself to live in the moment. To enjoy holding him and feeding him. To be content to sit at home and watch him sleep. To try to not worry about getting sleep or returning to work (which seemed an impossibility for a while). To just be, and be happy. It worked sometimes, and other times I was deeply depressed. And when I get depressed I am super critical of the actions of others. Every phone all that wasn't returned to me, every email that never got a reply back felt awful and I asked Brent what was wrong with everyone. But I've lived long enough to know that if it seems like everyone else has a problem, it's probably me with the problem. So then it became, "am I a total freak that no one wants to be around?" This is the voice of depression. When the depression lifted, the unanswered emails didn't bother me as much, they didn't become a referendum on my likeability. "People are busy this summer." Maybe that is delusional too, but it feels better than "I'm a freak!"
So I would say that I got the post partum depression, but that I coped with it alright. And it only lasted hours or a couple days, not the clinical diagnosis of two weeks, most of the time. Plus my therapist helps a lot. I kept off of meds for the prenatal depression, I can keep off of them for the post natal. And now, maybe finally, I can get back to feeling like myself. Which brings me to the body.
I hated pregnancy. The first month wasn't too bad, I had a couple bad headaches and some dizziness, but that's it. Then I had nausea for the next two months. My nausea wasn't severe, but it was moderate, and lasted 24 hours a day, 7 days a week, for a good 6 weeks, and wasn't really completely gone until week 15. I never threw up, but only because I hate throwing up so much that I did everything I could to prevent it, there were definitely some close calls and dry heaves. And then when the nausea went away I had headaches for a month. Then months 5, 6, and 7 weren't too bad accept that my heartburn was still going strong and I was swelling and needing to sleep a bunch, then month 8 is when I really started to feel like I did not own my body at all, that something awful was controlling it and I felt trapped. This feeling only intensified in the ninth month, the last couple weeks before he was born I was even starting to feel resentful. I wanted the pregnancy to end, I wanted my body back. I did not bond with my unborn baby. I did not like that he had to grow inside of me, I wanted a baby, not a pregnancy! I was super impatient and extremely crabby the last week. I was so happy that he came a week early. I felt like he listened to me and said, "OK mom, I guess I can get born now if it will make you feel better."
I'm still happy to not be pregnant. So happy. My uterus is off limits for two years. I want two years of having my body back. And because I so badly felt like I didn't have my body during pregnancy, I now feel this intense connection to my body. I've never loved my body more. I feel so in control of it now. My shoes fit again and my waist is slowly shrinking. I feel like it took the pregnancy to make me appreciate this body. For nine months I had to give up control of my body over to this alien growing inside of me. Pregnancy effects everything, they don't tell you that, it changes EVERYTHING in your body. But you get it back, slightly changed, slightly deformed, but you get it back. Except not your boobs, your boobs still belong to the alien, but you learn to love giving them to him.
Saturday, July 16, 2011
The First Six Weeks
My baby boy is 6 weeks and 5 days old today. What a roller coaster it has been. I must say that I don't think anything can prepare you for being a new mother.
First of all you get this primal, overwhelming love for your baby. A love that is so intense it hurts and you are constantly worried that something is going to happen to him. It was hard to have him out of my sight for the first three weeks or so. I remember sitting on my porch with him and watching cars drive by and I thought they were going to hit him, I was sure that people were going much too fast.
On one of the hot days in June, when he was only a week old and we were headed to his one week appointment, I got this vision of a baby in a hot car and started crying and made Brent promise me we would never leave him in a hot car. I was so sure that one of us would forget him. It was hard to leave the house with all this worry, not to mention, no one exactly tells you what you need to bring in a diaper bag, and at first you either forget vital things or bring too much. And infant slings and other carriers are hard to deal with at first, especially when your body is still recovering from birth. And some days it's too hot to use any of them. It took about a month to really feel comfortable taking him out places.
