Nursing Drama

So far, it seems that Megan really is a bit of a sleeper. I'm not willing to totally buy it until I'm completely off codine but she is currently about a million times easier to care for than I remember Charlie being.

She tends to nurse fairly quickly and efficiently during the day for 15 minutes or so and then goes to sleep for another 3 hours. In the late evening she will cluster feed for a good hour or hour and a half but then sleeps for 4-5 hours, nurses in a highly focused manner for 10-15 minutes and then goes back down for another 3-4 hours. This might be slightly less than accurate (re:codine) but is what my muzzy brain remembers. Last night and today have been a bit different but I think we may have hit the 7 day growth spurt. This nursing pattern is a bit on the unusual side for a newborn (and is vastly different from Charlie's clockwork 45 minute session starting every hour and a half around the clock) and caused a bit of drama at the hospital where they really don't like them to go much more than 2-3 hours at the outside. Megan has strong feelings about when she would like to sleep and when she would like to eat and does not appreciate attempts to mold her to your will. But, since she was making plenty of wet and poopies and appeared quite healthy and happy the nurses didn't really push it on the whole. I also got a lot of ground from having nursed Charlie for 14 months- including through my 1st trimester. The nurses seemed to feel that this was plenty sufficient to ensure my nursing competence. The pediatricians were a different story.

We had to use the on-call practice because our family physician doesn't do hospital rounds for newborns. We also did this with Charlie and liked the doctors reasonably well and since it's only for a few days it didn't seem like a big deal. This time was different. Starting with the 1st visit, less than 12 hours after Megan was born, I started getting told to consider supplementing because Megan was such a big baby. The first pediatrician made the argument that I wouldn't ever be able to get any rest because it would be such a struggle to feed her. Instead, we should make liberal use of the night nursery and allow for supplements from the start. There were so many things wrong with this argument, I was stunned. How did she ever expect my supply to catch up if I was supplementing from the start? In addition, there were simply no indicators that there even was a problem and, while 9 2, is on the larger size, considering that one woman can nurse multiples or tandem nurse siblings, the assumption that one newborn is beyond the capacity of a woman who never even fully lost her milk from her previous nursing stint, was just dumb. I was of the impression that most new parents understood that sleep deprivation is part and parcel of new parenthood.

Things continued to go downhill as she dropped weight every day. The hospital flagged 8 6 as being the point of concern (although it isn't actually the 10% mark) and she hit 8 5 on Tuesday morning. Since this was also the day of discharge, the pediatrician (a different one) decided that he needed to be as dour as possible, telling tales of readmission and droopy, dehydrated babies needing IVs. The dreaded supplements were brought up again (for the 3rd time). The thing is that while 8 5 was a fairly steep drop, it didn't appear that the pediatrician actually looked at any other health indicators. Megan routinely nursed to the point of falling off the nipple, falling asleep contentedly or having a brief and happy awake period. She showed no signs of the fussy or listless behavior that come with an infant who isn't getting enough milk. I showed signs that my milk was coming in that morning. Her poop was rapidly shifting from merconium. There were plenty of wet diapers. She showed no signs of jaundice and her blood sugar (checked several times of the first 36 hours as a matter of course for babies over 9 pounds) was wonderfully stable. The daily visits from the lactation consultants were brief and positive. As far as I can tell, the only thing the pedi looked at was weight. He didn't even bother to ask me about how nursing was going, my milk coming in, etc. He said he would send in the lactation consultant to talk to me about supplementing, helpfully adding that she didn't need to go directly to the bottle, instead we could look at finger feeding and cups. This still didn't really fix the issue of the best way to increase supply being to nurse more and, as she was apparently starving before my eyes, she should be more than happy to nurse, right? Of course, every time I had tried to increase her nursing frequency, I was met by hours of frustration and tears on both our parts but I figured we could work around that somehow.

