Well I did not ovulate when I said I thought I was, last entry! It was very weird because I had all my classic ovulation signs, and even the very familiar ovulation pain at the end of it all. I started taking my temperature in the mornings right away and have managed to keep that up consistently, but all my temps since then have been my typical pre-ovulation temps, so I was pretty sure I hadn't ovulated.
I have somehow got myself a bit of a horrid urine infection at the moment. I woke up with blood in my urine on Saturday and became increasingly unwell-feeling and crampy with backache during the day, so by the evening I was worried enough about my kidneys (I have a history, and resulting scar tissue in my kidneys) to phone the out-of-hours doctor, who told me to go to the urgent care clinic at the hospital right away. My kidneys turned out to be okay (they are not painful when squished by a doctor, haha!) but they put me on a 3-day course of antibiotics. The doctor asked me when my last period was, and then asked if there was any chance I could be pregnant - I guess they ask just as a routine thing when it comes to prescribing medicine. So I said yes, as there was a teensy chance. He asked permission to do a pregnancy test so I said yes to that as well. I knew there was next to no chance of it being positive but ohhh, it's just inbuilt isn't it, lol! I had that slight adrenaliney joyful feeling sitting there waiting for the test to cook so he could tell me the result! :) He said the pregnancy test was negative, and added, "Which I guess is no bad thing!" given that I'd just told him I am breastfeeding a 6-month-old and have 4 other young children! ;) My grandparents saw us the next day and knew about my poor bladder, so asked worriedly about what the doctor had said and what tests he had done. I mentioned that he'd done a pregnancy test which was negative, and they made a big deal of it being wonderful news, and congratulations, etc! *sigh* Hey ho! I'm lately caring less and less what anyone else thinks, which is healthy and MUCH less stressful! :) Neil says if we have another baby, we are NOT telling my family until like the WEEK before the baby is born, hehe! They're not terribly bad about it, just not that happy at first, and we could do without that I guess.
Anyway, so the test was negative, of course. At the end when I was about to leave with the prescription, I hesitated and said, "And the pregnancy test was definitely negative, right?" Hehe! He gave me an amused smile and walked over to check it again, and held it up, saying, "Just one line!" I just said, "Right. Okay. Just checking!" :) Neil had been asking (pestering!) me to take a pregnancy test in the couple of days beforehand, because he thought I was giving off "pregnant vibes" - I was more irritable and moody in a hormonal way (apparently!), and felt a bit queasy and gaggy at things easily. I was crampy as well. I wonder now if that was just early signs of this UTI? Probably, as those are common symptoms (well, not the moodiness!).
So I am still waiting to ovulate. I think I am somewhere in the 30s in terms of my Cycle Day now. I have lately been having some EWCM again and so I think my body is gearing up for another "go" at ovulating. That seems to be common for me postpartum - I sometimes have a longer cycle where the first run-up to ovulation is fruitless, and then a bit later my body tries again and usually succeeds. Once it was 3 tries though, I think, before ovulation did occur - a VERY long cycle that time! Anyway, it's nice to be temping again, because I can know what my cycle is doing without wondering (and getting pestered to take pregnancy tests when I know I'm not pregnant yet!). I kept telling Neil that my temps were too low :) I think I should probably buy a cheapy pack of pregnancy tests though. Then I would have them ready for any time I really DO wonder in the future. I'll get around to that soon hopefully!
I still have my UTI, blah. STILL blood in my urine, and I hate that. It always bugs me to see blood where it shouldn't be! My sides ache like anything and that bothers me too, but I know how to squish my own kidneys and they aren't tender at all, so I guess it's bladder-related? I feel under the weather and tired and achy along with it. No fever though, thankfully. I finished my course of antibiotics yesterday, so when the symptoms were all still there today I went to the doctor. I had to take all the boys with me, and do a urine sample in one of those tiny 2cm diameter sample tubes (no funnel or anything useful like that!) in a public toilet at the doctor's surgery, with all 5 of my little ones around me! That was NOT fun! I did not have the pushchair with me and really had not thought it out well, as Samuel was in my arms! Thankfully the toilet had a fold-down baby changing mat in the wall next to the toilet, and I lay Samuel in that (it was sort of hammocky so he couldn't roll "up" and out), and had the boys stand around it and play peekaboo over the edge to keep Samuel amused. This kept Samuel more secure and their eyes busily on the baby instead of my antics, lol! I have never been more thankful to have been wearing an ankle-length skirt in my life, haha!
Samuel is now scooting, and scooting pretty fast! He started last week, and ramped up the speed this week. He fell off my bed the other evening and landed on his head, just before bedtime! :( I felt sooooooooo awful. I remember Matthew doing that and I felt terrible then too. He moved so much faster than I expected him to, and suddenly shows an interest in getting to the edge of the bed FORWARDS rather than rolling at it sideways, so that he can look down, and GET down. His interest in things is getting further and further afield from where he is positioned. He spends a lot of time roaming around the living room floor now, never mind the large number of boys around the place, lol! I always put him in the bouncy chair (which he has largely outgrown) or take him with me if I leave the room though. He is keen on paper and card, tissues, BABY WIPES (bleurgh!!), and fluff to chew on, hehe! Funny boy. He seeks all these things out and is coming on leaps and bounds with his fine motor skills practising pincering little bits of tissue or fluff off the laminate floor! He's like a royal at the moment, making his way around while his humble servant (me!) scuttles in front of him, bent over, sweeping his path clear the whole while, hehehe! Laminate floor is fabulous but boy does it need sweeping, especially if it has a wool rug on top of it which sheds as much as a sheep does on a daily basis! Tsk!
Samuel loves the laminate floor! He always starts on the rug where I put him, but he's off it as fast as he can go. He gets a lot further with each little scoot once he's on the laminate, and can swivel on his tummy ever so fast. His eyes get all big and bug out a bit with excitement at the speed sometimes, lol! He's such a sweet funny baby, and the boys spend so much time watching him and giggling! I have a video clip of him the day he started scooting, which I posted at Facebook. I will try to get it on OneTrueMedia.com so I can post it here:
There you go! :) It's a little snippet of an example of how the boys are SO involved with him at all times, constantly amused and excited by his activities and developments. They actually ARGUE about who is spending time with him sometimes, especially about who goes to see him when he wakes from his naps! They find all his expressions, noises, movements, etc, etc, so sweet and funny, even when they're not THAT sweet or funny! ;) Lovely boys!
They are hard work at the moment. I haven't written my other blog for AGES, and when I last did (as Jemma mentioned in her comment last entry), it was a not-too-descriptive brief entry about being in OVER MY HEAD with these children right now, and having no idea what to do about it! I felt a bit hopeless at the time! Things are a little better now that we're FINALLY not ill any more (although we're on Chicken Pox watch starting today for about 10 days! :) ) - it seemed like we were unwell in one way or another for EVER, and it really pulled me down energy-wise. I couldn't keep up with behaviour and school and housework and so on, and ugh. The boys' behaviour is difficult to manage but MUCH more so when they've been ill for an age themselves, OR better but still not doing much because siblings and parents are STILL unwell. Okay so I'm not feeling well right now because I have a UTI, BUT things are much better. We're doing school again consistently and the routine is helping a LOT. I still don't really know what to do about much, but that is okay because I was reminded recently that His grace is sufficient for me, and His strength is made perfect through weakness. BOY did that verse lift me up! I want to put it on the wall - I need to see it so often these days, because I am so very weak at this, and it's refreshing to be reminded where my strength comes from! And grace! Where would I be without it?! In the poo, that's where. Thank you Lord for GRACE! :)
I should be writing this at my other blog! I meant to follow-up, but never found time to do it. Anyway the reason I mentioned it here was to just say, even when things are feeling overwhelming, it really doesn't alter a thing when it comes to babies and getting pregnant. That is all in the Lord's hands. He knows what is best for our family much better than we do, and it is He who provides for our needs and enables us to even DO this job in first place. He will never give us more than we can bear, and it's His desire for us to be fruitful and have babies and babies and babies - I am so thankful! Even when it's hard, I am so thankful and joyfully expectant as I look forward to more! I hope He will bless us with more!
Wednesday, July 13, 2011
Tuesday, June 28, 2011
6 months postpartum update!
Ohhh how ridiculously long it has been since I updated here!! Just no time, none at all! I can do little snatches of things online, but I always procrastinate when it comes to blogging because I always end up SO VERY long-winded, lol! And I don't have time to be long-winded, mostly. My laptop has had a rather unfortunate accident involving a glass of water (ahem), and has been away being fixed (oh I do so hope!!) for two weeks now. I'm so nervous that it won't be salvagable :( Anyway, meanwhile I have even less time online because of sharing the antique computer with Neil. BUT he brought a laptop home from work this week so I have a little more time than usual in the evenings! :)
So where were we?! I think Samuel was 8 weeks old last time I posted! He is now 6 months old and so verily scrumptious. I can't post photos because they're on my laptop (sob! though most are backed up, thankfully!) and so is all my camera software, so I'll have to wait to upload them when I get it back. There have been a few of him on my main blog since I last posted here though... I think?? I am not doing great at keeping up there either! :S
Samuel is so precious! He is wearing age 6-9 month clothes, and still squeezing into the larger 3-6 month ones. He is acting a bit teethy sometimes, but not too much. He bites on things really hard so I guess his teeth may be bothering him a little. Oh he's waking! I'll be back.
Back! I am not expecting him to cut any teeth yet, because none of his brothers have done so this early. The last two babies were nearly at their first birthdays before they cut their first tooth! Arthur was 8 months, and Matthew 7 months, so he could be more like them, or wait a good while longer yet! We'll see.
He's the most delightful, good-natured, easy-going baby! He rarely cries about anything, just fusses when tired or hungry. He beams and smiles at the slightest bit of attention, and not because he's short of it. He gets LOTS of attention, despite being the 5th child under 7 in this house! Oh his brothers LOVE him!! Especially Matthew. I wish I could show you the photos I took yesterday of Matthew loving on him. Matthew adores him, and spends as much time as he can with him. He will drop anything he's doing to run upstairs and be first to open Samuel's (my) bedroom door when he wakes from a nap - every single nap he takes! He loves going in and saying, "Hel-LO Samuel!" in a babytalk voice, as he approaches the bed, and seeing Samuel light up. Sometimes I want to tell Matthew NO! *I* want to be the first to get his sweet waking smile, hehe! But I let him. Sometimes I do get to see it though, and of course, I always always get the morning rays from that little man! :)
Samuel has still never slept a wink in a cot! My last three babies had all slept in a cot by now, Matthew from quite early on. Benjamin had his Amby Hammock of course, but he was in it for naps all the time from much earlier than Samuel's age. Samuel has my bed, and Benjamin's cot set up next to it (we bought a cabin bed to match the bunks in the boys' room, and Matthew sleeps on top of that, with a mattress on the floor for Benji underneath, and it worked VERY well from the get-go, so that's good!). Anyway, the cot just sits full of laundry, lol! I am SO enjoying co-sleeping with this sweet little baby. He breastfeeds on and off through the night, but who knows how often or how many times. All I know is it doesn't seem that frequent, but it's probably a few times - 2 or 3? I don't know. I mostly sleep! :) He does too, but I think I always smile, however sleepily, as I adjust my clothing to nurse him as he rolls in towards me in the dark. It's just so wonderful, so much more wonderful with each baby it seems, for me. I love love love and cherish it so very much that even half asleep I am just aware of smiling in the dark as I latch my sweetie pea on. Then I go to sleep, and when he's finished, so does he. In the morning he wakes me up and smiles at me. Gosh, I am blissful right now! :) Life is very full and hectic, and I am at my wit's end in some departments, but ohhhh the baby bliss!!! I happen to have a very "easy" baby, for which I am grateful as it makes things much easier for me, and I am enjoying having a little baby VERY much indeed! :)
Samuel is my first thumb-sucker! They have all had a short "go" at that, usually for a few weeks, and I've wondered if it would stick but it never did. Samuel sucks his thumb all the time really. He's the first of mine to self-soothe, and I think that is making life much easier. He is SO like Matthew in personality as a baby - laid-back and liking his sleep, and not wanting to snack snack snack on breastmilk like *some* little people have! ;) He only ever takes one breast for a full feed, and makes such an amusing face when I offer him more of the same or the other side after he's finished! He won't take any more, that's for sure, hehe! This week he has been nursing more frequently and wanting the other side, which he NEVER does, so I'm assuming (he's so easy to read!) that he's having a growth spurt. I think that's a typical occurance at 6 months, but I can't remember.
Anyway, he sucks his sweet little thumbie to go to sleep, ALWAYS. He nurses until full, pops off and rolls away and puts his right (always right) thumb in his mouth, all in one smooth movement. Then he sucks his thumb until he's asleep. He has been doing this for months now. He does often let his thumb go and roll back for a little more milk, and then repeats the pop off/roll/thumb. I have learnt to scarper out of the bedroom the moment he rolls away because lately he's a bit more restless if I hang around. If he rolls back and I'm there, he sort of pops on and off the breast, not wanting any more milk but getting fidgetty and fussy. If I am not there, I go quickly downstairs and watch him on the video monitor, and he rolls to where I was lying and settles there happily. It seems like I'm in his way once he's finished with milky and wants to sleep! ;)
I MISS him so much if he sleeps longer than 3 hours, day or night!! I always just want to wake him up and stroke his sweet little face or squeeeeeze him! He's so darling. Words can't describe how much I love him. I know all mamas feel this way about their tiny ones, but ahhhhhh how strong that feeling is!!! I wish I could record it properly here. Oh well.
