Brody is 5 weeks old

I posted yesterday about Brody's adventures at 1 month old, so there isn't too much to add with this post. Instead I'll just show off pictures of my adorable little boy (not that I am biased or anything)

Venti please!

I've found the secret to success in surviving the first couple months of mommyhood: Venti White Chocolate Mocha. Ahh, the days I make a trip through my favortie drive-thru I feel on top of the world!

Of course after the caffeine high and no nap, I'm ready to crash by 8pm.

Brody's 1 month "birthday" & 1 month doctor appt

Brody turned one month over the weekend, and I didn't do a good job blogging about it, so I am going to combine it with a post about his 1 month pediatrician appointment.

I can't believe he's 1 month already. He's growing extremely fast (already more than 10lbs) and changing everyday. He's a lot more alert and awake more often. We play together everyday usually just by playing on his playmat, talking to him and making funny faces. He's still taking in the world around him so he's always looking around facinated with everything. He loves bright lights and will often stare out a window or up at the ceiling lights. He's growing out of some of his 0-3 month clothes (Gerber brand sizes run very small) and is already into size 1 diapers. Below is a picture of J holding him up to his growth chart which starts at 2 feet. He's not quite there yet, but getting close!

Today was Brody's one month check-up. He's now 10lbs 1oz and 23inches long! He's in the 90th percentile for his length and 50th percentile for his weight. So if it's any indicator of what's to come, he'll be a tall guy. While the nurse was measuring him, she kept mentioning how alert and active he was. He was so well behaved and just kept looking around and observing everything.

The doctor examined him and said everything looked good. We talked through the many questions I had so I left feeling great about his health.

First, we talked about the blood in his diaper. It lingered for a couple days after his appointment last week but appears to be gone. Since I'm now planning to start formula feeding more frequently, we talked about whether or not I should stick with the soy version that we started last week. He said that we should stick with the same formula for at least a month and make sure that the blood doesn't reappear. Then down the road if we want to try a milk-based formula again, we'll talk about it.

The other big item I was worried about is his fussiness after he eats. I am not sure if it is typical gassiness or if he has something else wrong (reflux can occur in babies). He said though it could be reflux, before he prescribes medicine he thinks we should give it some time and see if it gets better. He said that as his muscles become stronger it may just resolve itself. He recommended gas drops and to just call if it gets worse.

Also, since he seems to have trouble falling asleep at night when we lay him flat on his back, I asked about a sleep positioner which will prop him up a bit on an incline. Our doc said to definitely go ahead and use one if it works. He used one with his daughter and loved it. So maybe that will help get Brody back to sleep better at night.

Then Brody needed to get his second round of the hepatitis B shot. He handled it like a pro! The nurse gave him the shot and he didn't even flinch. Then after she was done, all of a sudden he got this look on his face like, "what the heck just happened?!?" and cried for about 10 seconds. Then he was calm and happy again. Let's hope he handles the 2 month shots just as well!

Breastfeeding woes

This blog is meant to be about Brody and the path to his arrival. However, since he's eats 8-12 times a day, breastfeeding has been consuming both his life and mine for the last 4 weeks. It's been a very difficult road for us and therefore seems fitting to write about it here.

Today, you'll hear from nurses, doctors, birthing class teachers and almost any book you read : Breastfeeding is the best for babies. There are a ton of benefits from breastfeeding and obviously I want to give my son the best start in life. So from the beginning I expected to breastfeed for at least 6 months.

However, for something that is supposed to be so natural (formula wasn't always around), it doesn't come naturally to everyone. For a variety of reasons, it was very difficult for me to breastfeed. Not only was it painful, but it became both physically and emotionally draining for me. To be completely honest, there were a couple nights where I cried while holding him due to the stress. (As a bit of background, I've never done well on lack of sleep - tears come easy when I'm sleep deprived)

Since Brody wasn't gaining weight as quickly as they wanted, I continued to breastfeed until he was back to his birthweight. At 3 weeks I decided to switch to exclusively pumping. I no longer nurse, but I feed Brody pumped breast milk in a bottle instead. He's still getting the benefit of breastmilk and I get to keep my sanity. There haven't been any tears since. Plus in the first week of pumping, he gained almost a pound. Obviously we're doing something right!