After he left I just started sobbing (no mean feat for a woman who just had abdominal surgery). As far as I could tell my baby was happy and healthy with just my milk and supplementing was the last thing I wanted. I was already quite disappointed about not being able to deliver vaginally (more to come later but I'm not ready to "talk" about it yet). The idea that my body would fail again was quite upsetting. Particularly as I just didn't see it. Luckily, the lactation consultant was able to observe a nursing session right after she came in and agreed with me that Megan seemed completely fine and that my milk was already starting to come in. I was encourage to simply continue on the current course, go to our doctor for a weight check the next day and was told to write plenty on the evaluation form I was given that would go to the nursing supervisor. We took Megan to our doctor on Wednesday and she was actually down a few more ounces but our regular doctor wasn't at all concerned. Megan continued to look healthy and happy and her weight was far from being at a concerning level. She said we could bring Megan back early this week for another weight check if we wanted but she felt the 2 week appointment would be plenty soon enough for her.

I don't know why she wound up dropping so much weight. I have a few theories. She got rid of almost all of her merconium on the first day which had to account for a least a couple of ounces. I had a good hunk of water weight gain in the last week or so of my pregnancy and she may have gained with that as well. On a less logical note, I wonder if there was a reason that she did wind up so very unexpectedly big so that I would need a c-section. God does work in mysterious ways and all indicators flatly contradicted my growing a 9 pound baby. I am so beyond thankful that I somehow managed to have a relatively easy recovery that allowed me the option to go home on Tuesday. I shudder to think what would have happened if Megan had stayed in the care of those pediatricians another day, knowing she went down a few more ounces. I am also so thankful that I had a strong confidence in my ability to breastfeed as well as plenty of factual knowledge to back up my instincts. I really worry about the poor, first time mother who would be in a similar situation. The advice I was given would set her up for failure and oodles of unnecessary stress. I'm somewhat hopeful that the lactation consultants are now aware of an unfortunate tendency by this practice and will act to alleviate it's effects.

Megan!

Megan Mac... arrived at 2:51 am on Sunday, May 18th. She weighed 9 pounds 2 ounces and was 20.5 inches long. Labor was very, very long with many unexpected difficulties. I finally wound up with a c-section under full anesthesia (courtesy of my epidural's hot spots). More to come later. Mommy and baby are both doing well but are both very, very tired.

So Sweet

We have a Roomba. It is a shining point of light in my life and a wonderful Mother's Day gift. Ask for one now.

Anyway, Charlie calls it the "uh-oh" because it bumps into things as it wanders about. I ran it in the kitchen last night and it finished up as he was taking a bath. He had been very concerned about it getting put away and had to be repeatedly reassured by his father that Mama would put the uh-oh away (which I did, right before his stories). My husband reported that the last thing Charlie said before drifting off to sleep was "Mama, oh-oh away," followed by a very content "Ya." It's good to know that I can bring some comforting order to his life even if I am the less favored (boring) parent at the moment.

Laughing

I am reasonably certain that my hospital bag started laughing at me this morning. It has sat, faithfully in the corner, for the last 2 weeks and is apparently getting bored...

In other news, Charlie is proving the world correct in their assertions that bad sleepers are gifted. His special gift lies in the world of teething. He seems to have already started like gangbusters on his 2 year molars 4 months early. I feel so blessed.

Charlie is also showing some really nice language development which is beyond cute. As of late, he will make various statements (such as "bye-bye pee-pee") for a good 10 minutes or so and the appropriate conversational response (obviously!) is to repeat his statement back to him so he can be sure you've properly deciphered it. If you get it right, you are rewarded by an emphatic "Ya." Apparently, my long buried Nordic ancestry is surfacing in my 19 month old. We've also started being treated with 4 word phrases, although the syntax is always an adventure- "Woo Woo don't touch eyes" ("don't touch the puppies eyes"). And, he's started to recount events that happened earlier in the day without me around. The other day he told me about how they blew bubbles in the nursery- mind, there is a lot of linguistic interpretation to figure out that "Ducksi, pop boo, boat" means Lexi blew bubbles that I could pop and I played with the boat but it does make my child development heart proud. And finally, Charlie's new favorite game with his father (who seems to focus a lot more on adverbs and counting than I do) is to claim he has 2 noses just to get his father to say "No, you have 1 nose." This is greeted with the ubiquitous emphatic "ya" and a big grin.