Samuel's hair is growing in pretty well now. It doesn't stick straight up like Matthew's did! It lies flat, and has a little twist-curl at the middle of his forehead :) His hair is fair, like Matthew's - all the others have brown hair. I LOVE how like Matthew he is, especially given how much Matthew adores him. He is physically incredibly like Matthew to look at as well. We have photos for a screensaver on the antique computer, from when I was pregnant with Arthur until Nathan was just born. The baby photos of Matthew sometimes pop up and take our breath away because we have a hard time telling that it's not Samuel, even KNOWING it's not. We can see that it's Matthew, because it just IS, and he does have his own look, but otherwise... I think if these two were fraternal twins, they would constantly be mistaken for identical twins. It's hard to tell their baby photos apart sometimes, and seeing photos of Matthew a few months OLDER than Samuel is a weird experience. It sometimes looks like we're seeing a glimpse of what Samuel will look like cruising the furniture, or with more hair grown in, etc. Strange feeling! :) But I love how alike they are. Samuel's hair looks different in different light. From one angle it looks light brown, and from another it looks WHITE blonde. Mostly it just looks in between the two, or like both colours are mixed in there together. He still has a nice mullet of dark newborn hair, and at the sides too, haha! It's sweet but I will be happy when he's older and has lost the dark hair and only has his "proper" hair! We haven't really noticed that lingering newborn hair with the others because of their dark "proper" hair, and Matthew lost ALL his newborn hair in the first few months, so he didn't have this issue.
Samuel's eyes are currently blue blue blue, like Matthew's were, but just recently I am noticing a very subtle change around the pupils - the faintest hint of yellow/tan. I wonder if his eyes will turn out like Matthew's have - a sort of grey green with a tan ring around the pupil?
Samuel isn't crawling or anything near yet (Matthew and Nathan were crawling at 6 months, but Benjamin and Arthur not until 8 months). I guess he has spent less time freely roaming about the floor than the others, because of, well, the others! lol! We're STILL in our tiny 2-bedroom house. Space is limited for a little baby to be on the living room floor all the time. If I am in the room, I get him out of his bouncy chair and let him roll about on the floor. He LOVES the floor now. He would get tired of it and cry a month ago, quite quickly, but he loves it now. He is reaching and lunging forwards for toys, rolling all over the place, and swivelling round 360 degrees on his tummy. He started rolling months ago - at 3 months old I think - in both directions. I get nervous about him still napping on my bed, but we have a camera on him and make a pillow barrier all the way round the edges of the bed. Whatever we are doing downstairs, whether it's eating, doing school, housework - we always have his monitor right in front of us. If I am occupied at the washing machine or something like that, I often call a boy to check his monitor to see what he's doing, and they like reporting back to me. Pretty soon I think I will have to move him to the cot for naps though, to be safe.
He has started sitting without support this week! He did have the same 3 nights of HORRIBLY disturbed sleep that all my little ones have had before a brand new gross motor skill. Finally I have had enough kids and thus enough experience for me to actually recognise it BEFORE the motor skill emerged, lol! It's only taken me this long! ;) I felt triumphant when he sat up for the first time one day and promptly went back to normal sleep patterns! :) He is currently sitting steadily with support (me behind him, or in the activity ring that they've all used), and for 10 seconds or so without wobbling at all if he's chewing on a toy. The moment he reaches for something he topples though. He looks so much older suddenly, sitting up! :(
Samuel is my first baby NOT to have had any solid food upon turning 6 months old. I just am so content exclusively breastfeeding him, and HE seems completely happy. He isn't acting desperate for our food. He has been interested in it for a couple of months, watching us eat calmly but with interest. He reaches for food, but only in the same way that he reaches for the post, a toy, a pen, etc, if it's in my hand while he's on my lap. The other day I gave him a spoon to bite on, and he loved that. I sat eating an apple next to him, and he watched me. When I was down almost to the core, I held it out to him and asked him if he wanted a taste. He gave the apple a very calm look for the LONGEST time, as though he was interested but not that fussed. He didn't try to get it, and after a while just went back to chewing the spoon. The next time I held it out to him he was bored of his spoon and took it from me. He chewed hard on it but not like he wanted to consume or taste it, more like it was an ideal teether for his gums. He didn't seem too bothered about the taste either!
I was lamenting on Facebook that I wasn't looking forward to him turning 6 months and starting solids, because I was so enjoying exclusively breastfeeding him, and a couple of people replied to say THERE'S NO RUSH! :) So, I thought, why not wait a bit longer. And I have! :) Arthur's pestering me somewhat to give him a banana - he's looking forward to the milestone! When I do give him food it will be proper food, not purees, as we've done with the last three babies, but I am not in any hurry and don't particularly have a timescale for it. Right now I'm LOVING being his sole source of nutrition, and he seems completely satisfied so I'm happy. I have NO idea what he weighs! He hasn't been weighed since I was last writing entries here! I don't get chance to take him to drop-in centres for weighing, and I care less and less about what my babies weigh, what percentile they're at, and whether they are keeping to their curve, the more babies I have. I LOVE to know "stats" about my babies though, so that's the only nagging thought - I would like to know for that reason! :) But otherwise, pfthth. He will have a developmental check at around 8 months old, so he'll be weighed then, but that's probably it.
Ohhh there's probably SO much else to write about Samuel! But it's getting really late and I must go to bed!
I am on my 4th postpartum cycle now. Still can't believe how early it all started up again this time! I have been very loosely charting, only when my period arrives. I mostly forget to chart CM until LONG after the fact, and then I go back eventually and fill in the blanks where I can remember, but it's not that reliable! I chart what I can anyway. I think the last cycle was only a 3 day luteal phase - oh actually I think that was the one before. Last cycle, I'm not sure? I can't remember. Anyway. I am starting to chart more actively this cycle because I think I want more of an idea of what is going on with my body. I know I am ovulating, and that my luteal phase is short. Ovulation is getting a little earlier, and that's the time for me to start watching my cycles. Especially if parsnips are involved, so I'm starting to chart that too. I think there's almost zero chance of pregnancy right now because my luteal phases are very very short, and may well stay that way for a couple more cycles at least, but that's why I'm going to chart to find out. I am starting temping this cycle too, though I got started a little late. I think I might be ovulating today. I have been bloated all day, crampy increasingly through the evening, and the last 20 minutes I am pretty sure I am experiencing ovulation pain on my left side. Will chart it tomorrow, and see if it's actually true. And then probably get my period in 4 days, lol! If I had a normal LP and I am ovulating right now, I have a good chance of conception. But NOT a normal LP right now! ;)
Ohhh so looking forward and HOPING for more babies still to come for us! Arthur is hoping too - he was squishing my tummy wistfully a couple of weeks ago, and looking thoughtful. I asked him what he was doing, and he said, "Mummy, when can you go and wee on one of those stick things that tells us if you have a new tiny baby growing in your tummy again?" He clutched his fists under his chin with glee on the words "new tiny baby" :) Love that boy! And then last week (this week??) Matthew said he hoped God would bless us with more babies! He said he loves Samuel so much, and Samuel is his best friend in the whole world! Ahhh, where's the heart smiley when I want it?! :)
Right now, the reality of a new pregnancy would actually feel a bit overwhelming and scary to me. It feels really familiar from other times when I've had a baby aged about 6 months old. Once or twice I've thought maybe I could conceive that month, and it turned out to feel pretty scary in the reality of the moment! I worried about my milk for my baby boy, and morning sickness while still feeling like I was emerging from the postpartum fog, and HOW to do it all whilst dealing with the first trimester, etc. Not so much how to juggle another child, or how to manage with two very close in age, but more the pregnancy demands. I worry about whether my body is going to manage if I haven't had much time to recover from the latest pregnancy, especially my hips which were so very NOT happy this last time! I don't worry about labour any more. The whole thing just seems scary at this early stage, to me, but if it happened I would REJOICE because it would be a blessing from God. What's 15 months between babies?! It would not be so bad at all, and I would be so glad and thankful a year down the line - and during my pregnancy too. Just... the scariness! ;) BUT, fast forward a couple of months, to when I have an 8 month old or so... that's when I stop feeling this way and start getting proper baby fever! ;) Not really a coincidence that it is also when my body is about ready to conceive again. I love God's timing!! :)
I know that at any time, God could say, "That's it. Your family is complete". I know. I am so hoping He has plans to bless us again and again yet! I am now 35, and thus, for the first time, of "advanced maternal age". My mother, and her mother, and various other mothers before them (!) have started symptoms of menopause at age 40 and pretty much been done with it around age 42 or so. That's now only FIVE years away from me, which kind of makes me feel a bit clutchy around my throat! :S I don't mind getting old - I have never been someone who has issues with that idea - but I slightly panic at the thought of my childbearing years coming to an end. So sad! I hope these next five years are fruitful ones! My doula told me that if women continue having babies in their later reproductive years, it can delay menopause if it would have otherwise come on the early side. I hope she's right! I know it would be more tiring to be pregnant, give birth, recover from birth, and have a newborn (plus other kiddies) as I get older, but I don't care. TOTALLY. WORTH IT. :)
I shall be back! :)
So where were we?! I think Samuel was 8 weeks old last time I posted! He is now 6 months old and so verily scrumptious. I can't post photos because they're on my laptop (sob! though most are backed up, thankfully!) and so is all my camera software, so I'll have to wait to upload them when I get it back. There have been a few of him on my main blog since I last posted here though... I think?? I am not doing great at keeping up there either! :S
Samuel is so precious! He is wearing age 6-9 month clothes, and still squeezing into the larger 3-6 month ones. He is acting a bit teethy sometimes, but not too much. He bites on things really hard so I guess his teeth may be bothering him a little. Oh he's waking! I'll be back.
Back! I am not expecting him to cut any teeth yet, because none of his brothers have done so this early. The last two babies were nearly at their first birthdays before they cut their first tooth! Arthur was 8 months, and Matthew 7 months, so he could be more like them, or wait a good while longer yet! We'll see.
He's the most delightful, good-natured, easy-going baby! He rarely cries about anything, just fusses when tired or hungry. He beams and smiles at the slightest bit of attention, and not because he's short of it. He gets LOTS of attention, despite being the 5th child under 7 in this house! Oh his brothers LOVE him!! Especially Matthew. I wish I could show you the photos I took yesterday of Matthew loving on him. Matthew adores him, and spends as much time as he can with him. He will drop anything he's doing to run upstairs and be first to open Samuel's (my) bedroom door when he wakes from a nap - every single nap he takes! He loves going in and saying, "Hel-LO Samuel!" in a babytalk voice, as he approaches the bed, and seeing Samuel light up. Sometimes I want to tell Matthew NO! *I* want to be the first to get his sweet waking smile, hehe! But I let him. Sometimes I do get to see it though, and of course, I always always get the morning rays from that little man! :)
Samuel has still never slept a wink in a cot! My last three babies had all slept in a cot by now, Matthew from quite early on. Benjamin had his Amby Hammock of course, but he was in it for naps all the time from much earlier than Samuel's age. Samuel has my bed, and Benjamin's cot set up next to it (we bought a cabin bed to match the bunks in the boys' room, and Matthew sleeps on top of that, with a mattress on the floor for Benji underneath, and it worked VERY well from the get-go, so that's good!). Anyway, the cot just sits full of laundry, lol! I am SO enjoying co-sleeping with this sweet little baby. He breastfeeds on and off through the night, but who knows how often or how many times. All I know is it doesn't seem that frequent, but it's probably a few times - 2 or 3? I don't know. I mostly sleep! :) He does too, but I think I always smile, however sleepily, as I adjust my clothing to nurse him as he rolls in towards me in the dark. It's just so wonderful, so much more wonderful with each baby it seems, for me. I love love love and cherish it so very much that even half asleep I am just aware of smiling in the dark as I latch my sweetie pea on. Then I go to sleep, and when he's finished, so does he. In the morning he wakes me up and smiles at me. Gosh, I am blissful right now! :) Life is very full and hectic, and I am at my wit's end in some departments, but ohhhh the baby bliss!!! I happen to have a very "easy" baby, for which I am grateful as it makes things much easier for me, and I am enjoying having a little baby VERY much indeed! :)
Samuel is my first thumb-sucker! They have all had a short "go" at that, usually for a few weeks, and I've wondered if it would stick but it never did. Samuel sucks his thumb all the time really. He's the first of mine to self-soothe, and I think that is making life much easier. He is SO like Matthew in personality as a baby - laid-back and liking his sleep, and not wanting to snack snack snack on breastmilk like *some* little people have! ;) He only ever takes one breast for a full feed, and makes such an amusing face when I offer him more of the same or the other side after he's finished! He won't take any more, that's for sure, hehe! This week he has been nursing more frequently and wanting the other side, which he NEVER does, so I'm assuming (he's so easy to read!) that he's having a growth spurt. I think that's a typical occurance at 6 months, but I can't remember.
Anyway, he sucks his sweet little thumbie to go to sleep, ALWAYS. He nurses until full, pops off and rolls away and puts his right (always right) thumb in his mouth, all in one smooth movement. Then he sucks his thumb until he's asleep. He has been doing this for months now. He does often let his thumb go and roll back for a little more milk, and then repeats the pop off/roll/thumb. I have learnt to scarper out of the bedroom the moment he rolls away because lately he's a bit more restless if I hang around. If he rolls back and I'm there, he sort of pops on and off the breast, not wanting any more milk but getting fidgetty and fussy. If I am not there, I go quickly downstairs and watch him on the video monitor, and he rolls to where I was lying and settles there happily. It seems like I'm in his way once he's finished with milky and wants to sleep! ;)
I MISS him so much if he sleeps longer than 3 hours, day or night!! I always just want to wake him up and stroke his sweet little face or squeeeeeze him! He's so darling. Words can't describe how much I love him. I know all mamas feel this way about their tiny ones, but ahhhhhh how strong that feeling is!!! I wish I could record it properly here. Oh well.