However, exclusively pumping isn't a picnic either. Not only do I spend 20 minutes feeding Brody a bottle, then I spend another 20 minutes or so pumping. Plus he's eating more than I can pump for him, so we are giving him one bottle of formula once a day.

I'm honestly not sure how long I can keep up the pumping schedule, but I'm taking it a day at a time. Even if "breast is best," I do believe that formula is not poison and I know a ton of smart, healthy adults that were fed formula as a baby. So stay tuned...

Brody is 4 weeks

Brody is 4 weeks old today! He's growing fast and as of yesterday is almost 1lb bigger than his birth weight. Since he lost weight after birth, the 12oz weight gain happened in only 8 days. He's definitely growing fast.

This week Brody has become more alert and started getting into a bit more of a night/day routine. He's still unpredictable, but that should be expected. Some nights he will go 4-5 hours between feedings, giving mommy a bit more sleep.

We also bought him a playmat this week and he's been getting in some good tummy time to strengthen his neck muscles. He seems to like the brightly colored toys and the mirror. His eyesight is developing as well and he can follow objects in front of him. He will turn his head or his eyes to follow one of us as we walk back and forth. He's also making a lot more eye contact, which is adorable!

Brody's first unscheduled doctor appointment

As a new mom, I've already called the pediatrician a few times in Brody's short 4 weeks of life. However, my concerns this week resulted in a trip to the doctor to get him checked out. Best part of the visit is that we learned that he's now up to 9lbs 10oz!! He's definitely gaining a good amount of weight.

(You can stop reading now if you're not interested in hearing about baby poop)

Over the weekend I noticed a couple of Brody's diapers had blood in them. Now of course this worried me a bit. But I decided to at least wait until he had another bloody diaper on Monday to call the doc. When he didn't poop all day Monday, I decided to call anyway (he normally poops 5-6 times a day). They told me that it probably wasn't anything to worry too much about and just call back if he has another one. Well when he finally pooped again, there was a tiny bit of red in it, so I decided to call back. The nurse told me to come in on Tuesday. I had done some research (courtesy of google) and found that blood in his stools can be a sign of a dairy protein allergy.

A dairy allergy has been something I've been worried about, since I was allergic to milk protein as a baby. We gave Brody formula a couple times over the weekend (a story for another day, but the formula was because I haven't been keeping up with Brody's demand with pumped breast milk). Both breastfed babies and formula fed babies can have milk protein allergies, but since non-fat milk is the first ingredient in formula, I was worried that it was causing him problems.

So today we went in to see our really great pediatrician. He looked Brody over and showed us some small tears on his butt that was probably causing the blood. He did say that another reason there could be blood is a dairy protein allergy, but it likely wasn't the cause in his case. Even though he doesn't think that Brody has an allergy, he gave us a sample of soy formula so that when we do supplement, we can use soy instead of milk based formula.

We have his one month appointment next week, so we'll check on his progress then. If the blood doesn't get worse, it's likely just the tears and not an allergy.

Things I never thought I'd say or do until I became a Mom

I know this list will continue to expand as Brody grows older, but here's what I've found myself doing/saying so far:

-I never realized how much I'd miss taking a shower regularly (and taking one longer than 3 minutes)
-I've never been so excited to have time to clean the house
-I never thought I'd wake a sleeping baby
-I never thought I'd be able to survive on only 2 hours of consecutive sleep at a time for 2 1/2 weeks straight
-I never thought that the most frequent topic of conversation in our house would be breastfeeding
-I never realized I could fall even more in love with my husband

Brody is 3 weeks today!