My husband and I think we may have figured out what the future holds for Charlie. We are reasonably sure he has a place waiting for him in the Mob. His favorite activities persist in being moving large objects and throwing things away. He's also a very social fellow so, of course, the obvious choice for someone with interests in moving services and refuse collection is the Mob. Now we just have to work on his actually liking pasta.

Ok, now that my 2 readers are bored beyond relief, I'm off to gestate.

Watched Pot

I am officially in the watched pot stage of pregnancy. There was a run to Labor and Delivery in which we found out that my cervix is still totally closed but is at least thinning and they even managed to register 1 contraction before it all came to a crashing halt with the internal exam. Apparently, your flight or fight response tends to kick in and you body feels that anywhere that involves people with cold hands and cold gel is really not the spot to have a baby. I felt fabulous yesterday and there was some activity of interest very early this morning and things looked somewhat hopeful but it all stopped by nap time. The thing that is really making it all much more difficult is the Charlie factor. I don't have the luxury of just puttering around waiting for something definitive to happen. By the time definitive things are happening, I'm in no shape to chase after a toddler. So, instead, every time my cervix hiccups, there is anxious analysis which really isn't conducive to either the relaxation the Sears family would like me to practice nor the acquisition of the "excited" stage Dr Bradley would like me to attain. I am growing so tired of having my husband (and others) inquire. I told my husband today that I would let him know, really I would. At which point, he told me he just liked to stay abreast of things. While I sympathise, I have to say that I think I am the one who would most like to know the when and where and I don't have a clue.

While I find it rather frustrating that Charlie came so unexpectedly early and this baby, while by no means late, is later than I would like, it really is working out fairly well. She apparently settled in the other day (I'm assuming this was why I had all those contractions and what not that send me to L and D) and I'm much more comfortable that I had been. The OB assured me that negative progress was usually not seen as my 1st assumption was that she had discovered how difficult getting out would be and decided to just un-drop and hang out for a while. It sort of nice to actually have time to finish up the projects that I had given up on. My husband is in the final sprint to the end of the semester and, while he's having to be home a bit more than optimal (there is only so much toddler wrangling you can do at 37 weeks), he's certainly getting more time at work than he would be getting otherwise. And, if she holds out for about another week, most of his major responsibilities will be over- not say he doesn't do any work over the summer but the really time sensitive stuff will be done. Also nice is all the cuddling with Charlie. The quality of my parenting has taken a steep dive over the last few weeks. Teletubbies and Sesame Street figure heavily into our routine now but this does lead to lots of snuggling on the couch, which is so sweet. Of course, there is the semi-constant dark cloud of "Good Lord, she's just getting bigger!" at this point but, eh, perhaps all this means she'll be a sleeper!

Jealousy...

First, yes, I am still gestating. I didn't get "checked" at my last appointment because I just didn't want to know- if he had said no change, I would have started sobbing and if he had said there was progress it would just get my hopes up. I have come to the conclusion that while this pregnancy was much easier overall, late pregnancy with a toddler is just bound to be unpleasant. My husband keeps being very concerned about me as he comes in and I'm in tears or moaning and groaning my way (not in a good way) through the night but I've told him that the general consensus seems to think this is par for the course. She's dropped (I'm pretty sure- the OB could feel her head at the exit so I'm thinking that's solid evidence) but I think she's started to stretch out some so the heartburn and what not is back. I asked if they ever changed their minds and went back up but the OB assured me that didn't generally happen. The plug has been wandering out in dribs and drabs for a couple of weeks now. There have been many twinges but they apparently aren't doing much productive. And, as far as I can tell (the pelvic pressure sort of makes it tricky) there has been very little in the way of contractions. It's actually better, in terms of logistics if she stays put for a bit longer but it's getting harder and harder for me to remember that.