Samuel's hair is growing in pretty well now. It doesn't stick straight up like Matthew's did! It lies flat, and has a little twist-curl at the middle of his forehead :) His hair is fair, like Matthew's - all the others have brown hair. I LOVE how like Matthew he is, especially given how much Matthew adores him. He is physically incredibly like Matthew to look at as well. We have photos for a screensaver on the antique computer, from when I was pregnant with Arthur until Nathan was just born. The baby photos of Matthew sometimes pop up and take our breath away because we have a hard time telling that it's not Samuel, even KNOWING it's not. We can see that it's Matthew, because it just IS, and he does have his own look, but otherwise... I think if these two were fraternal twins, they would constantly be mistaken for identical twins. It's hard to tell their baby photos apart sometimes, and seeing photos of Matthew a few months OLDER than Samuel is a weird experience. It sometimes looks like we're seeing a glimpse of what Samuel will look like cruising the furniture, or with more hair grown in, etc. Strange feeling! :) But I love how alike they are. Samuel's hair looks different in different light. From one angle it looks light brown, and from another it looks WHITE blonde. Mostly it just looks in between the two, or like both colours are mixed in there together. He still has a nice mullet of dark newborn hair, and at the sides too, haha! It's sweet but I will be happy when he's older and has lost the dark hair and only has his "proper" hair! We haven't really noticed that lingering newborn hair with the others because of their dark "proper" hair, and Matthew lost ALL his newborn hair in the first few months, so he didn't have this issue.
Samuel's eyes are currently blue blue blue, like Matthew's were, but just recently I am noticing a very subtle change around the pupils - the faintest hint of yellow/tan. I wonder if his eyes will turn out like Matthew's have - a sort of grey green with a tan ring around the pupil?
Samuel isn't crawling or anything near yet (Matthew and Nathan were crawling at 6 months, but Benjamin and Arthur not until 8 months). I guess he has spent less time freely roaming about the floor than the others, because of, well, the others! lol! We're STILL in our tiny 2-bedroom house. Space is limited for a little baby to be on the living room floor all the time. If I am in the room, I get him out of his bouncy chair and let him roll about on the floor. He LOVES the floor now. He would get tired of it and cry a month ago, quite quickly, but he loves it now. He is reaching and lunging forwards for toys, rolling all over the place, and swivelling round 360 degrees on his tummy. He started rolling months ago - at 3 months old I think - in both directions. I get nervous about him still napping on my bed, but we have a camera on him and make a pillow barrier all the way round the edges of the bed. Whatever we are doing downstairs, whether it's eating, doing school, housework - we always have his monitor right in front of us. If I am occupied at the washing machine or something like that, I often call a boy to check his monitor to see what he's doing, and they like reporting back to me. Pretty soon I think I will have to move him to the cot for naps though, to be safe.
He has started sitting without support this week! He did have the same 3 nights of HORRIBLY disturbed sleep that all my little ones have had before a brand new gross motor skill. Finally I have had enough kids and thus enough experience for me to actually recognise it BEFORE the motor skill emerged, lol! It's only taken me this long! ;) I felt triumphant when he sat up for the first time one day and promptly went back to normal sleep patterns! :) He is currently sitting steadily with support (me behind him, or in the activity ring that they've all used), and for 10 seconds or so without wobbling at all if he's chewing on a toy. The moment he reaches for something he topples though. He looks so much older suddenly, sitting up! :(
Samuel is my first baby NOT to have had any solid food upon turning 6 months old. I just am so content exclusively breastfeeding him, and HE seems completely happy. He isn't acting desperate for our food. He has been interested in it for a couple of months, watching us eat calmly but with interest. He reaches for food, but only in the same way that he reaches for the post, a toy, a pen, etc, if it's in my hand while he's on my lap. The other day I gave him a spoon to bite on, and he loved that. I sat eating an apple next to him, and he watched me. When I was down almost to the core, I held it out to him and asked him if he wanted a taste. He gave the apple a very calm look for the LONGEST time, as though he was interested but not that fussed. He didn't try to get it, and after a while just went back to chewing the spoon. The next time I held it out to him he was bored of his spoon and took it from me. He chewed hard on it but not like he wanted to consume or taste it, more like it was an ideal teether for his gums. He didn't seem too bothered about the taste either!
I was lamenting on Facebook that I wasn't looking forward to him turning 6 months and starting solids, because I was so enjoying exclusively breastfeeding him, and a couple of people replied to say THERE'S NO RUSH! :) So, I thought, why not wait a bit longer. And I have! :) Arthur's pestering me somewhat to give him a banana - he's looking forward to the milestone! When I do give him food it will be proper food, not purees, as we've done with the last three babies, but I am not in any hurry and don't particularly have a timescale for it. Right now I'm LOVING being his sole source of nutrition, and he seems completely satisfied so I'm happy. I have NO idea what he weighs! He hasn't been weighed since I was last writing entries here! I don't get chance to take him to drop-in centres for weighing, and I care less and less about what my babies weigh, what percentile they're at, and whether they are keeping to their curve, the more babies I have. I LOVE to know "stats" about my babies though, so that's the only nagging thought - I would like to know for that reason! :) But otherwise, pfthth. He will have a developmental check at around 8 months old, so he'll be weighed then, but that's probably it.
Ohhh there's probably SO much else to write about Samuel! But it's getting really late and I must go to bed!
I am on my 4th postpartum cycle now. Still can't believe how early it all started up again this time! I have been very loosely charting, only when my period arrives. I mostly forget to chart CM until LONG after the fact, and then I go back eventually and fill in the blanks where I can remember, but it's not that reliable! I chart what I can anyway. I think the last cycle was only a 3 day luteal phase - oh actually I think that was the one before. Last cycle, I'm not sure? I can't remember. Anyway. I am starting to chart more actively this cycle because I think I want more of an idea of what is going on with my body. I know I am ovulating, and that my luteal phase is short. Ovulation is getting a little earlier, and that's the time for me to start watching my cycles. Especially if parsnips are involved, so I'm starting to chart that too. I think there's almost zero chance of pregnancy right now because my luteal phases are very very short, and may well stay that way for a couple more cycles at least, but that's why I'm going to chart to find out. I am starting temping this cycle too, though I got started a little late. I think I might be ovulating today. I have been bloated all day, crampy increasingly through the evening, and the last 20 minutes I am pretty sure I am experiencing ovulation pain on my left side. Will chart it tomorrow, and see if it's actually true. And then probably get my period in 4 days, lol! If I had a normal LP and I am ovulating right now, I have a good chance of conception. But NOT a normal LP right now! ;)
Ohhh so looking forward and HOPING for more babies still to come for us! Arthur is hoping too - he was squishing my tummy wistfully a couple of weeks ago, and looking thoughtful. I asked him what he was doing, and he said, "Mummy, when can you go and wee on one of those stick things that tells us if you have a new tiny baby growing in your tummy again?" He clutched his fists under his chin with glee on the words "new tiny baby" :) Love that boy! And then last week (this week??) Matthew said he hoped God would bless us with more babies! He said he loves Samuel so much, and Samuel is his best friend in the whole world! Ahhh, where's the heart smiley when I want it?! :)
Right now, the reality of a new pregnancy would actually feel a bit overwhelming and scary to me. It feels really familiar from other times when I've had a baby aged about 6 months old. Once or twice I've thought maybe I could conceive that month, and it turned out to feel pretty scary in the reality of the moment! I worried about my milk for my baby boy, and morning sickness while still feeling like I was emerging from the postpartum fog, and HOW to do it all whilst dealing with the first trimester, etc. Not so much how to juggle another child, or how to manage with two very close in age, but more the pregnancy demands. I worry about whether my body is going to manage if I haven't had much time to recover from the latest pregnancy, especially my hips which were so very NOT happy this last time! I don't worry about labour any more. The whole thing just seems scary at this early stage, to me, but if it happened I would REJOICE because it would be a blessing from God. What's 15 months between babies?! It would not be so bad at all, and I would be so glad and thankful a year down the line - and during my pregnancy too. Just... the scariness! ;) BUT, fast forward a couple of months, to when I have an 8 month old or so... that's when I stop feeling this way and start getting proper baby fever! ;) Not really a coincidence that it is also when my body is about ready to conceive again. I love God's timing!! :)
I know that at any time, God could say, "That's it. Your family is complete". I know. I am so hoping He has plans to bless us again and again yet! I am now 35, and thus, for the first time, of "advanced maternal age". My mother, and her mother, and various other mothers before them (!) have started symptoms of menopause at age 40 and pretty much been done with it around age 42 or so. That's now only FIVE years away from me, which kind of makes me feel a bit clutchy around my throat! :S I don't mind getting old - I have never been someone who has issues with that idea - but I slightly panic at the thought of my childbearing years coming to an end. So sad! I hope these next five years are fruitful ones! My doula told me that if women continue having babies in their later reproductive years, it can delay menopause if it would have otherwise come on the early side. I hope she's right! I know it would be more tiring to be pregnant, give birth, recover from birth, and have a newborn (plus other kiddies) as I get older, but I don't care. TOTALLY. WORTH IT. :)
I shall be back! :)
Wednesday, February 16, 2011
8 weeks old and time to close, but uhhhmmm....
Samuel is 8 weeks old!!! He had his 6-8 week check last week (flying colours! :) ) and so I should have updated by now and (sadly!) said goodbye to this blog for a while, but I just haven't got round to it yet. Proper entry coming, because I DO want to do that properly. And I still haven't written his birth story, aaargh! So want to get that done soon as well.
My lochia has FINALLY stopped, woohoo! It faded off to nothing about 10 days ago, and I noticed normal CM starting right off the bat. Then 5 (ish) days ago I noticed EWCM. And again the next day. And the next day (but not so much). Also I noticed that my man looked particularly attractive during those three days, hehehe! ;) I did think, "Hmmm..." and wondered if I should chart those things, but that seemed RIDICULOUS since I was only just 7 weeks postpartum and was only days off finishing my bleeding from giving BIRTH! And not to mention the two newborns I'm breastfeeding - that's the ACTUAL newborn, and the 19-month-old who is nursing like another one! ;) Not at night, but he easily nurses as often and long as Samuel during the day. So I didn't chart it.
Wish I had! I have been crampy for a week now (started with the EWCM) and increasingly bloated over the past week. Today I wondered if my lochia was somehow starting up a touch again, and then tonight when I went to the loo and wiped there was red blood! Periods ALREADY?!?!?!?! I thought last time was a record for me at just under 3 months postpartum, as I was between 5.5 months and 6.75 months postpartum with all the others. But 8 weeks to the day?!?! Whaaaaaat?!!
I am now feeling that yucky achy hot crampy feeling, so I'm fairly sure I'm starting a period. Which I can. not. believe. So unusual for me, this early! And with what looks like ovulation as well!
I will update again properly soon, but I just wanted to note this evening's "news" here first. I am going to start charting to keep track of things, as always. It's just totally surreal to be doing so 8 weeks after giving birth! :S
My lochia has FINALLY stopped, woohoo! It faded off to nothing about 10 days ago, and I noticed normal CM starting right off the bat. Then 5 (ish) days ago I noticed EWCM. And again the next day. And the next day (but not so much). Also I noticed that my man looked particularly attractive during those three days, hehehe! ;) I did think, "Hmmm..." and wondered if I should chart those things, but that seemed RIDICULOUS since I was only just 7 weeks postpartum and was only days off finishing my bleeding from giving BIRTH! And not to mention the two newborns I'm breastfeeding - that's the ACTUAL newborn, and the 19-month-old who is nursing like another one! ;) Not at night, but he easily nurses as often and long as Samuel during the day. So I didn't chart it.
Wish I had! I have been crampy for a week now (started with the EWCM) and increasingly bloated over the past week. Today I wondered if my lochia was somehow starting up a touch again, and then tonight when I went to the loo and wiped there was red blood! Periods ALREADY?!?!?!?! I thought last time was a record for me at just under 3 months postpartum, as I was between 5.5 months and 6.75 months postpartum with all the others. But 8 weeks to the day?!?! Whaaaaaat?!!
I am now feeling that yucky achy hot crampy feeling, so I'm fairly sure I'm starting a period. Which I can. not. believe. So unusual for me, this early! And with what looks like ovulation as well!
I will update again properly soon, but I just wanted to note this evening's "news" here first. I am going to start charting to keep track of things, as always. It's just totally surreal to be doing so 8 weeks after giving birth! :S
Saturday, February 5, 2011
Smiley Samuel at 6 weeks old :)
Sweet Samuel at six weeks:
Cooing at me in his sweet soft husky little voice (SO like Matthew's voice, just not quiiite as husky):
Smiles for Mummy! :)
Samuel has an inquisitive big brother! ;) Poor baby!
Good thing he's an easy-going boy! :)
Samuel's 6-8 week check is this Tuesday coming at 7 weeks old exactly, and I need to update more than just this photo update BEFORE then because there's tons to write about him before I need to close this blog down at the usual time! But I am not altogether well at the moment (nausea that won't subside and just feeling weak and exhausted, for days now :( ) and so I don't feel up to writing a long blog entry. Hopefully I'll be up to that tomorrow or the next day! Just couldn't resist posting these recent photos of my sweetest little manny manoo! Love this baby boy SOOOO much! :)
Cooing at me in his sweet soft husky little voice (SO like Matthew's voice, just not quiiite as husky):
Smiles for Mummy! :)
Samuel has an inquisitive big brother! ;) Poor baby!
Good thing he's an easy-going boy! :)
Samuel's 6-8 week check is this Tuesday coming at 7 weeks old exactly, and I need to update more than just this photo update BEFORE then because there's tons to write about him before I need to close this blog down at the usual time! But I am not altogether well at the moment (nausea that won't subside and just feeling weak and exhausted, for days now :( ) and so I don't feel up to writing a long blog entry. Hopefully I'll be up to that tomorrow or the next day! Just couldn't resist posting these recent photos of my sweetest little manny manoo! Love this baby boy SOOOO much! :)
Sunday, January 23, 2011
One month old!