Another week has flown by. Brody's biggest acheivement this week was gaining back his birth weight. As of Monday he was back up to 8lbs 14oz. The best part about this milestone is that the pediatrician said we can stop waking him every 2-3 hours to eat. Now we let him tell us when he's hungry. So far, he's slept for 4-5 hours in a row Monday & Tuesday nights! I'm not expecting this trend to continue, but the extra sleep has been nice!

He is still too young to really have a routine but he seems to have developed a pattern. Every other day he's awake and fussy most of the day. The days in between, he sleeps like crazy. Yesterday was a fussy day and so far today he's been pretty sleepy.

Other adventures this week included going out to dinner twice and going to the mall again. We also had some visitors over the weekend, where Brody met his Aunt Karen & Uncle Chris (Karen is one of my best friends & her husband Chris). He also was fed for the first time by someone other than Jason or me. J's best friend Todd fed him a bottle, which was also his first time feeding a baby. It was adorable.

The many faces of Brody

Brody has the best facial expressions. We're constantly laughing at how cute he looks. Here are a few that I've been able to capture on film.

Brody's "First Word"

Jason and I are convinced that Brody has already spoken his first word: "ow."

Every once in awhile after Brody sneezes, he makes this adorable noise that sounds like "ow." It's really cute and the first time we heard it we both swore that is what he was saying.

Last night we had our first non-biased witnesses to this behavior. They agreed with us that is what is sounded like. So I'm officially convinced, at less than 3 weeks old, our genius baby is already talking!

Dinner out with a newborn

Our goal for Jason's last week at home was to try to get out of the house a bit each day. Since it was my sister Nicole's birthday on Monday, two of our outings were to celebrate her birthday. One of which required taking Brody out to dinner, by myself.

After spending most of the weeknights feeding Brody for a couple hours straight, by Thursday, I wasn't sure it would be feasible to take him out to dinner. Thursday is Jason's bowling night, so if I was going to go out, I would have to take him myself. Armed with a bottle of pumped milk in a cooler and a diaper bag stuffed with all the newborn necessities, I headed out.

The end result? A baby that slept the entire time! He barely opened his eyes the entire time we were at the restaurant. Taking a baby out to dinner by myself? Piece of cake!

Jason also wanted to take him out one night, so we decided to give it a try again Friday night. He was being a bit fussy before we left, so we figured we'd probably have to make dinner short, but wanted to give it a try anyway. We chose a family friendly restaurant close to home and set out armed with the same items as the night before.

The end result? A baby that slept the entire time! I'm now convinced that the combination of the car ride, the comfort of his carseat and the noise of the restaurant puts him to sleep.

It's still early in his life and he may become more difficult to take out, but so far so good!

Brody is 2 weeks today

It's hard to believe but Brody is two weeks old already. The last two weeks have flown by and I can hardly believe how quickly he will grow up on me. He's already changed so much from the day we brought him home.

He's doing very well and at his check-up today his weight is up to 8lbs 9.5oz and he's 22.5 inches long. Babies lose weight after their born and ideally will get back their birth weight by two weeks. As you can see, he's not quite back to his 8lb 14oz birth weight, but he's heading in the right direction. He's eating like crazy and I think he'll get his weight up in no time.

We haven't set into a routine schedule yet, but the days fly by between feeding every 2 hours and trying to get a nap in every afternoon. We're now trying to get out of the house once a day, even for a short period. We went to the mall and walked Brody around for awhile on Monday. He really likes his stroller and car rides/walks put him to sleep.

Jason is still off of work and it's fantastic having someone around to help out. Right now Brody is sleeping on his Daddy's chest while I blog. Starting next week I'll definitely have my work cut out for me and will work on my one handed typing!

Welcoming Brody into the world

Brody Daniel arrived January 20th at 4:34pm! Here is his birth story if you're interested. I'll keep the gory details to a minimum.