Plus you have hot flashes and your emotions go from being overjoyed to feeling downright suicidal. There were many instances where I cried to Brent that I couldn't do it, "I can't raise a baby, it's too much responsibility!" And I'm a person who is very hard on herself for being depressed, I can't just be depressed, I have to feel like a loser and a failure for getting depressed, "how dare I get depressed, what is wrong with me?" So I've been working on first accepting that I'm depressed sometimes.
But it's not just depression, it's anxiety. I wanted everything to be perfect and was pretty much unable to make any decisions for the first few weeks. I remember Brent asking me what I wanted for breakfast and I told him, "I can't decide, just bring me something!" Any decision meant I was not choosing other things that might possibly be better, so I was stuck. I let Brent lead the way for a while. I'm better at making decisions now.
Also, people act so excited that you are going to have a baby, but then never call you after you have it. I got various emails and texts from people saying they wanted to stop by, then I would tell them that they could, just call me before to make sure we're up, and pretty much no one actually called. There are family members who haven't been over to see him yet, and friends who acted very excited who I haven't heard from at all. It really brings you down, I was expecting way more visitors, we've had very few. This led me to cry to Brent, "am I a freak? Does no one actually like me? Do I have no friends?" Even trying to reach out to others who have recently had babies has been turning up dry so far, though I have hope that someone will want to do SOMETHING with me at some point.
Newborns are boring. I was not a person who bonded well with her baby while it was in utero. The ultrasounds were kind of cool, but I just didn't feel much for my baby before it was born, I wanted it, and was glad I was going to have a baby, but I didn't feel connected to him while I was pregnant. After his birth he would wake up to eat and poop and then fall back to sleep for several hours, that's it. Repeat for many days. Then when he was about a month old he started to have longer awake periods where we could actually play a little and then around 5 weeks he smiled at me for the first time. Having your baby smile at you when he's looking at you after weeks of nothing is amazing, and last night he smiled at Brent for the first time. Our baby has these huge, full mouth, full face smiles too that just melt your heart. He also seems to really love the pattern on the blanket on the couch and the pictures hanging above the couch. He's slowly becoming a person, and I think he looks a lot like me right now.
I'm lucky that breastfeeding went pretty well for me, besides the over-active let down (milk frickin' SPRAYS out of me!), which was kind of scary for a couple weeks when our baby was choking on it, I've had no problem with supply or latching, and my nipples toughened up in about 5 days. Baby gained weight rapidly and when I started pumping, I had no trouble with it. Introducing the bottle took a little while, but he takes it pretty well from Brent right now. We gave him a pacifier at two weeks, which is super early, because he really just wanted to suck on something. Since he was gaining weight the lactation consultants OKed it. I was also a baby that liked to suck a lot.
Sleep has also gone well, we lucked out with our baby, it took about a month, but he seems to know when it's night now and I can lay him next to me, sometimes swaddled a bit, and he will eventually give in and go to sleep too. Last night he was swaddled, but his arms were out and he sucked on a pacifier while laying in the co-sleeper, because mom and dad wanted to cuddle without baby and baby seemed happy, and he just fell asleep just like that. He amused himself with his arms a bit and then fell asleep. Though after his first night time feeding probably around 2 am, I kept him in bed next to me. Feedings are kind of on a regular schedule now at night, one at about 10 pm, one around 2 am, and one around 6:30 am. Then he'll wake up again at 8 or 9 am, and I generally get up then. He takes several naps during the day and feeds every hour at some points during the day.
He still rarely cries. The only time he really cried significantly was when he was choking on my over-active let down. That pissed him off. It was hard to comfort him through that because he was hungry but it was painful to eat.
So that's a kind of rushed overview of the first six weeks of being a mother.
First of all you get this primal, overwhelming love for your baby. A love that is so intense it hurts and you are constantly worried that something is going to happen to him. It was hard to have him out of my sight for the first three weeks or so. I remember sitting on my porch with him and watching cars drive by and I thought they were going to hit him, I was sure that people were going much too fast.