My tiny man is one whole month old! I missed updating on the actual day (in fact I feel rather ashamed to admit that I FORGOT on the actual day - only remembered on the 22nd that Samuel turned one month old the day before!), but there it is. He will be 5 weeks old on Tuesday (it's Sunday today) - I can't believe how fast the time is going!
I don't have much time to update as Samuel is starting to wake now that I'm typing, and seems like he is going to be very hungry and cross if I don't hurry up and feed him, lol! I wish I had kept up better over the past couple of weeks. A lot has happened that I wanted to keep a record of, but I just haven't had time.
Right after my last update (literally, immediately!), Samuel became really fussy, and it got progressively worse each day until he was basically spending the entire day crying and seeming uncomfortable, and no longer doing calm things like making eye contact or smiling at me :( He would not fuss or cry if he was sleeping or breastfeeding, but otherwise he was crying constantly. He would start the moment he let go of the breast, and he started to have only a handful of catnaps throughout the day (10-20 mins at a time). It became hard to handle a really really upset baby all day as well as the four other little ones, and I started to worry that he was becoming "colicky". Only Matthew out of my others was like that as a small baby, and it was sooooooo incredibly hard. Matthew's colic started in the same way and at exactly the same age I think, so I was not feeling too optimistic about it. I did not know how I was going to cope with several more months of it! The only thing was that his evening sleep still remained consistent and good - if I got him nursed and asleep between 7 and 8pm, he would stay asleep the rest of the evening, and would then nurse right back to sleep after a nappy change and a feed, for another 2-3 hours.
On the very worst day, he did not sleep well during the evening. In fact he was still awake at 10pm crying, having had no sleep yet that evening! Thinking of this being the new norm was soooo depressing, as I hated seeing him in pain, and that is how he seemed to be. I figured he needed to see a chiropractor like Heather had suggested when he was born, so I made an appointment for him (and me - OW my hips are SOOOOO sore still!!) with the same place I took Benjamin to when he was a baby - they specialise in babies, children, and mothers who are pregnant or newly postpartum. The appointment wasn't until Feb 1st, but at least it was made.
So at 10pm that evening I marched downstairs with him and handed him to Neil because I had tried everything to soothe him, breastfed him to bursting point and still he was crying and wouldn't sleep. My back and arms were hurting and I hoped Neil would have an idea. He sent me upstairs to rest and held Samuel in the kitchen to keep the crying noise as far away from the sleeping children as possible in our teeny house! I heard him crying on and off for a while and then he stopped. After it had been quiet for a bit, I went down to investigate, and found Samuel fast asleep in Neil's arms. Neil said he had prayed over Samuel and then he had gone to sleep! I was so glad that he was asleep, and so grateful that Neil had taken the initiative to pray over him! We put him to bed and he slept intil 2am, and next woke at 5.45 or 6am. When he got up for the day, he was a totally different baby! Absolutely zero fussing or crying all day long, other than if he was hungry and I was taking too long getting my bra open, hehe! He was calm and physically relaxed, and seemed contented. He made eye contact and cooed and smiled all day! :) He still had quite a few catnaps in the bouncy chair and woke if I tried to transfer him to the bedroom, but he did take one nice long 2hrs and 45 minutes nap in the afternoon. That was Tuesday, and he has been calm and happy ever since!!! Well, he was kind of fussy for the hour before bedtime this evening, but anyway, God is so faithful and I am SO relieved!!
Ahh I didn't get to finish this, so Samuel has now been changed and fed, and then changed into a different sleepsuit after bringing up milk on himself (and me!), and then nursed some more, and now he's dozing draped across my front while I type this with one hand! :) These precious days are so fleeting so I am enjoying it while I can. It is just about midnight now and another week starts tomorrow, and I'm tired, but he isn't asleep enough yet for me to put him down, otherwise he might wake up. Hopefully if I hold him for 5 or 10 more minutes he'll stay asleep when I put him down and I can go and brush my teeth. So I may as well continue typing for now! :)
Samuel still hasn't used his crib! He naps on my bed or in the bouncy chair, though he doesn't stay asleep so long in the chair. If he stays asleep when I put him on my bed, he always sleeps for the next 2.5 - 3 hours. He now has one such nap per day, as yet unpredictably. He won't stay asleep any other time that I try it, but once a day at some point, he will. Usually that's somewhere in the afternoon but one day this week he started a long nap at 10.30am. It was a day that Benjamin had been awke since 4.45am (those molars again!) and poor Benji was exhausted, so he nursed into a deep sleep only 15 minutes after Samuel did. They both slept for a record 3hrs and 15 minutes! Which was perfect, since their naps were staggered by 15 minutes, so I had chance to nurse and change Samuel in the 15 minutes before Benjamin woke up. I got housework done, read alouds and other quality time with the older three, and I even managed to cut Nathan's hair after they ate lunch! They all badly need a haircut so the other 3 are on my to-do list this week! I am also preparing to start school this week - we start back on Mon 31st, and Matthew starts school for the very first time! :) He's so excited! I hope I can pull it off, but I am also really looking forward to it. Neil's birthday is on Tuesday too!
Samuel is now sleeping 4-5 hours consistently in the evening, and usually goes from about 8pm to 1am, or 7pm to midnight, or something like that. I just put him down now and he has stayed asleep next to me, so I can finish the typing a little faster if it doesn't disturb him! Then I MUST go to bed!
He wakes a couple of times in the night after midnight I think, but maybe some nights only once?? I really don't know, it could be more than that, but we now have a dark room (I kept the lamp on to see by in the first few weeks) and sleep tummy-to-tummy, so I barely come round enough to get him latched on and then fall straight back to sleep. My hips have been slightly less painful in the last two days, but before that I had to change sides with Samuel halfway through the night because it became too painful to stay on that side (also better for Samuel's head I should think!). The last two nights I haven't had to, so I had unknowingly been offering Samuel the same breast all night, and boy was I lopsided in the morning, haha! The side I hadn't used was engorged. Ow. In the evening he sleeps in my bed, and I just climb in next to him part way through the evening and go on the internet via my laptop. He isn't disturbed by it at this age, but he will be soon. Some evenings I am downstairs till bedtime though. Then I just climb in beside my sweet tiny man and go to sleep! I LOVE it. Love it soooo much. He is just precious and I love being close to him. I have no desire whatsoever to put him in his own sleeping space. It's just GORGEOUS sharing my bed with him.
He is cooing so sweetly these days! I keep trying to catch it on camera (for a video clip) but EVERY time there's deafening bellowing in the background from another kiddie or else he stops and starts to fuss a bit instead of cooing, or someone comes and stands in front of the camera to make a silly face or ask me a question! Hopefully I'll get a good clip to share soon! He has Matthew's sweet husky little voice - only Matthew has had that type of voice so far. It's UNCANNY how many similarities there are between Samuel and Matthew. He SMELLS like Matthew did as a baby as well. Again, only Matthew smelled like that - he was quite a... strong-smelling baby, lol! Like a MAN smell, quite stinky sometimes! ;) Even right after a bath, it was like his sweat glands were all full of pheromones or something, and he was quite a sweaty baby in general. Arthur, Nathan and Benjamin weren't like that at all. Samuel is! He's also showing the start of cradle cap which all the boys have had (and Benjamin and NATHAN still do, even though they only ever have their hair washed with Dentinox!! What is up with that?! Nathan is THREE!!!), and his hairline is doing that receding thing now that his brain just had a growth spurt (so did his forehead therefore, hehe!), so it's becoming more visible. He has only had two baths (gasp! Yes, I'm a bad mother! ;) ) so far, but he has his hair washed with Dentinox. Hey ho.
His smile is so precious!! Big and broad and open and gummy, and he has a dimple in one cheek like I do (the same side too!). His face lights up when he smiles. I LOVE him so much!! He is beginning to get some newborn acne on his cheeks, poor little manny. He is otherwise doing great, and growing SO fast! He is now outgrowing all his 0-3 month sleepsuits and fits the smaller 3-6 month ones well. Craziness at just 4 weeks old!! He was 11lbs 1oz at three weeks old, and I guess he will next be weighed at his 6-8 week check. I have no idea what he weighs now but I'm guessing at around 12lbs? I am noticing my arm and shoulder hurting a LOT lately after holding him, so he must be gaining weight! He is tracking things with his eyes, and starting to watch his brothers around him (which they love!). He has smiled at Matthew and coos at him too, since Matthew is (as usual) the one who really puts in the time with little babies, sitting with them and being calm and interested in them. He was the same with Benjamin, and Benjamin warmed to him so much more than the others as a baby. Matthew has a real tender heart for little babies :)
I'm sure there's so much more that I wanted to write about, but for now I need to go to bed. I need to make an appointment for my 6-week postnatal check (just a week or so away!), and they'll send Samuel's in the post. Once he's had that check I will need to follow my tradition of finishing posting at this lovely blog, which is sad! I will try to update a couple of times at least before then, while I have the chance! I can't believe my new baby is almost at the end of the newborn stage already! :( I LOVE me a newborn!
I will be back though! ;) I have a couple of boys names at the ready for boy #6. Heather thinks the next baby will be born in June 2012, just in time for the Olympics! :) Matthew told me randomly the other day that he thought I would have another baby in October, but not this October. We shall see! I DO hope and pray that God will bless us with more babies yet! I hope it's not greedy of me, but I just love it so much, and don't want it to end!
I don't have much time to update as Samuel is starting to wake now that I'm typing, and seems like he is going to be very hungry and cross if I don't hurry up and feed him, lol! I wish I had kept up better over the past couple of weeks. A lot has happened that I wanted to keep a record of, but I just haven't had time.
Right after my last update (literally, immediately!), Samuel became really fussy, and it got progressively worse each day until he was basically spending the entire day crying and seeming uncomfortable, and no longer doing calm things like making eye contact or smiling at me :( He would not fuss or cry if he was sleeping or breastfeeding, but otherwise he was crying constantly. He would start the moment he let go of the breast, and he started to have only a handful of catnaps throughout the day (10-20 mins at a time). It became hard to handle a really really upset baby all day as well as the four other little ones, and I started to worry that he was becoming "colicky". Only Matthew out of my others was like that as a small baby, and it was sooooooo incredibly hard. Matthew's colic started in the same way and at exactly the same age I think, so I was not feeling too optimistic about it. I did not know how I was going to cope with several more months of it! The only thing was that his evening sleep still remained consistent and good - if I got him nursed and asleep between 7 and 8pm, he would stay asleep the rest of the evening, and would then nurse right back to sleep after a nappy change and a feed, for another 2-3 hours.
On the very worst day, he did not sleep well during the evening. In fact he was still awake at 10pm crying, having had no sleep yet that evening! Thinking of this being the new norm was soooo depressing, as I hated seeing him in pain, and that is how he seemed to be. I figured he needed to see a chiropractor like Heather had suggested when he was born, so I made an appointment for him (and me - OW my hips are SOOOOO sore still!!) with the same place I took Benjamin to when he was a baby - they specialise in babies, children, and mothers who are pregnant or newly postpartum. The appointment wasn't until Feb 1st, but at least it was made.
So at 10pm that evening I marched downstairs with him and handed him to Neil because I had tried everything to soothe him, breastfed him to bursting point and still he was crying and wouldn't sleep. My back and arms were hurting and I hoped Neil would have an idea. He sent me upstairs to rest and held Samuel in the kitchen to keep the crying noise as far away from the sleeping children as possible in our teeny house! I heard him crying on and off for a while and then he stopped. After it had been quiet for a bit, I went down to investigate, and found Samuel fast asleep in Neil's arms. Neil said he had prayed over Samuel and then he had gone to sleep! I was so glad that he was asleep, and so grateful that Neil had taken the initiative to pray over him! We put him to bed and he slept intil 2am, and next woke at 5.45 or 6am. When he got up for the day, he was a totally different baby! Absolutely zero fussing or crying all day long, other than if he was hungry and I was taking too long getting my bra open, hehe! He was calm and physically relaxed, and seemed contented. He made eye contact and cooed and smiled all day! :) He still had quite a few catnaps in the bouncy chair and woke if I tried to transfer him to the bedroom, but he did take one nice long 2hrs and 45 minutes nap in the afternoon. That was Tuesday, and he has been calm and happy ever since!!! Well, he was kind of fussy for the hour before bedtime this evening, but anyway, God is so faithful and I am SO relieved!!
Ahh I didn't get to finish this, so Samuel has now been changed and fed, and then changed into a different sleepsuit after bringing up milk on himself (and me!), and then nursed some more, and now he's dozing draped across my front while I type this with one hand! :) These precious days are so fleeting so I am enjoying it while I can. It is just about midnight now and another week starts tomorrow, and I'm tired, but he isn't asleep enough yet for me to put him down, otherwise he might wake up. Hopefully if I hold him for 5 or 10 more minutes he'll stay asleep when I put him down and I can go and brush my teeth. So I may as well continue typing for now! :)
Samuel still hasn't used his crib! He naps on my bed or in the bouncy chair, though he doesn't stay asleep so long in the chair. If he stays asleep when I put him on my bed, he always sleeps for the next 2.5 - 3 hours. He now has one such nap per day, as yet unpredictably. He won't stay asleep any other time that I try it, but once a day at some point, he will. Usually that's somewhere in the afternoon but one day this week he started a long nap at 10.30am. It was a day that Benjamin had been awke since 4.45am (those molars again!) and poor Benji was exhausted, so he nursed into a deep sleep only 15 minutes after Samuel did. They both slept for a record 3hrs and 15 minutes! Which was perfect, since their naps were staggered by 15 minutes, so I had chance to nurse and change Samuel in the 15 minutes before Benjamin woke up. I got housework done, read alouds and other quality time with the older three, and I even managed to cut Nathan's hair after they ate lunch! They all badly need a haircut so the other 3 are on my to-do list this week! I am also preparing to start school this week - we start back on Mon 31st, and Matthew starts school for the very first time! :) He's so excited! I hope I can pull it off, but I am also really looking forward to it. Neil's birthday is on Tuesday too!
