First baby

- Oh Happy Daze

Dear daughter,

Dear 2 month old daughter,

When you look at me and smile that gummy, toothless grin and give me a little snorty laugh it melts my heart completely and I don’t ever want that moment to end because I know that there will come a day when just the simple sight of my face won’t bring about that gleeful response. But until then I am super-mom, the most important person in your life!

…and then you turn to the pile of washcloths folded on the back of the sofa and give it that same gummy, toothless grin and a snorty laugh even greater than the one you gave me and my mommy super-powers are deflated. womp womp.

I won’t take it personally, but as your mother I should caution you about your choice of friends. I’m just sayin’.

love, mom

 

- Oh Happy Daze

How to get your infant to take medicine – It’s a miracle!

As you know, Charlotte’s been dealing with some reflux issues {aka GERD}. She has silent reflux, meaning the spit-up comes up into her throat and mouth but then is swallowed back down instead of being spit out {most of the time} – not a lot of clean-up for mom {unless I do something silly like put her on her tummy too soon after eating…. bad mommy!}, but more pain for her because the acid passes through her throat twice! Poor little lamb. Here’s a video of me torturing Charlotte with tummy time – spoiler alert: someone {I won’t say who} spits up.

Yikes, who’s manning the camera anyway?! Don’t quit your day job!

I do think I should get some brownie points for not screaming or gagging, though. Yay me!

At her one month check-up Charlotte’s pediatrician and I opted to try some postural techniques to alleviate the reflux instead of using medication. The amount she was actually spitting-up {spitting out really} greatly reduced with just a bit more work on my part:

1. We keep her upright for about 30 minutes after each meal {This means not laying down, but also not in a sitting position that squishes her belly}. This isn’t too difficult, although in the middle of the night it does make for a very long process. During the day I like to sit with her propped up against my thighs – that way she’s upright and we can get some good ‘face time’ while we’re at it – woohoo, efficiency!! At night I just keep her up on my shoulder so she can go back to sleep.

2. One of Chris’ coworkers let us borrow “The Reflux Pillow“. It’s a wedge that the baby sleeps on to keep them at a 30* incline. The first night I put Charlotte on the pillow she slept for 6 hours! Initially, though, I was very skeptical- mostly because the pillow looked outdate, the website looked outdate… everything looked OLD and I didn’t want to put her on something that was no longer safe. I did extensive internet research for any reviews/complaints/recalls but couldn’t find much. The only comments I read were regarding older babies wiggling themselves partially out of the straps which could be dangerous if they get stuck in a bad position. I will have to make a decision about whether or not to continue using the pillow when Charlotte gets older and is moving a lot more. For now, she stays perfectly strapped in throughout the night and continues to average 6 hours each night, sometimes more!

3. I nurse her in more of an upright position, rather than a cradle/laying down position.

These postural changes definitely helped reduce the amount that she was spitting up and improved her comfort level throughout the day. However, the biggest issue continued to be while she was actually nursing or taking a bottle. She would pull off frequently, arch her back, cry, cough, choke, spit up  while she was actually drinking. It didn’t seem to make a difference whether she nursed or took a bottle of expressed milk. It is so hard to see her in pain and I didn’t want her to begin associating meal time with pain.  At Charlotte’s two month check-up the pediatrician prescribed a small amount of Zantac to help. I’ll keep you posted on whether or not that helps, but the issue then became giving her the medication! It has a very strong ‘mint’ odor, so I’m sure it tastes strong too. I used the medicine syringe and put the first dose inside her mouth along side her cheek to reduce the amount of contact with her taste buds. Fail. She immediately spit it all out and began screaming, which seems to usually activate her reflux even more. She may not be able to say ‘yuck’ yet, but she certainly got the message across with her facial expression. PLan B. It was time for some ingenuity and good ‘ol fashion sneakiness. I remember reading this trick somewhere {maybe Pinterest?} but I couldn’t find the source when I went to look for it. Just know that this was not really my brain child and that someone out there is way smarter than me and deserves credit for thinking this up.

I took a pacifier {one of the giant ones with an open back that they gave us in the hospital} and made a cross-cut in the very tip. This is what a cross cut looks like – though I made my cuts even smaller.

Here’s our set-up. Medicine in the syringe, hole cut in the pacifier, and a baby {that last part is optional…. I mean,  you could be someone who gets their kicks cutting holes in pacifiers, I don’t know?! sicko}

This was her before the medicine… I think she suspects some sneakiness is going on.

Keep in mind, this only works if your baby takes a pacifier {obviously} and is wanting one at that moment. Sometimes Charlotte refuses a pacifier and sometimes she loves it; we just got lucky with this experiment.

