Survival

We're two weeks into parenthood! What an adventure. It's definitely been an exhausting transition, but I'm not complaining. I love this little man more than anything. He's already been my whole world for a long time, the deal is just definitely sealed.

Some of our greater challenges right now have been feedings and sleep - of course... sleep. My milk didn't come in until the later end of the acceptable timeline and it caused Nolan to lose 10% of his body weight which had all the doctors flipping out. He's just in the 2% for weight and 7% on length and head circumference.

When my milk did come in, I got that terrible Mastitis breast infection. That was no fun at all. Also, engorgement is so uncomfortable. Pretty weird to go up two cup sizes overnight. Literally.

Thankfully, mine only lasted about 48 hours. Then, I got some clogged milk ducts which was another discomfort. That lead to some red blotchy spots and fever and eventually the diagnosis of Mastitis.

Luckily, we caught it very early. So we treated it quickly and I was able to breastfeed through it. 

Since it took my milk a bit to come in, he was use to eating about every hour. Yeah. That turned into a comfort eating thing. Or so the Pediatrician suspects. She told us to try and get it spaced out to every 2 1/2 to 3 hours - even though you're suppose to feed on demand (?). We're doing better. He does go about 2 1/2 to 3 hours between most feedings now. Though I do still get the occasional demand at the hour and a half mark. 

You guessed it, that means we're only sleeping in time frames from 1 to 3 hours. Actually, 3 hours of sleep hasn't happened for me yet. It's more like the 2 1/2 mark and just a few times 2 hours and 45 minutes. 

Of course, babies are suppose to eat that frequently in the first month, and even if he doesn't wake up I have an alarm set on my phone that goes off 3 hours past his last feeding. He usually wakes up before it though. 

They say 6-8 weeks is a good time to start sleep training, so I guess that's what we'll go for. 

On top of all of that he had a few hiccups with his umbilical cord and his circumcision. His cord must've got caught on something (I'm not sure how as we'd been clipping and sufficiently folding down diapers) and it tore about half way off a little too early. Of course, you have to leave it alone even still. So it bled, just a little, and they told us to go ahead and dab it with alcohol swabs once a day. I know it had to sting and he would cry... so then mom would cry. 

For his circumcision the procedure they used was the Plastibell. His bell did fall off right at the 10 day mark, but when it did it was hanging by like a string-sized piece of skin. Ouch :'(  They told us to put an antibiotic ointment or Vaseline on it and to not touch it. So that's what we did. About 4 hours later it had come off and looked fine. 

But, then, late in the night that same day I was changing his diaper and there was blood galore. That's probably the most flipping out I've done. I guess the skin that had caught on the bell, must've made a scab or something (? don't know, we're guessing here) and it might've been stuck to the diaper and pulled off. They said a few drops of blood was normal, but there was more than a few drops. 

Can you imagine the distress of changing your newborn son's diaper and seeing all of that? 

Trauma. For everybody. 

We called the hospital and they told us to rinse it off and if it stopped bleeding it should be fine, but that if it kept bleeding to take him to the ER. 

He was screaming of course. I can only imagine his discomfort and he was in so much distress that I could barely stand it. I was sobbing - probably more than him.

Of course, this was all made worse (for me) by the fact that Cory didn't even want him to be circumcised in the first place. I felt like it was all my fault :(

Thank the Lord, after we rinsed it all down and put some ointment on it it was fine and has since been fine. 

Whew. Mommy came very close to putting Nolan in the bed with us that night. But, I know that's a terrible thing to do and start, so we avoided it.

He did sleep in a bassinet in our room for the first week and then we transitioned him to his crib. In a lot of ways we have more monitoring on him in his crib with the movement sensor pad and the camera, etc. 

Though, Nolan has been much fussier these last two days, he is a way awesome baby. For the most part he's quiet (unless he's getting changed or hungry - he hates diaper changes).

He makes the most hilarious faces. I love when he's just about to fall asleep and he's slightly fighting it. It's like he loses control over his face and a flood of expressions cross it so quickly - his kiss-kiss face, a frown, a big smile, a cry face.

He loves to cuddle, he seems to like being in the moby wrap, and like most babies he enjoys his swing, bouncer, and car rides.

He hates getting cleaned up. He still hasn't had a real first bath yet, because we had to wait for the okay on the circumcision. But he's gotten a few real good sponge baths and he is not a fan.

He's too big for preemie clothes and too small for newborn clothes. Super frustrating. Though, the newborn stuff is fitting much better as he's grown in length a bit. But they still swallow him up. 

Oh... I so hope I get one of those fat, squishy, breast fed babies! Come on, Nolan! It's time to chub up, Son. This 2% stuff is not cuttin it...

His face is so much rounder these last few days though. Daddy was even making fun of it last night. Mmmm... such kissable little cheeks!

He's doing really well with head control too. I'm surprised by how much he'll hold it up when on his tummy.

Cory went back to work yesterday. It was so sad. We managed though, I even forfeited a nap to do some things in the house - bad idea in hindsight, but at least the house looks less gross now. 

And, I started our gDiapers yesterday, what was I thinking (first day without Dad, let's start cloth diapers)? We've had to wait because he was too small for them. They're still a little big on him, but I managed them all during the day yesterday with no leaking or catastrophes or anything. I love that they have the liners that you just pull out and flush. It really does take the mess out of cloth diapering. 

I'm not sure he likes them though. It'll take some adjusting on his part. They are a little bigger than regular diapers. Although the newborn style is bulkier than the others. I'm not sure why they did that. I think when he gets to the point of using the regular little gPants he'll be fine. But, he won't fit into those until he hits about 8 or 9 pounds. So... we'll see how this goes.

I think that about sums up our first few weeks. We're surviving. I'm managing to feed myself and a baby and keep us both clean and I'm getting some sleep. Though I do have days where by the end of it I realized I haven't brushed my hair, I'm still in my pajamas, and I have to really think on whether or not I brushed my teeth. Super hot.