Samuel is now sleeping 4-5 hours consistently in the evening, and usually goes from about 8pm to 1am, or 7pm to midnight, or something like that. I just put him down now and he has stayed asleep next to me, so I can finish the typing a little faster if it doesn't disturb him! Then I MUST go to bed!
He wakes a couple of times in the night after midnight I think, but maybe some nights only once?? I really don't know, it could be more than that, but we now have a dark room (I kept the lamp on to see by in the first few weeks) and sleep tummy-to-tummy, so I barely come round enough to get him latched on and then fall straight back to sleep. My hips have been slightly less painful in the last two days, but before that I had to change sides with Samuel halfway through the night because it became too painful to stay on that side (also better for Samuel's head I should think!). The last two nights I haven't had to, so I had unknowingly been offering Samuel the same breast all night, and boy was I lopsided in the morning, haha! The side I hadn't used was engorged. Ow. In the evening he sleeps in my bed, and I just climb in next to him part way through the evening and go on the internet via my laptop. He isn't disturbed by it at this age, but he will be soon. Some evenings I am downstairs till bedtime though. Then I just climb in beside my sweet tiny man and go to sleep! I LOVE it. Love it soooo much. He is just precious and I love being close to him. I have no desire whatsoever to put him in his own sleeping space. It's just GORGEOUS sharing my bed with him.
He is cooing so sweetly these days! I keep trying to catch it on camera (for a video clip) but EVERY time there's deafening bellowing in the background from another kiddie or else he stops and starts to fuss a bit instead of cooing, or someone comes and stands in front of the camera to make a silly face or ask me a question! Hopefully I'll get a good clip to share soon! He has Matthew's sweet husky little voice - only Matthew has had that type of voice so far. It's UNCANNY how many similarities there are between Samuel and Matthew. He SMELLS like Matthew did as a baby as well. Again, only Matthew smelled like that - he was quite a... strong-smelling baby, lol! Like a MAN smell, quite stinky sometimes! ;) Even right after a bath, it was like his sweat glands were all full of pheromones or something, and he was quite a sweaty baby in general. Arthur, Nathan and Benjamin weren't like that at all. Samuel is! He's also showing the start of cradle cap which all the boys have had (and Benjamin and NATHAN still do, even though they only ever have their hair washed with Dentinox!! What is up with that?! Nathan is THREE!!!), and his hairline is doing that receding thing now that his brain just had a growth spurt (so did his forehead therefore, hehe!), so it's becoming more visible. He has only had two baths (gasp! Yes, I'm a bad mother! ;) ) so far, but he has his hair washed with Dentinox. Hey ho.
His smile is so precious!! Big and broad and open and gummy, and he has a dimple in one cheek like I do (the same side too!). His face lights up when he smiles. I LOVE him so much!! He is beginning to get some newborn acne on his cheeks, poor little manny. He is otherwise doing great, and growing SO fast! He is now outgrowing all his 0-3 month sleepsuits and fits the smaller 3-6 month ones well. Craziness at just 4 weeks old!! He was 11lbs 1oz at three weeks old, and I guess he will next be weighed at his 6-8 week check. I have no idea what he weighs now but I'm guessing at around 12lbs? I am noticing my arm and shoulder hurting a LOT lately after holding him, so he must be gaining weight! He is tracking things with his eyes, and starting to watch his brothers around him (which they love!). He has smiled at Matthew and coos at him too, since Matthew is (as usual) the one who really puts in the time with little babies, sitting with them and being calm and interested in them. He was the same with Benjamin, and Benjamin warmed to him so much more than the others as a baby. Matthew has a real tender heart for little babies :)
I'm sure there's so much more that I wanted to write about, but for now I need to go to bed. I need to make an appointment for my 6-week postnatal check (just a week or so away!), and they'll send Samuel's in the post. Once he's had that check I will need to follow my tradition of finishing posting at this lovely blog, which is sad! I will try to update a couple of times at least before then, while I have the chance! I can't believe my new baby is almost at the end of the newborn stage already! :( I LOVE me a newborn!
I will be back though! ;) I have a couple of boys names at the ready for boy #6. Heather thinks the next baby will be born in June 2012, just in time for the Olympics! :) Matthew told me randomly the other day that he thought I would have another baby in October, but not this October. We shall see! I DO hope and pray that God will bless us with more babies yet! I hope it's not greedy of me, but I just love it so much, and don't want it to end!
Thursday, January 13, 2011
3 weeks old!
I'm still here! Absolutely no time to update - we've had no internet most of the last week anyway (tsk!!), but it's back on now by the looks of it.
Managing with Neil at work is incredibly hectic! My parents came to stay with my grandparents nearby last Friday and they've been to see us every weekday since then. They go home tomorrow so today was the last day they came over. They came each afternoon and it was LOVELY to have their help with keeping the boys entertained and busy (and the dishwasher running!) - they brought me sandwiches every day too. Love my parents! I'm a bit sad that they're going home!
Not quite sure how things will go without my parents around to help! A couple of the days this week have seemed absolutely unmanageable, but I think those were days when I had added stress factors. Nathan's 3rd birthday was on Wednesday, which also turned out to be the day that Samuel started breastfeeding like he was starting a growth spurt (he was!), and Benjamin started cutting both bottom molars at once - literally all of a sudden they were halfway up through huge purple swollen gums, my poor baby! :( Benjamin literally breastfed as much as Samuel did that day, either that or he was screaming and crying continually, and wanting to focus on making the day special for Nathey, I found it pretty stressful. Last week (before my parents came) there was one day that felt completely impossible to manage. I thankfully don't even remember the details of it too well now, but I do remember the bit where I was in the boys' bedroom rummaging frantically for a change of clothes for the one who had merrily tipped out a whole cup of water over the recently-opened Christmas presents, while Benjamin cried for me at the stairgate and Samuel cried in his bouncy chair and I just sat down on Nathan's bed and cried, saying, "I can't do it Lord! I can't do it Lord!" over and over. It was the last thing in an ENDLESS line of difficult-to-manage things that day and I felt so much less ready physically than I had expected to feel. Anyway, at that moment I was completely overwhelmed and did not know what to do. But, you know, I pulled myself together pretty quickly and changed a boy, cuddled another, and nursed another, and I survived.
But it is hard with 5 such very little ones! :S
Health Visitor came last week and since Samuel had just been weighed by the midwife 2 days before, she didn't weigh and measure him that day, but she sent someone to do that this week instead. So on Tuesday, at 3 weeks old exactly, Samuel weighed 11lbs 1oz - ANOTHER pound in a week gained!! He's at the 98th percentile for weight which I think is a record for one of my babies, even over Arthur (who wasn't far behind that as a baby)! His length was funny though - somebody has made a mistake somewhere because he ws 57cm long and DEFINITELY longer than he was a couple of weeks ago (he's filling out the length of even his biggest 0-3 month clothing) and yet he was measured at 59.5cm at birth?!?! Hmmmm! I would think that the birth measurement was wrong, but she was very careful and thorough. It's different though, because they use a tape at birth, and stretch them on a flat scale with the HV.
Anyway, growing boy! He's doing his 3 week growth spurt right now but it's not too bad. He's napping okayish, mostly in the bouncy chair but also on my bed once or twice a day for a good 2 hours each time, if I can put him down without waking him. He sleeps most of the evening now from about 8pm if I nurse him thoroughly (with 5 breasts, haha!) around that time. It's just after midnight now and he's stirring next to me having been asleep since 7.30pm ish. I'm noticing this is becoming "normal" for Samuel, which is nice! After that he'll usually need a full change and feed between midnight and 1am (yep, he's fussing and sucking his hands now!) and then wake around 4.30am to feed. Neither of us really wake up since we stay lying tummy-to-tummy (LOVE that!), and he wakes again about 3 hours later - usually AFTER I have to get up for Neil to go to work. It's quite nice to get the boys changed and eat breakfast before he wakes up for the day.
Bless! He's sucking his index finger really noisily right now (and very contentedly!) - never seen him do that before!
I have photos, but no time! Soon, hopefully. He is smiling occasionally and once did a HUGE beaming smile which changed his whole face - gummy and broad! :) Like Arthur's smile I think. He is starting to coo like he is really wanting to communicate with me, but just the odd one or two now and again - soooooooo sweet! :)
I have a ton more I could say but I need to nurse my sweetie pea and go to sleep! Back soon hopefully! :)
Managing with Neil at work is incredibly hectic! My parents came to stay with my grandparents nearby last Friday and they've been to see us every weekday since then. They go home tomorrow so today was the last day they came over. They came each afternoon and it was LOVELY to have their help with keeping the boys entertained and busy (and the dishwasher running!) - they brought me sandwiches every day too. Love my parents! I'm a bit sad that they're going home!
Not quite sure how things will go without my parents around to help! A couple of the days this week have seemed absolutely unmanageable, but I think those were days when I had added stress factors. Nathan's 3rd birthday was on Wednesday, which also turned out to be the day that Samuel started breastfeeding like he was starting a growth spurt (he was!), and Benjamin started cutting both bottom molars at once - literally all of a sudden they were halfway up through huge purple swollen gums, my poor baby! :( Benjamin literally breastfed as much as Samuel did that day, either that or he was screaming and crying continually, and wanting to focus on making the day special for Nathey, I found it pretty stressful. Last week (before my parents came) there was one day that felt completely impossible to manage. I thankfully don't even remember the details of it too well now, but I do remember the bit where I was in the boys' bedroom rummaging frantically for a change of clothes for the one who had merrily tipped out a whole cup of water over the recently-opened Christmas presents, while Benjamin cried for me at the stairgate and Samuel cried in his bouncy chair and I just sat down on Nathan's bed and cried, saying, "I can't do it Lord! I can't do it Lord!" over and over. It was the last thing in an ENDLESS line of difficult-to-manage things that day and I felt so much less ready physically than I had expected to feel. Anyway, at that moment I was completely overwhelmed and did not know what to do. But, you know, I pulled myself together pretty quickly and changed a boy, cuddled another, and nursed another, and I survived.
But it is hard with 5 such very little ones! :S
Health Visitor came last week and since Samuel had just been weighed by the midwife 2 days before, she didn't weigh and measure him that day, but she sent someone to do that this week instead. So on Tuesday, at 3 weeks old exactly, Samuel weighed 11lbs 1oz - ANOTHER pound in a week gained!! He's at the 98th percentile for weight which I think is a record for one of my babies, even over Arthur (who wasn't far behind that as a baby)! His length was funny though - somebody has made a mistake somewhere because he ws 57cm long and DEFINITELY longer than he was a couple of weeks ago (he's filling out the length of even his biggest 0-3 month clothing) and yet he was measured at 59.5cm at birth?!?! Hmmmm! I would think that the birth measurement was wrong, but she was very careful and thorough. It's different though, because they use a tape at birth, and stretch them on a flat scale with the HV.
Anyway, growing boy! He's doing his 3 week growth spurt right now but it's not too bad. He's napping okayish, mostly in the bouncy chair but also on my bed once or twice a day for a good 2 hours each time, if I can put him down without waking him. He sleeps most of the evening now from about 8pm if I nurse him thoroughly (with 5 breasts, haha!) around that time. It's just after midnight now and he's stirring next to me having been asleep since 7.30pm ish. I'm noticing this is becoming "normal" for Samuel, which is nice! After that he'll usually need a full change and feed between midnight and 1am (yep, he's fussing and sucking his hands now!) and then wake around 4.30am to feed. Neither of us really wake up since we stay lying tummy-to-tummy (LOVE that!), and he wakes again about 3 hours later - usually AFTER I have to get up for Neil to go to work. It's quite nice to get the boys changed and eat breakfast before he wakes up for the day.
Bless! He's sucking his index finger really noisily right now (and very contentedly!) - never seen him do that before!
I have photos, but no time! Soon, hopefully. He is smiling occasionally and once did a HUGE beaming smile which changed his whole face - gummy and broad! :) Like Arthur's smile I think. He is starting to coo like he is really wanting to communicate with me, but just the odd one or two now and again - soooooooo sweet! :)
I have a ton more I could say but I need to nurse my sweetie pea and go to sleep! Back soon hopefully! :)
Monday, January 3, 2011
Nearly 2 weeks old already!
Wow, the time is passing so fast! I can hardly believe that Samuel is going to be 2 weeks old tomorrow! Christmas came and went so fast, and then I blinked and 2010 had passed into the memory banks and 2011 was here! Crazy.
Today is Monday 3rd of January and it's the last day of Neil's paternity leave. Tomorrow he'll go to work at 7.30am and not get back until about 7pm. Yikes! I have such a mixture of feelings about the new normal around here! I'm so excited - breathlessly excited! - to be starting out as the mother of five children, spending my days watching them grow and learn and develop, and managing my home and my little ones. It's such a challenge (and TOO hard sometimes, but you keep going I guess!) but ohhhh so rewarding! And exciting to tackle. I can't think of anything I would rather be doing - no job or career could possibly hold this much anticipation or joy or love or thrills or rewards for me, I'm sure of it. It has to be hard work and a big challenge in order to be THAT thrilling and rewarding. So in part I am eager for tomorrow because it's the start of a new year which stretches out ahead of us, and a new beginning with a new little person in our family. I'm excited for all that it means, and all that the year will hold for us!
But ohhh I'm scared, lol!
How in the wide world will I juggle the needs of five little people, when the youngest is a needy newborn baby and the eldest is only just 6?! I was never proficient at it with four little people (trust me, I was NOT "there" yet!) so I am not sure how to proceed!
