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Tuesday 31 March 2015

Baby L is 13 weeks.

Time is flying so quickly in the land of little baby L. He is 13 weeks and going through so many developmental changes. He laughs now (more for his daddy than me) and is able to grab toys sometimes. Still no sign of rolling. I am glad about this. We were still swaddling him because his startle reflex wakes him up but the second he starts rolling, no more swaddle. Actually we unswaddled him last night. There is a story on my Babycenter birth board about a baby that was swaddled and rolled for the first time in her sleep. It does not have a happy ending. Baby L did wake up every 2 hours last night but really it was not that bad. He always wakes up anyway, so one extra wake up was fine and he fell asleep again in a few minutes. So maybe we will survive the unswaddling.

He has lost so many of his adorable baby reflexes now. I miss his rooting reflex so much. It was the cutest thing. Also it told us when he was hungry. I have no freaking clue when this baby is hungry now. It is driving me insane. It is not a good idea to wait until he cries from hunger because then he gets too upset to eat. Ugh. We used to call his rooting "rhinoing" because he did these adorable little headbutts. I remember having him on my chest and his little face would start headbutting my cheek and giving me these wet little kisses. Oh man I miss that so much. Now he hates being on my chest. He would also randomly latch onto any body part. He latched onto my cheek once and sucked for ages. Also the lower half of my boob, nowhere near the nipple. Crazy baby.

Boob update - things are thinging. I pumped like crazy for two weeks. Power pumping every evening. In general, the milk supply in my ridiculous boob has been restored but it is not totally reliable yet. I do feed him on it now. But I kind of hate it. It is so uncomfortable. The nipple is a weird shape and he hurts it, he does not suck on it the same way as my other boob. He still twists and clamps down on it. And the boob is so small that it is hard to get into his mouth. And I have to quickly pump it to bring the milk down or else he does not manage. I honestly prefer pumping it and feeding it to him in a bottle. One problemmo - the last 2 days he has forgotten how to use the bottle!! Now he loves the boob? This same baby who used to scream and totally refuse the boob now screams and totally refuses the bottle. NIGHTMARE. I need him to take the bottle. I am feeling terrible. The bottle is more important than the boob. There will always be something to drink in the bottle, but not in my boobs. Usually he feeds at 6pm and then is ravenous again at 7.30pm so my boobs are empty and we give him a bottle. Last night we could not do that. It was awful. He woke up again at 11pm to eat and I had some milk for him then, but this is not cool. I need him full and happy. He usually sleeps til 3 am. He used to take bottle and boob at every feeding. I almost wonder if I should just give him bottles from now on as this is less problematic than him refusing a bottle. Ugh. Please take the bottle baby L!

Sidenote - this morning I pumped rather than breastfeed and fed him with a bottle and he took it like a champ. I really hope I can repeat this. As G pointed out, babies make terrible scientific experiments as nothing ever seems to be repeatable with them.

He eats every 2 hours in the day like clockwork. I find it sooo exhausting. His naps were down to 15 minutes at one point, but I realised I was keeping him awake a little too long. Now he is napping about half an hour. I never ever get anything done but at least I have a bit more rest.

I have no life. I crave exercise but feel that until the little guy stops needing to eat every 2 hours (maybe when he is on formula? I hope so) I just have to make my life about feeding the baby. Which is a battle every day, whether he is refusing boob or bottle or whatever. I never imagined feeding a baby would be so much damn hard work. It sucks. But he is fat and healthy and that is my only daily goal.

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