On one of the hot days in June, when he was only a week old and we were headed to his one week appointment, I got this vision of a baby in a hot car and started crying and made Brent promise me we would never leave him in a hot car. I was so sure that one of us would forget him. It was hard to leave the house with all this worry, not to mention, no one exactly tells you what you need to bring in a diaper bag, and at first you either forget vital things or bring too much. And infant slings and other carriers are hard to deal with at first, especially when your body is still recovering from birth. And some days it's too hot to use any of them. It took about a month to really feel comfortable taking him out places.
Plus you have hot flashes and your emotions go from being overjoyed to feeling downright suicidal. There were many instances where I cried to Brent that I couldn't do it, "I can't raise a baby, it's too much responsibility!" And I'm a person who is very hard on herself for being depressed, I can't just be depressed, I have to feel like a loser and a failure for getting depressed, "how dare I get depressed, what is wrong with me?" So I've been working on first accepting that I'm depressed sometimes.
But it's not just depression, it's anxiety. I wanted everything to be perfect and was pretty much unable to make any decisions for the first few weeks. I remember Brent asking me what I wanted for breakfast and I told him, "I can't decide, just bring me something!" Any decision meant I was not choosing other things that might possibly be better, so I was stuck. I let Brent lead the way for a while. I'm better at making decisions now.
Also, people act so excited that you are going to have a baby, but then never call you after you have it. I got various emails and texts from people saying they wanted to stop by, then I would tell them that they could, just call me before to make sure we're up, and pretty much no one actually called. There are family members who haven't been over to see him yet, and friends who acted very excited who I haven't heard from at all. It really brings you down, I was expecting way more visitors, we've had very few. This led me to cry to Brent, "am I a freak? Does no one actually like me? Do I have no friends?" Even trying to reach out to others who have recently had babies has been turning up dry so far, though I have hope that someone will want to do SOMETHING with me at some point.
Newborns are boring. I was not a person who bonded well with her baby while it was in utero. The ultrasounds were kind of cool, but I just didn't feel much for my baby before it was born, I wanted it, and was glad I was going to have a baby, but I didn't feel connected to him while I was pregnant. After his birth he would wake up to eat and poop and then fall back to sleep for several hours, that's it. Repeat for many days. Then when he was about a month old he started to have longer awake periods where we could actually play a little and then around 5 weeks he smiled at me for the first time. Having your baby smile at you when he's looking at you after weeks of nothing is amazing, and last night he smiled at Brent for the first time. Our baby has these huge, full mouth, full face smiles too that just melt your heart. He also seems to really love the pattern on the blanket on the couch and the pictures hanging above the couch. He's slowly becoming a person, and I think he looks a lot like me right now.
I'm lucky that breastfeeding went pretty well for me, besides the over-active let down (milk frickin' SPRAYS out of me!), which was kind of scary for a couple weeks when our baby was choking on it, I've had no problem with supply or latching, and my nipples toughened up in about 5 days. Baby gained weight rapidly and when I started pumping, I had no trouble with it. Introducing the bottle took a little while, but he takes it pretty well from Brent right now. We gave him a pacifier at two weeks, which is super early, because he really just wanted to suck on something. Since he was gaining weight the lactation consultants OKed it. I was also a baby that liked to suck a lot.
Sleep has also gone well, we lucked out with our baby, it took about a month, but he seems to know when it's night now and I can lay him next to me, sometimes swaddled a bit, and he will eventually give in and go to sleep too. Last night he was swaddled, but his arms were out and he sucked on a pacifier while laying in the co-sleeper, because mom and dad wanted to cuddle without baby and baby seemed happy, and he just fell asleep just like that. He amused himself with his arms a bit and then fell asleep. Though after his first night time feeding probably around 2 am, I kept him in bed next to me. Feedings are kind of on a regular schedule now at night, one at about 10 pm, one around 2 am, and one around 6:30 am. Then he'll wake up again at 8 or 9 am, and I generally get up then. He takes several naps during the day and feeds every hour at some points during the day.
He still rarely cries. The only time he really cried significantly was when he was choking on my over-active let down. That pissed him off. It was hard to comfort him through that because he was hungry but it was painful to eat.
So that's a kind of rushed overview of the first six weeks of being a mother.
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