Personality-wise, I work well under pressure, and better still when I don't have someone else to fall back on. If Neil is at home I will manage less well, than if he's at work. I rise to the challenge, and I can't afford to be lazy (which is my tendency unfortunately!). It's a GOOD thing that I need to do my days without Neil home for 12 hours, although it's kind of the last thing that I want to do right now, thinking about the week ahead! ;) It will be good for me!
On Friday my parents are coming!! I can't wait to see them, and neither can the boys - they LOVE Nana and Grandy! I'm so excited for them to meet Samuel as well. They've seen his photos but it will be lovely to see them hold him and see all the things about him that I've been telling them on the phone, for themselves. They are travelling up from France on Thursday, and staying with my grandparents until the following Friday. Apart from the weekend, they are planning to come here for part of the day every day, yay! To help me with the boys mostly, and to meet Samuel. Nathan's birthday is next week (HOW ON EARTH WILL HE BE THREE?!?!!) and Neil has to work that day so I am really happy that my parents will be here and can help me make the day special for him. I have 3 children aged 2 and under at the moment! Two, one, and newborn! :) And four and six! :) Anyway I am looking forward to my parents visiting because it will help me to have them here. I have Tuesday, Wednesday and Thursday on my own, which will be interesting!
I get tired very quickly when I do things with the boys these last few days - I've been going downstairs for anything from 30 minutes to a couple of hours, just slowly tidying the living room (which is beyond description, truly) or sitting with Samuel in my arms, or just chatting with the boys as they play. I get tired quickly and go back upstairs with Samuel when that hits, and just feel like I need a long nap to recover from sitting downstairs! I'm nervous about the days to come since I will never get the chance to nap. It has been several babies since I last was able to nap, no matter how desperate the need, obviously! I hope I hold up physically.
I have made a list this evening to help me keep focused tomorrow. This is all I want to achieve tomorrow and even though it's basic I think I will not manage much more, and will have to work at just achieving what's on the list!
* Drink 4-6 glasses of water
* Benjamin down for a nap at appropriate time
* Meals on time for all of us (give or take 30 mins)
* Read aloud to the boys (at least 1 hour)
* Nappy changes for all the nappy wearers, at least morning, noon, and bedtime! (Nathan and Benjamin are full-time nappy wearers, no potty training yet. Matthew wears a nappy at night and whenever he needs to poo still.)
* Keep on top of the living room floor (tidy-ish)
* Read Bible and pray, at least first thing, but if possible at any moment I can grab too!
* Feed and cuddle Samuel as much as possible. Change his nappy as often as needed (LOTS lately!).
That's it. Hopefully I'll manage to keep the above stuff going, because if I do I think the day will go okay for us all. I am not sure what we'll have for dinner - there are precisely NO freezer meals this time! I have no idea why that slipped my mind, but hmmm, that could make things tricky! I'm guessing tomorrow's dinner for the boys will be baked beans on toast, since it's quick, easy, nutritious, and one of their favourites! :)
Another part of me is just feeling so sad that my babymoon is over! :( I still get to snuggle my tiny man, but it has been so precious just focusing on him and snuggling him ALL the time. He has mostly slept all his sleeps on my front. These last two or three days I have started to put him down next to me on the bed when he is WELL asleep on my front. I don't want to! But I started to get worried about when Neil goes back to work, and what if he absolutely will not sleep unless he's on my front by then?! Today I really feel that pull of the fact that it's the last day where I get to rest in bed with my tiny love. Even when he's been happy and contented NOT in my arms, I have still scooped him up anyway and held him close all curled up against my chest, and kissed his little soft head a zillion times, and rubbed his back until he fell asleep - as often as I could. I know I can't do that during the week after today, and I really have a lump in my throat just thinking about it. The demands of the day will mean I have to keep on putting him down to deal with issues with the boys, discipline, and various things that need doing like nappies and meals. Samuel is SUCH a contented little baby. He doesn't mind being put down, but I can feel him relax more when he's in my arms. He goes so calm and still, and just blinks and does his sweet fast breathing, and eventually dozes off. I LOVE holding him! I will hold him just about as much as I possibly can even with Neil at work, but I know I will need to keep putting him down, and he won't be able to take his naps on me.
A sling would fix that, I know, but I don't get on well with slings in general. Either they hurt my back, or even if they don't, I find them too cumbersome, especially when trying to tend to the other little ones. I can't pick up or lift a toddler when I have a baby on my front, even with 2 arms free. It just doesn't work for me. It's possible to cook a meal or change a nappy with a baby on my front, but I find it physically straining and exhausting to do so. My back hurts just trying to lean round the baby to get things done. So I am not going the slinging route, unless he ends up a colicky baby and it's a survival tactic for a while. I HOPE he won't be!! But so far he seems very very laid-back and calm and happy. He's such a precious blessing!
Our last bouncy chair broke when Benjamin was a baby, so when I realised we didn't have one, I went looking on eBay. I wanted a Fisher Price one with a vibrate function, like our old one. We had a Fisher Price Kick and Play before and it was brilliant. Just the right bounce-ability when pushed with a foot, and the vibrate function was very helpful too! I needed one that was being sold locally enough so that I could avoid postage costs. I found a more basic Fisher Price bouncy chair for £5 (I think?) just a few streets away from us, and won it! It has a vibrate function but no lights and sounds like the other one, which I'm PERFECTLY happy about! ;) It has a built in blanket to cover the baby up if it's chilly, which is sweet! And it does bounce as nicely as the other one, so I'm pleased about that. After I washed the cover, I put Samuel in it (yesterday or the day before, I can't remember which!), and he was very happy there while his brothers stroked his head and put the blanket on and off and on and off and on and off and on and off, etc, and bounced the chair none-too-gently. The chair got nudged and bumped a few times as they busied themselves playing next to it, which made Samuel jump a bit, but he was calm through it all. Eventually he started to fuss a bit, so I put the vibrate function on and rocked the chair gently with my foot, and he went very still, just blinking. Over about 10 minutes, his sweet little eyelids got heavier and heavier, until he went to sleep. Today I put him in the chair for a short while and he did the same thing. After he had been asleep about 5 minutes I picked him up out of the chair and put him in my bed upstairs and he stayed asleep for a couple of hours. So I am cautiously hopeful with the bouncy chair to help me! :) It's a safe place to put him down, so long as I do not leave the room. Our house is conveniently teeny tiny so we only HAVE the one room to be in anyway, lol! ;) Very handy at this stage! I think if I need to go to the toilet or the kitchen, I will have to take him with me. Or just not go to either of those places unless I have him put to bed upstairs or something.
He has not used his crib at all so far - well, I tried him in it when he was fast asleep once at under a week old, and he stayed asleep less than 10 minutes on his back in there, and then woke up kind of fussy. He sleeps with me at night and I have no plans to change that any time soon. LOVE co-sleeping! :) For naps though, once Neil is not with the little ones in the day times, I need to do something different I think. While he's tiny, he is safe on my bed unsupervised, but only until he gets near to the age where he could roll. And even so, I don't feel safe even now putting him there for naps, because Arthur and Matthew are able to let themselves upstairs through the kiddy gate now, and I don't want them to have access to him on the bed if I don't know they're in there.
Soooo I will try transferring him to his crib once he's fallen asleep either breastfeeding or in the bouncy chair. I am not too confident about it because if I put him on his back he is likely to wake up pretty quickly. If I am in the room with him all the time, I have been putting him on his tummy to sleep, because he goes off to sleep on my front (tummy down) and his front is therefore all warm and toasty, and he stays settled if he goes down on his tummy if he fell asleep that way. He sleeps for a couple of hours every time like that. I am not crazy about sort of training him to be a tummy sleeper though, because at night he sleeps on his side or on his back next to me in between nursing, and he seems to have no problems sleeping on his back. So I don't want to mess with a good thing! I know how hard it is to try to get a baby to sleep on his back who is plain hurting or uncomfortable on his back for whatever reason - two of mine have been that way, but Samuel is definitely not so far. I don't want to lay him down in his crib on his tummy to sleep and then walk away and shut the door. So I will persevere trying to transfer him asleep onto his back in the crib and hope he stays sleeping. I think he will wake within 5 minutes every time and eventually get cross and overtired, but I'll give it a try anyway. I also suspect he'll take some of his naps actually in the bouncy chair. He is disturbed by the noise around him so I want to try to get him napping upstairs if possible, because it doesn't seem fair to him to see him flinching and startling at crashes and bangs and screeches from his brothers, even though he stays asleep! That can't be as good a quality of sleep for him, and I want him to be well rested at all times.
Anyway, so I need to change the crib sheets tonight in preparation for tomorrow, and also find the spare monitor to plug in where he'll be sleeping, so I can hear when he stirs. The video monitor is in the boys' room so I can see/hear when Benjamin wakes from his nap and during the evening, but we have an old monitor (which hopefully still works!) that I need to put in with Samuel too.
I hope I can do it! I feel like I'm pretty sure I CAN do it, but it's a bit nerve-wracking at the moment! I need to somehow stay calm and sane so that I treat the boys the way they should be treated, and not get snappy or shouty or irritable with them if I get tired. They are HARD work, behaviour-wise, so that's a challenge at the best of times.
Samuel is doing great! :) The midwife came yesterday and discharged us to the Health Visitor, who will be coming tomorrow at noon. I am sad and nostalgic about the midwife discharging us because it is an official closure to the whole pregnancy and birth thing, which - as you know - I absolutely love and adore! :) So I am sad to leave that behind. Again! I can't believe I have done it five times now, and I feel kind of clutchy around the throat thinking that I may not have many more times left to experience, compared with how many I have been through already. I mean, I can't see myself being pregnant five more times, as much as I would LOVE to. I'll be 35 next month. I am hoping and praying (actively!) for more babies yet!
Samuel is waking so I will have to finish this later. I have photos to add, and just a bit more waffle about my darling boy! I'm so besotted with him, he is just delightful and lovely in every way and it's going to be hard to get back to normal life when I'm still SO in babymoon mode!
Oh, he seems to have resettled himself (he's on his tummy next to me in bed), so I'll carry on for now!
The midwife weighed Samuel yesterday at 12 days old and he now weighs 10lbs 2.5oz! He was 9lbs 1.5oz exactly a week before, so he has gained over a lb in a week! She was very pleased with his weight gain and his colour. He had a lot of swelling and bruising to his face, which has FINALLY started to go. I would say his swelling is all gone now, and his bruising almost all gone - it's not really noticable at all any more unless you know what to look for. Poor little man still has red patches on the whites of his eyes from the birth, and the midwife told me that can take several weeks to clear up. I am noticing today that the worst patch has started to look less red at last, and the others are more pinky now, so that's good. Anyway, she was very pleased with him because even with bruising he has had no jaundice whatsoever. He has been feeding almost constantly though, so that will have been flushing his system out very well.
He feeds on demand, basically whenever he is awake, hehe! I am working on making sure he has FULL feeds, so if he dozes off after one full side, I still wake him up and offer him the other side. Once he's well and truly stuffed, I let him sleep. He will then typically sleep for a couple of hours, or 2.5 hours even. My policy this time around is to make sure that's the longest he sleeps before I wake him up and feed him again. The idea is that with feeds no further apart than 2.5 hours in the day, he will be well tanked up during the day and eventually begin to space out his night-time feeds by himself. I hope! I have no idea of his nights, none at all! I lay down next to him and nurse him, and we both fall asleep. Next thing I know, he's fussing and I wake up enough to offer him the other breast and fall back to sleep. Fast forward to another moment where I become aware of him fussing, and I glance at the clock and acknowledge the time, offer him the breast and fall back to sleep. When I next wake, I have no recollection of the time I saw on the clock the last time, offer the boy the breast and fall back to sleep. And so it goes on! So I just can't tell you anything at all about his nights. I don't know how often he wakes, how many times each night, how long he feeds for, how much sleep I'm missing or how often my sleep is disturbed. I'm a bit frustrated because I really DO want to know the answers, and I try to be aware of it during the night, but I'm so half asleep that I forget it before morning comes and can't recall it by then! I think I would have to come round enough to physically write down the time each time I wake, to know how the nights are going, but that seems like a big faff so I probably won't get around to that! It's a GOOD way to do it, as it preserves my sleep in the best way possible. Samuel nurses back to sleep right away every time I feed him at night, and often has alert times after feeding during the day, so I am happy to see him being specific in that way about day and night. I don't give him the opportunity to be alert and wakeful in the night mind you! ;) I fall asleep and don't engage him at all. I also don't change his nappy at all, unless he is wet through (not happened yet) or has obviously pooed. Once or twice I have missed a pooey nappy until a couple of hours later because I have just fallen back to sleep and missed it, which I feel bad about!
He did start to get a couple of sore patches when he was first doing lots and lots of breastmilk poo after his meconium cleared out, so I've been using Sudocrem since then and he has no sore or red patches any more, even if he poos frequently. He typically will do 3 or 4 pooey nappies in the space of about 30 minutes, and then nothing for 5 or 6 hours, so that's better than some of my little ones who have just pooed and pooed and pooed around the clock and ended up sore no matter the barrier cream! It never really cleared up until a couple of months later when the frequency of poos calmed down.
Samuel's eyes are grey. They were so dark and murky the first week, and even with good light from the window and him looking directly into it, I still couldn't see any discernable colour to them, just dark murkiness. But this week they have been lightening up just slightly, and I can see that they're dark grey at the moment (no blue at all), and there is a ring around the pupil that I can't describe at the moment, but it could turn into a sort of tan-coloured ring like Benjamin's, I am guessing. Benjamin's are grey with a tan ring, just like mine, and I wonder if Samuel's will be similar. No way to really know this early, but I like guessing! :) They could also turn brown, as Arthur's started out grey too. His eyebrows and eyelashes are starting to "come out" now and so far to me they look light brown, so I think he'll have the same hair colour as Arthur and Benjamin. Nathan's is similar too, but his hair is slightly darker brown than the others, and Matthew's is quite fair - a cross between blonde and light brown. I think Samuel's eyebrows are more brown than Matthew's were though, so I think his colouring will be more like Arthur and Benjamin.