Anyway, this brings me to my jealousy. I am so jealous of working moms right now. Admittedly, it's a select segment of working moms. I'm specifically jealous of those with office jobs involving cushioned chairs and peeing whenever they need to. I'm also jealous of those that are going ahead and starting their maternity leave a week or so early but keeping their children that were considerate enough to leave the womb in a timely manner in daycare. My husband has been wonderful. He is staying home later in the mornings and coming home early in the evenings. He is giving me more hands on support than some fathers do by a long shot but still... Today I really thought that I would throw up from the pelvic pressure if I didn't sit for just a few minutes but it was the middle of lunch and bringing in the groceries and Charlie was screaming for applesauce and the milk was out and I really had to shovel something in my mouth and I couldn't help but think of how nice it would be to let someone else have him for 6 hours a day. I very much sympathize with the plight of the working mother and it's not really something I would want to do but right this moment, nothing sounds better.

In addition, it recently occurred to me that the longest my "maternity leave" would last is 2 weeks. I spend a great deal of time being appalled at the US concept of appropriate maternity leave, especially when you pair it with the health initiative to dramatically increase breast feeding rates by 2010 but even the meanest leave is 6 weeks. I actually feel quite lucky that I will likely have my husband's help for 2 weeks and I am so glad I won't have to watch my newborn being cared for by others but there is a part of me that fervently wishes I had Charlie in day care and a maternity leave of 6 weeks coming up.

Of Corks and Coconuts

I am beginning to suspect that this baby will be here sooner rather than later and, at any rate, she is sure to be here in a little over a month. So, I've been reviewing my childbirth books. I'm hoping to go unmedicated. It's not for any particularly "crunchy" reason, I don't think I will be birthing myself as a woman or anything like that. I'm not looking for a feeling of empowerment. But, it does seem to be that you have 3 options about the pain of childbirth. You can frontload it with an unmedicated birth and while the labor and delivery process itself will be more intense you are also less likely to tear, more likely to use your muscles efficiently, and the whole thing is likely to be done faster- including the recovery afterwards. You can spread things out a bit with an epidural but you are likely to have a longer labor and may have more tearing and hemorrhoids and that sort of thing and that may cause the recovery to be somewhat longer. Finally, you can go the c-section route and the actual delivery is a breeze but, for me at least, it took a couple of weeks to really be up and about and much longer than that for my abdominal and back muscles to get back up to functional snuff. Of course, there are those poor souls with back labor, stalled labor, unmedicated for 30 hours and then a c-section labor and for you I offer up a toast and my deepest sympathies. Since I have Charlie to consider, I would really like to make this recovery as quick as possible so, I'm hoping for the unmedicated birth with the quick recovery. But, I also know I'm a bit of a wimp so, if an epidural or c-section are called for, so be it. At the end of the day, I would really like a baby. The rest is mere semantics as far as I'm concerned.

Anyway, the popular way of dealing with contractions or, as some books called them, "expansions" (I refuse to even entertain the whole "life surges" terminology) is to visualize being a cork on a wave. While I appreciate the imagery in theory, every time I read it, I wince. It makes me think of rotting corks, corks mangled by corkscrews, cork floors with strong warnings about exposure to wetness, and an ancient pair of cork sole shoes I found that were scuffed and disintegrating. In addition, corks are little and ocean waves are huge. Corks can get lost, pummeled, buffeted, and broken. Charlie could easily break a cork into bits for heavens sake! I have come to the conclusion that I would much rather be a coconut. Coconuts want to wander around on the water. They look at the intense waves and say "Bring it on! I would like to go forth and multiply! I have an entire ocean of island to colonize!" Coconuts are strong and hardy- how many of us have stared at the whole coconut at the store and been tempted to buy but didn't because, for pete's sake, how will you get the thing open? I have no wish to be a wimpy, rotting, bobbing cork, I am much more the firm, stubborn coconut, waiting for the perfect beach.