Tuesday the 19th of January I woke up about 3am with painful cramping. It was enough to wake me up from a dead sleep. I sat there for about a minute thinking that this has got to be a contraction. Sure enough, after about a minute it was gone. Then about 30 minutes later, same thing, which continued about every hour until I was up for the day. They were so far apart I knew that nothing was happening anytime soon.

I continued on with my second day off of work by having breakfast with my dad, lunch & shopping with my sister and dinner for my Nana's birthday. Starting with breakfast my contractions became about 10 minutes apart. They never got closer together and I was always able to talk through the pain. By the time we got home from dinner (around 9pm) they were becoming a little more painful. By bedtime I had a feeling that labor was progressing as I started timing the contractions. They were now getting more like 8 minutes apart. Jason couldn't sleep (like a little kid on Christmas eve), so we just stayed in bed timing the contractions and I tried to rest while I could.

About 12:30am Wednesday my contractions were 5 minutes apart, lasting 1 minute each and had been for an hour. This was the magic sign to call the doctor. I called my OB and he told me to head into labor & delivery. As we started getting ready to go to the hospital, my contractions were getting closer to 3-4 minutes apart. I wasn't worried, but Jason started to get a little more nervous. I believe all husbands have a fear that you'll go into labor at home no matter how many times you tell them that this process takes time.

We arrived at the hospital about 1:30am. I had now been having contractions for about 22 hours but at my appointment Monday night, I was only 0 cm dilated. So I was curious what these contractions had done to my progress. The nurse got us settled in and then did an exam. She then informs me that I wasn't dilated, at all!! Are you kidding me?!? I had a few moments of feeling like I was making it up. I was then hooked up to the machines which showed that yes, I was having regular contractions now only 3 minutes apart. At least I knew I wasn't making that up!

The nurse and my OB believed that I may just be dehydrated and that the contractions would go away. They decided to keep me until about 5am and see if I progress on my own. I was also to drink tons of water & juice to try to get hydrated. I knew that I had been drinking tons of water all day, so I didn't really believe that hydration was the issue, but to make sure, I went through over 64oz of water and 32oz of apple juice.

The nurse came back around 5:30 and did another exam to find out that I was 1cm dilated. I had progressed (however slight) on my own!! So they decided to keep me and augment my progress with pitocin. Basically, they didn't have to induce my labor but the pitocin would speed up the dilation.

At this point, I was having a really hard time with the pain. The contractions were still 3 minutes apart which didn't allow for much rest in between. I tried walking around the room and breathing through them but nothing was helping the pain. I never intended to go through labor naturally, but I also didn't want to start an epidural too early in the day. The nurse offered some pain medication instead. I decided to take it. It didn't take away the feeling of the contractions, it just took away the edge.

They also suggested I eat a light breakfast since I would likely be in for a long stretch. I had a bowl of Special K and a piece of toast. Shortly afterwards, I saw my entire breakfast in reverse. Not sure if it was the food or the pain meds, but I recommend not eating while in labor. I continued to get sick several times for the next few hours until they finally gave me anti-nausea medicine. This was the worst part of my labor.

12:30pm I had them do the epidural. This was the best decision I could have made. The pain meds had worn off a few hours earlier and I didn't take more for fear of getting sick again. The anesthesiologist was fantastic. He kept the atmosphere in the room light and talked me through what he was doing. He also let me keep my tank-top on underneath my gown, which made me more comfortable. As soon as the nurse found out Jason was scared of needles, she sent him to the other side of the room to look out the window. But she did a great job keeping me distracted.

I felt very little pain when he did the local anesthetic and no pain as he used the bigger needle (which thankfully I never saw!)

From 12:30 until 4pm I was blissfully relaxed. I just layed in bed, Jason napped, we watched TV, went on facebook and just relaxed. In the meantime, I was having contractions every minute. If I hadn't had the epidural, it would have been a much more stressful, painful afternoon.