Samuel definitely looks most like Matthew in the face (their noses are almost identical!) but he's also a mix of all of them. It's lovely to see the unique combinations of each child as they arrive! This is probably a good time to post some photos! :) I think Samuel has been asleep nearly 2.5 hours now so I need to wake him up and feed him if he doesn't wake up himself. Here are the latest photos - starting way back on Christmas Eve at 3 days old:
Here is Samuel on Christmas Day in another Christmas outfit! :) Good old eBay! His eyes were still swollen, and his bruising probably peaked from that day. It seemed to really come up. He was looking at the window (he seems to really like looking at any light source, especially natural light, and will stare at it for ages and ages):
I already have a photo of Samuel in the Mr. Bump sleepsuit (which they all wear and get photographed in!) which I posted last entry. But here's another one, just for the records! He was 6 days old here, and really did not fit it any more in the length. He doesn't fit ANY of his newborn (up to 10lbs) sleepsuits now - his feet are restricted by the length as he's such a LONG baby! Neil got the box of 0-3 month clothes out of the loft today and the first load is in the washing machine, so that's a relief! I can't believe we're cracking that box open so soon! Anyway, here is Samuel looking at the window again, in the Mr. Bump sleepsuit! :)
So many people keep on saying how BIG he is, which I guess he is for a brand new baby, but as far as human beings go he is still EVER SO TINY! And that's how he seems to me, he is just soooo teeny tiny in my eyes, almost to the point where I can't understand why people keep on about how big he is, lol! I took a photo of him sleeping on his front with my hand laid gently on his head, just because when I was stroking his little head like that, it struck me again how tiny he was, and so I wanted to capture that to dispel the myth that he's this gigantic baby! ;) He was 6 days old here too:
Here is a series of photos that I took when Samuel was 8 days old, just before the boys' bedtime. Arthur and Matthew came up to see him as they often do at that time of day, and I realised I didn't yet have any photos of the boys with Samuel, except for the one I posted last entry of Benjamin holding him. So I got out my camera, even in the poor light (hence grainy photos), and took a few photos of them. Matthew is very taken with Samuel (just as he was/is with Benjamin, only more so) and is a very calming influence - he gets very serious about him and talks in hushed tones near him, and constantly wants to stroke or kiss him. He strokes his little head or tummy soooo gently and carefully. That's why he's wearing such a serious expression in one of these photos - this is Matthew looking after Samuel and taking the job very seriously. They are both giving him a kiss in the last photo, when it was time for them to go and get ready for bed :)
And lastly, here are 3 photos of Samuel taken when he was 9 days old, on my bed. His one Christmas present was a Very Hungry Caterpillar touchy-feely toy, and he does seem to focus on it and look at it so I put it near him sometimes for him to look at. I put it on the bed and fiddled about with depth of field, wanting to focus on Samuel and make the caterpillar blurry. While I was doing that I managed to catch him starting to smile at me! :) Samuel looked me right in the eye at 7 days old, raised his eyebrows in surprise as though recognising me for the first time, and SMILED! I couldn't believe it because he was only 7 days old, long before babies are apparently "able" to do proper social smiles yet, but I knew it was not wind, and was definitely "social" behaviour. Matthew and Benjamin were my previous earliest smilers at 3 weeks old which was already "early", but 7 days?!! I do know baby smiles by now, after 5 babies, but I still didn't mention it at first in case I was wrong. But he has smiled at me about once or twice a day, every day since, and at Neil a couple of times too. All the occasions were when he was particularly alert, focused on our faces, and being held about 12 inches from our faces as we talked to him. Definitely social smiles! :) I still can't believe he's doing it so early but there we go! In the last photo here, he was just beginning a smile - see how his eyes are so different and all lit up as he switches into his "social" mode?! :) Such a sweet little peanut!
He's fed and asleep curled up on my chest right now. Bliss!!! I will miss it so much tomorrow but at least I can still do it in the evenings and at the weekends! This precious stage is so fleeting and passes WAY too quickly. How I long to slow down time so that I can revel and soak in it all I like! *sigh*
The one sad thing that I have noticed about my sweet little Samuel is that he has undoubtedly got Arthur's curly feet :( I'm soooo sad about it, though my mum reminds me that it's not bad going to only have two out of five with the stupid curly feet gene (okay she didn't call it that, but that's what I think of the darn thing!), considering Neil was one of 3 siblings affected by it out of 4. Ugh. I know it means many rounds of both his little legs in full plaster casts, traipsing back and forth to the hospital with all the kiddies for frequent appointments, night boots that will disturb his sleep, and follow ups FOREVER where the physio struggles to figure out why his feet are not staying straight despite the treatment (ongoing with Arthur, whose feet are still curly and whose next appt is next month). So sad to have to begin it all over again, and to have to see my little baby in plaster casts. His feet don't look as curly as Arthur's did before his first casts, BUT the thing that concerns me is that they also turn in at the ankle, which Arthur's didn't, sort of suspiciously like clubfoot. But, I can flex them into a straight foot position, but they don't have any flexibility beyond that. I will not be hanging around waiting for the Health Visitor to notice and refer him, which is how we did it with Arthur and the physio told me she really should have seen him as a newborn (he was 3 months old before his appt came through). I will be phoning Arthur's physio tomorrow morning, and I'm sure she'll arrange to see Samuel pretty quickly.
*sigh*
Other than that, things are going well with my newest little man! When the midwife was packing up to go yesterday, she said (completely deadpan), "See you again later this year?" LOVE THAT, hehe! I answered, "Yeah, probably!" ;) And she said, "Going to be another boy?" And I said, "I should think so! I'm thinking of names already!" - which (shh!) I am! ;) Pretty sure that if God blesses us with another baby it will likely be a boy! And I'm already excited about that - my desire for a daughter, whilst THERE, seems to diminish with each baby that comes. I'm more excited for another sweet baby boy right now, than a baby girl. I love my boys! :)
Okay, that's all for now. I will try to update again soon, and work on my birth story in bits whenever I can. Heather has written loads of notes during my labour and no doubt will give me a copy next time I see her, so that will help me! :)
Today is Monday 3rd of January and it's the last day of Neil's paternity leave. Tomorrow he'll go to work at 7.30am and not get back until about 7pm. Yikes! I have such a mixture of feelings about the new normal around here! I'm so excited - breathlessly excited! - to be starting out as the mother of five children, spending my days watching them grow and learn and develop, and managing my home and my little ones. It's such a challenge (and TOO hard sometimes, but you keep going I guess!) but ohhhh so rewarding! And exciting to tackle. I can't think of anything I would rather be doing - no job or career could possibly hold this much anticipation or joy or love or thrills or rewards for me, I'm sure of it. It has to be hard work and a big challenge in order to be THAT thrilling and rewarding. So in part I am eager for tomorrow because it's the start of a new year which stretches out ahead of us, and a new beginning with a new little person in our family. I'm excited for all that it means, and all that the year will hold for us!
But ohhh I'm scared, lol!
How in the wide world will I juggle the needs of five little people, when the youngest is a needy newborn baby and the eldest is only just 6?! I was never proficient at it with four little people (trust me, I was NOT "there" yet!) so I am not sure how to proceed!
Personality-wise, I work well under pressure, and better still when I don't have someone else to fall back on. If Neil is at home I will manage less well, than if he's at work. I rise to the challenge, and I can't afford to be lazy (which is my tendency unfortunately!). It's a GOOD thing that I need to do my days without Neil home for 12 hours, although it's kind of the last thing that I want to do right now, thinking about the week ahead! ;) It will be good for me!
On Friday my parents are coming!! I can't wait to see them, and neither can the boys - they LOVE Nana and Grandy! I'm so excited for them to meet Samuel as well. They've seen his photos but it will be lovely to see them hold him and see all the things about him that I've been telling them on the phone, for themselves. They are travelling up from France on Thursday, and staying with my grandparents until the following Friday. Apart from the weekend, they are planning to come here for part of the day every day, yay! To help me with the boys mostly, and to meet Samuel. Nathan's birthday is next week (HOW ON EARTH WILL HE BE THREE?!?!!) and Neil has to work that day so I am really happy that my parents will be here and can help me make the day special for him. I have 3 children aged 2 and under at the moment! Two, one, and newborn! :) And four and six! :) Anyway I am looking forward to my parents visiting because it will help me to have them here. I have Tuesday, Wednesday and Thursday on my own, which will be interesting!
I get tired very quickly when I do things with the boys these last few days - I've been going downstairs for anything from 30 minutes to a couple of hours, just slowly tidying the living room (which is beyond description, truly) or sitting with Samuel in my arms, or just chatting with the boys as they play. I get tired quickly and go back upstairs with Samuel when that hits, and just feel like I need a long nap to recover from sitting downstairs! I'm nervous about the days to come since I will never get the chance to nap. It has been several babies since I last was able to nap, no matter how desperate the need, obviously! I hope I hold up physically.
I have made a list this evening to help me keep focused tomorrow. This is all I want to achieve tomorrow and even though it's basic I think I will not manage much more, and will have to work at just achieving what's on the list!
* Drink 4-6 glasses of water
* Benjamin down for a nap at appropriate time
* Meals on time for all of us (give or take 30 mins)
* Read aloud to the boys (at least 1 hour)
* Nappy changes for all the nappy wearers, at least morning, noon, and bedtime! (Nathan and Benjamin are full-time nappy wearers, no potty training yet. Matthew wears a nappy at night and whenever he needs to poo still.)
* Keep on top of the living room floor (tidy-ish)
* Read Bible and pray, at least first thing, but if possible at any moment I can grab too!
* Feed and cuddle Samuel as much as possible. Change his nappy as often as needed (LOTS lately!).
That's it. Hopefully I'll manage to keep the above stuff going, because if I do I think the day will go okay for us all. I am not sure what we'll have for dinner - there are precisely NO freezer meals this time! I have no idea why that slipped my mind, but hmmm, that could make things tricky! I'm guessing tomorrow's dinner for the boys will be baked beans on toast, since it's quick, easy, nutritious, and one of their favourites! :)
Another part of me is just feeling so sad that my babymoon is over! :( I still get to snuggle my tiny man, but it has been so precious just focusing on him and snuggling him ALL the time. He has mostly slept all his sleeps on my front. These last two or three days I have started to put him down next to me on the bed when he is WELL asleep on my front. I don't want to! But I started to get worried about when Neil goes back to work, and what if he absolutely will not sleep unless he's on my front by then?! Today I really feel that pull of the fact that it's the last day where I get to rest in bed with my tiny love. Even when he's been happy and contented NOT in my arms, I have still scooped him up anyway and held him close all curled up against my chest, and kissed his little soft head a zillion times, and rubbed his back until he fell asleep - as often as I could. I know I can't do that during the week after today, and I really have a lump in my throat just thinking about it. The demands of the day will mean I have to keep on putting him down to deal with issues with the boys, discipline, and various things that need doing like nappies and meals. Samuel is SUCH a contented little baby. He doesn't mind being put down, but I can feel him relax more when he's in my arms. He goes so calm and still, and just blinks and does his sweet fast breathing, and eventually dozes off. I LOVE holding him! I will hold him just about as much as I possibly can even with Neil at work, but I know I will need to keep putting him down, and he won't be able to take his naps on me.
A sling would fix that, I know, but I don't get on well with slings in general. Either they hurt my back, or even if they don't, I find them too cumbersome, especially when trying to tend to the other little ones. I can't pick up or lift a toddler when I have a baby on my front, even with 2 arms free. It just doesn't work for me. It's possible to cook a meal or change a nappy with a baby on my front, but I find it physically straining and exhausting to do so. My back hurts just trying to lean round the baby to get things done. So I am not going the slinging route, unless he ends up a colicky baby and it's a survival tactic for a while. I HOPE he won't be!! But so far he seems very very laid-back and calm and happy. He's such a precious blessing!
Our last bouncy chair broke when Benjamin was a baby, so when I realised we didn't have one, I went looking on eBay. I wanted a Fisher Price one with a vibrate function, like our old one. We had a Fisher Price Kick and Play before and it was brilliant. Just the right bounce-ability when pushed with a foot, and the vibrate function was very helpful too! I needed one that was being sold locally enough so that I could avoid postage costs. I found a more basic Fisher Price bouncy chair for £5 (I think?) just a few streets away from us, and won it! It has a vibrate function but no lights and sounds like the other one, which I'm PERFECTLY happy about! ;) It has a built in blanket to cover the baby up if it's chilly, which is sweet! And it does bounce as nicely as the other one, so I'm pleased about that. After I washed the cover, I put Samuel in it (yesterday or the day before, I can't remember which!), and he was very happy there while his brothers stroked his head and put the blanket on and off and on and off and on and off and on and off, etc, and bounced the chair none-too-gently. The chair got nudged and bumped a few times as they busied themselves playing next to it, which made Samuel jump a bit, but he was calm through it all. Eventually he started to fuss a bit, so I put the vibrate function on and rocked the chair gently with my foot, and he went very still, just blinking. Over about 10 minutes, his sweet little eyelids got heavier and heavier, until he went to sleep. Today I put him in the chair for a short while and he did the same thing. After he had been asleep about 5 minutes I picked him up out of the chair and put him in my bed upstairs and he stayed asleep for a couple of hours. So I am cautiously hopeful with the bouncy chair to help me! :) It's a safe place to put him down, so long as I do not leave the room. Our house is conveniently teeny tiny so we only HAVE the one room to be in anyway, lol! ;) Very handy at this stage! I think if I need to go to the toilet or the kitchen, I will have to take him with me. Or just not go to either of those places unless I have him put to bed upstairs or something.
He has not used his crib at all so far - well, I tried him in it when he was fast asleep once at under a week old, and he stayed asleep less than 10 minutes on his back in there, and then woke up kind of fussy. He sleeps with me at night and I have no plans to change that any time soon. LOVE co-sleeping! :) For naps though, once Neil is not with the little ones in the day times, I need to do something different I think. While he's tiny, he is safe on my bed unsupervised, but only until he gets near to the age where he could roll. And even so, I don't feel safe even now putting him there for naps, because Arthur and Matthew are able to let themselves upstairs through the kiddy gate now, and I don't want them to have access to him on the bed if I don't know they're in there.
Soooo I will try transferring him to his crib once he's fallen asleep either breastfeeding or in the bouncy chair. I am not too confident about it because if I put him on his back he is likely to wake up pretty quickly. If I am in the room with him all the time, I have been putting him on his tummy to sleep, because he goes off to sleep on my front (tummy down) and his front is therefore all warm and toasty, and he stays settled if he goes down on his tummy if he fell asleep that way. He sleeps for a couple of hours every time like that. I am not crazy about sort of training him to be a tummy sleeper though, because at night he sleeps on his side or on his back next to me in between nursing, and he seems to have no problems sleeping on his back. So I don't want to mess with a good thing! I know how hard it is to try to get a baby to sleep on his back who is plain hurting or uncomfortable on his back for whatever reason - two of mine have been that way, but Samuel is definitely not so far. I don't want to lay him down in his crib on his tummy to sleep and then walk away and shut the door. So I will persevere trying to transfer him asleep onto his back in the crib and hope he stays sleeping. I think he will wake within 5 minutes every time and eventually get cross and overtired, but I'll give it a try anyway. I also suspect he'll take some of his naps actually in the bouncy chair. He is disturbed by the noise around him so I want to try to get him napping upstairs if possible, because it doesn't seem fair to him to see him flinching and startling at crashes and bangs and screeches from his brothers, even though he stays asleep! That can't be as good a quality of sleep for him, and I want him to be well rested at all times.
Anyway, so I need to change the crib sheets tonight in preparation for tomorrow, and also find the spare monitor to plug in where he'll be sleeping, so I can hear when he stirs. The video monitor is in the boys' room so I can see/hear when Benjamin wakes from his nap and during the evening, but we have an old monitor (which hopefully still works!) that I need to put in with Samuel too.
I hope I can do it! I feel like I'm pretty sure I CAN do it, but it's a bit nerve-wracking at the moment! I need to somehow stay calm and sane so that I treat the boys the way they should be treated, and not get snappy or shouty or irritable with them if I get tired. They are HARD work, behaviour-wise, so that's a challenge at the best of times.
Samuel is doing great! :) The midwife came yesterday and discharged us to the Health Visitor, who will be coming tomorrow at noon. I am sad and nostalgic about the midwife discharging us because it is an official closure to the whole pregnancy and birth thing, which - as you know - I absolutely love and adore! :) So I am sad to leave that behind. Again! I can't believe I have done it five times now, and I feel kind of clutchy around the throat thinking that I may not have many more times left to experience, compared with how many I have been through already. I mean, I can't see myself being pregnant five more times, as much as I would LOVE to. I'll be 35 next month. I am hoping and praying (actively!) for more babies yet!
Samuel is waking so I will have to finish this later. I have photos to add, and just a bit more waffle about my darling boy! I'm so besotted with him, he is just delightful and lovely in every way and it's going to be hard to get back to normal life when I'm still SO in babymoon mode!
Oh, he seems to have resettled himself (he's on his tummy next to me in bed), so I'll carry on for now!
The midwife weighed Samuel yesterday at 12 days old and he now weighs 10lbs 2.5oz! He was 9lbs 1.5oz exactly a week before, so he has gained over a lb in a week! She was very pleased with his weight gain and his colour. He had a lot of swelling and bruising to his face, which has FINALLY started to go. I would say his swelling is all gone now, and his bruising almost all gone - it's not really noticable at all any more unless you know what to look for. Poor little man still has red patches on the whites of his eyes from the birth, and the midwife told me that can take several weeks to clear up. I am noticing today that the worst patch has started to look less red at last, and the others are more pinky now, so that's good. Anyway, she was very pleased with him because even with bruising he has had no jaundice whatsoever. He has been feeding almost constantly though, so that will have been flushing his system out very well.
He feeds on demand, basically whenever he is awake, hehe! I am working on making sure he has FULL feeds, so if he dozes off after one full side, I still wake him up and offer him the other side. Once he's well and truly stuffed, I let him sleep. He will then typically sleep for a couple of hours, or 2.5 hours even. My policy this time around is to make sure that's the longest he sleeps before I wake him up and feed him again. The idea is that with feeds no further apart than 2.5 hours in the day, he will be well tanked up during the day and eventually begin to space out his night-time feeds by himself. I hope! I have no idea of his nights, none at all! I lay down next to him and nurse him, and we both fall asleep. Next thing I know, he's fussing and I wake up enough to offer him the other breast and fall back to sleep. Fast forward to another moment where I become aware of him fussing, and I glance at the clock and acknowledge the time, offer him the breast and fall back to sleep. When I next wake, I have no recollection of the time I saw on the clock the last time, offer the boy the breast and fall back to sleep. And so it goes on! So I just can't tell you anything at all about his nights. I don't know how often he wakes, how many times each night, how long he feeds for, how much sleep I'm missing or how often my sleep is disturbed. I'm a bit frustrated because I really DO want to know the answers, and I try to be aware of it during the night, but I'm so half asleep that I forget it before morning comes and can't recall it by then! I think I would have to come round enough to physically write down the time each time I wake, to know how the nights are going, but that seems like a big faff so I probably won't get around to that! It's a GOOD way to do it, as it preserves my sleep in the best way possible. Samuel nurses back to sleep right away every time I feed him at night, and often has alert times after feeding during the day, so I am happy to see him being specific in that way about day and night. I don't give him the opportunity to be alert and wakeful in the night mind you! ;) I fall asleep and don't engage him at all. I also don't change his nappy at all, unless he is wet through (not happened yet) or has obviously pooed. Once or twice I have missed a pooey nappy until a couple of hours later because I have just fallen back to sleep and missed it, which I feel bad about!
He did start to get a couple of sore patches when he was first doing lots and lots of breastmilk poo after his meconium cleared out, so I've been using Sudocrem since then and he has no sore or red patches any more, even if he poos frequently. He typically will do 3 or 4 pooey nappies in the space of about 30 minutes, and then nothing for 5 or 6 hours, so that's better than some of my little ones who have just pooed and pooed and pooed around the clock and ended up sore no matter the barrier cream! It never really cleared up until a couple of months later when the frequency of poos calmed down.
Samuel's eyes are grey. They were so dark and murky the first week, and even with good light from the window and him looking directly into it, I still couldn't see any discernable colour to them, just dark murkiness. But this week they have been lightening up just slightly, and I can see that they're dark grey at the moment (no blue at all), and there is a ring around the pupil that I can't describe at the moment, but it could turn into a sort of tan-coloured ring like Benjamin's, I am guessing. Benjamin's are grey with a tan ring, just like mine, and I wonder if Samuel's will be similar. No way to really know this early, but I like guessing! :) They could also turn brown, as Arthur's started out grey too. His eyebrows and eyelashes are starting to "come out" now and so far to me they look light brown, so I think he'll have the same hair colour as Arthur and Benjamin. Nathan's is similar too, but his hair is slightly darker brown than the others, and Matthew's is quite fair - a cross between blonde and light brown. I think Samuel's eyebrows are more brown than Matthew's were though, so I think his colouring will be more like Arthur and Benjamin.
Samuel definitely looks most like Matthew in the face (their noses are almost identical!) but he's also a mix of all of them. It's lovely to see the unique combinations of each child as they arrive! This is probably a good time to post some photos! :) I think Samuel has been asleep nearly 2.5 hours now so I need to wake him up and feed him if he doesn't wake up himself. Here are the latest photos - starting way back on Christmas Eve at 3 days old:
Here is Samuel on Christmas Day in another Christmas outfit! :) Good old eBay! His eyes were still swollen, and his bruising probably peaked from that day. It seemed to really come up. He was looking at the window (he seems to really like looking at any light source, especially natural light, and will stare at it for ages and ages):
I already have a photo of Samuel in the Mr. Bump sleepsuit (which they all wear and get photographed in!) which I posted last entry. But here's another one, just for the records! He was 6 days old here, and really did not fit it any more in the length. He doesn't fit ANY of his newborn (up to 10lbs) sleepsuits now - his feet are restricted by the length as he's such a LONG baby! Neil got the box of 0-3 month clothes out of the loft today and the first load is in the washing machine, so that's a relief! I can't believe we're cracking that box open so soon! Anyway, here is Samuel looking at the window again, in the Mr. Bump sleepsuit! :)
So many people keep on saying how BIG he is, which I guess he is for a brand new baby, but as far as human beings go he is still EVER SO TINY! And that's how he seems to me, he is just soooo teeny tiny in my eyes, almost to the point where I can't understand why people keep on about how big he is, lol! I took a photo of him sleeping on his front with my hand laid gently on his head, just because when I was stroking his little head like that, it struck me again how tiny he was, and so I wanted to capture that to dispel the myth that he's this gigantic baby! ;) He was 6 days old here too:
Here is a series of photos that I took when Samuel was 8 days old, just before the boys' bedtime. Arthur and Matthew came up to see him as they often do at that time of day, and I realised I didn't yet have any photos of the boys with Samuel, except for the one I posted last entry of Benjamin holding him. So I got out my camera, even in the poor light (hence grainy photos), and took a few photos of them. Matthew is very taken with Samuel (just as he was/is with Benjamin, only more so) and is a very calming influence - he gets very serious about him and talks in hushed tones near him, and constantly wants to stroke or kiss him. He strokes his little head or tummy soooo gently and carefully. That's why he's wearing such a serious expression in one of these photos - this is Matthew looking after Samuel and taking the job very seriously. They are both giving him a kiss in the last photo, when it was time for them to go and get ready for bed :)
And lastly, here are 3 photos of Samuel taken when he was 9 days old, on my bed. His one Christmas present was a Very Hungry Caterpillar touchy-feely toy, and he does seem to focus on it and look at it so I put it near him sometimes for him to look at. I put it on the bed and fiddled about with depth of field, wanting to focus on Samuel and make the caterpillar blurry. While I was doing that I managed to catch him starting to smile at me! :) Samuel looked me right in the eye at 7 days old, raised his eyebrows in surprise as though recognising me for the first time, and SMILED! I couldn't believe it because he was only 7 days old, long before babies are apparently "able" to do proper social smiles yet, but I knew it was not wind, and was definitely "social" behaviour. Matthew and Benjamin were my previous earliest smilers at 3 weeks old which was already "early", but 7 days?!! I do know baby smiles by now, after 5 babies, but I still didn't mention it at first in case I was wrong. But he has smiled at me about once or twice a day, every day since, and at Neil a couple of times too. All the occasions were when he was particularly alert, focused on our faces, and being held about 12 inches from our faces as we talked to him. Definitely social smiles! :) I still can't believe he's doing it so early but there we go! In the last photo here, he was just beginning a smile - see how his eyes are so different and all lit up as he switches into his "social" mode?! :) Such a sweet little peanut!
He's fed and asleep curled up on my chest right now. Bliss!!! I will miss it so much tomorrow but at least I can still do it in the evenings and at the weekends! This precious stage is so fleeting and passes WAY too quickly. How I long to slow down time so that I can revel and soak in it all I like! *sigh*
The one sad thing that I have noticed about my sweet little Samuel is that he has undoubtedly got Arthur's curly feet :( I'm soooo sad about it, though my mum reminds me that it's not bad going to only have two out of five with the stupid curly feet gene (okay she didn't call it that, but that's what I think of the darn thing!), considering Neil was one of 3 siblings affected by it out of 4. Ugh. I know it means many rounds of both his little legs in full plaster casts, traipsing back and forth to the hospital with all the kiddies for frequent appointments, night boots that will disturb his sleep, and follow ups FOREVER where the physio struggles to figure out why his feet are not staying straight despite the treatment (ongoing with Arthur, whose feet are still curly and whose next appt is next month). So sad to have to begin it all over again, and to have to see my little baby in plaster casts. His feet don't look as curly as Arthur's did before his first casts, BUT the thing that concerns me is that they also turn in at the ankle, which Arthur's didn't, sort of suspiciously like clubfoot. But, I can flex them into a straight foot position, but they don't have any flexibility beyond that. I will not be hanging around waiting for the Health Visitor to notice and refer him, which is how we did it with Arthur and the physio told me she really should have seen him as a newborn (he was 3 months old before his appt came through). I will be phoning Arthur's physio tomorrow morning, and I'm sure she'll arrange to see Samuel pretty quickly.
*sigh*
Other than that, things are going well with my newest little man! When the midwife was packing up to go yesterday, she said (completely deadpan), "See you again later this year?" LOVE THAT, hehe! I answered, "Yeah, probably!" ;) And she said, "Going to be another boy?" And I said, "I should think so! I'm thinking of names already!" - which (shh!) I am! ;) Pretty sure that if God blesses us with another baby it will likely be a boy! And I'm already excited about that - my desire for a daughter, whilst THERE, seems to diminish with each baby that comes. I'm more excited for another sweet baby boy right now, than a baby girl. I love my boys! :)
Okay, that's all for now. I will try to update again soon, and work on my birth story in bits whenever I can. Heather has written loads of notes during my labour and no doubt will give me a copy next time I see her, so that will help me! :)
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