The OB came in around 4:00 to see my progress. At this point, we were all still expecting me to be in labor until probably after dinnertime. However, as soon as he started the exam he stated, "wow! you're ready to push!" I was at +2 station which meant that Brody was right there and ready to come out.

From 4:00-4:30 with the help of a nurse, my OB and my wonderful husband, I worked on pushing Brody out. Many first time moms will push for several hours, so it was very lucky that it only took me 30 minutes. When Brody was born there were several comments about how big he was. But he was adorable and I was immediately in love.

They put him directly on my chest as soon as he was out. Jason cut the umbilical cord and they wiped him clean while laying on top of me. He came out screaming and didn't stop until he was clean and warm. He has quite the lungs!

He was 8lbs 14oz and 21.5 inches long with an adorable head full of hair. We're officially a family of three!

40 Week Dr Appointment

It was the appointment I hoped I'd never have to go to. 3 days past my due date, I had both a non-stress test (NST) & regular OB appointment.

NST
They set me up in a chair, hooked up two monitors to my belly and gave me juice to keep the baby moving. One monitor was to measure his heartbeat and the other was to measure contractions.

The goal was to measure his heartbeat during movement. If his heartbeat increases during movement, it is a good sign. Within a minute he was already moving and his heartbeat spiked accordingly. Within the first 10 minutes his heartrate spiked appropriately 3 or 4 times. They kept me on the machine for another 20 minutes but he ended up sleeping by the end of it.

The second monitor that measures contractions? It recorded a flat line...my uterus is doing nothing.

Appointment
Weight: down a pound, yay!
Blood Pressure: 120/70
Heartbeat: 150 range
Fundal Height: 40 (he hasn't stopped growing!)
Labor Progress: NONE!!
Next Appointment: Thursday for another NST and to check for any progress

Next we discussed induction. He said we could go ahead & schedule for 10 days past my due date (next Monday) or we could wait until after my appointment on Thursday. My appointment on Thursday is currently scheduled with another OB because mine is not in the office. So I opted to just schedule it right away today since I wouldn't be seeing him on Thursday.

Induction: Scheduled to start Sunday the 24th. They will start by trying to dialate me overnight & then start pitocin (to stimulate contactions) on Monday morning. If all goes well, Brody will be born on January 25th.

I'm still holding out hope that Brody will come before Monday. Inductions are not always the easiest and often can lead to C-Sections. I've heard about many successful inductions and many that didn't go very well. Ideally, i'd like my body to do what it needs to do on it's own.

However, based on my progress so far, I am not holding my breath. And at the very least, I know I will only be pregnant for one more week.

40 Weeks

It's officially my due date. That wonderful date that everyone asks about for 9 months. The day is finally here, but my child is not. So here is my weekly recap. Hopefully it will be my last!


Weekly Checklist
How far along? 40 Weeks
Total weight gain/loss: 38ish lbs (at this point I really couldn't care less)
Maternity Clothes: When I actually get out of my pjs...I still have some maternity clothes that fit.
Sleep: Every other night.
Food Cravings: Nothing in particular, but I haven't been eating well at all. My theory is that I'll be in weight loss mode after Brody is here, so I might as well splurge now. (I know it's not healthy...but tell that to a 40 week hormonal pregnant woman.
What I am looking forward to: I doubt I even need to answer this. I want to meet my baby!!
Weekly wisdom: Next time I am pregnant, I'm going to ask my doctor to lie to me. Tell me my due date is at least one week later than it really is. Then I'm going to remind myself for 9 months, that a baby comes when it's ready to matter how many old wives tales you try to induce. So sit patiently and wait for him. We'll see if that really works with the next one.
Milestones: Reaching my due date. Also, working my last day until April. I will be taking vacation until my maternity leave kicks in when Brody is born. Hopefully he comes sooner than later, so I can save some of that vacation to spend with him!