As soon as she latched on I injected the medicine into the bowl of the pacifier and she sucked it right down. Keep in mind, I didn’t squirt the medicine into her mouth through the hole in the pacifier – that would probably have made her choke. Instead, I put the medicine into the bowl and let her suck it out at her own pace.

If you try this technique be sure to pull the pacifier out once the medicine is all gone to prevent your kiddo from sucking down air. Also, be sure to wash the pacifier thoroughly to remove any medicine and to remove any lingering medicine taste, which might thwart your efforts if you try this technique again.

Any hint of trickery and the game is up!

I’m just sayin’.

- Oh Happy Daze

Happy Two Months of Life!

Our sweet Charlotte is two months old on Thursday. Time is moving impossibly fast – It’s both exciting and heart breaking all at the same time. As thrilled as I am to see who she will grow to be as she achieves each new milestone I almost can’t bear to see her change anymore. I love who she is right now in this moment so much. But I am comforted with the fact that I have been able to take oodles of photos and video snippets of her over the past 2 months. I know I won’t always have that luxury (yay for maternity leave and for her being our first born!). Now, on to the official documentation of the past month!

At two months Charlotte..

  • Weighs …. who knows?! It is at least more than the 8 lbs. 4 oz. that she weighed at her 1 month appointment. We will know the details after her 2 month appointment in a few days – stay tuned!
  • Is starting to gain some ‘chunk’ and is filling out her newborn clothing really well.
  • Is still a snuggle bug and likes to nestle into your neck for a snooze.
  • Sometimes cries when she wakes up from her naps (as if she is scared and doesn’t know what’s going on… breaks my heart to see her little eyes well up with tears).
  • Is not yet loving tummy time. At her one month checkup the pediatrician noticed her head tilting to her right side and since then I’ve noticed that she doesn’t seem to want to turn her head to look to the right all the time – Commence exercises recommended by my PT friends who report that this is most likely due to the reflux.
  • Is not a peaceful eater. She grunts, she cries, she pinches and punches at mommy… it’s quite dramatic, to say the least, but probably relates to the reflux as well.  I haven’t really tried yet but I don’t think I could discretely nurse her in public … there’s no hiding the flailing piranha under a nursing cover and with all the grunting people might think I’m smuggling a baby piglet under my shirt. We’ve gotten by so far with carefully timed nursing before we venture out of the house and with bottles of expressed milk.
  • Has actually completed several car rides without a single whimper, though the tearful car rides are still prevalent.
  • Really loves diaper changing time. I don’t know if it’s the time of day because she’s so alert, the pictures and mirror I have hanging on the wall over the dresser, or that we are helping her get out of a soggy diaper that she loathes… but whatever it is she loves to laugh and talk and wiggle about while we discuss the plan for the day and which adorable outfit she will show off.
  • Has really found her voice and already has an arsenal of sounds (which her speech therapist mommy is SO proud of) – she cries, laughs, squeals, coos and shouts and she definitely uses them differentially and with purpose  – We love seeing her personality emerging.

Less than a month left of my maternity leave. Dagger.

Dishes and laundry can wait. I’m going to spend these next few weeks snuggling with my baby.

Priorities. I’m just sayin’.

- Oh Happy Daze

A Baby Story (Part Two)

If you’re just tuning in, my last post was about the events surrounding Charlotte’s arrival. I wanted to make sure I documented some of the details of those crazy first days because, let’s face it, it’s something that will only happen once (and it’s not like the parameters of my memory are never-ending. Actual factual: I have the worst memory ever). Charlotte was born early, early Saturday morning and by Sunday evening our new little family was headed home! Unfortunately, the story doesn’t end there. Fair warning, this is another looooong post.

On the following Tuesday (2 days after leaving the hospital) I woke up with a really terrible headache. I am prone to tension headaches and headaches from dehydration so I chalked my pain up to new baby stress and forgetting to drink water. By wednesday night the migraine had become so terribly painful… I was almost wishing to trade it for labor contractions again! Thursday morning I finally decided to call my OB’s office; after heading in for a blood pressure check and finding that it was 192/106 my doctor told us (in a very calm voice so as not to alarm me I guess) to head over to the emergency room and that she was going to call ahead of us and talk to the ER triage nurse about her concerns for preeclampsia (which can apparently occur after you’ve already had your baby, though it’s not so common).

The adventure begins.

We get to the ER. I have to explain numerous times to nurses that I’ve “already had my baby” and “well, apparently it can happen even after you’ve had your baby”. Well, we sat and we waited and we waited. The waiting room was packed (crazy for a Thursday morning!). Charlotte slept perfectly for most of the 2 hours that we waited (I know right?! TWO HOURS before even being called back!). Eventually, though, she got hungry while in the waiting room. Being new to the whole nursing thing, I wasn’t coordinated enough yet to juggle her and a nursing cover and all parts required to nurse her right there (with the whole waiting room looking on). If I could do it over I would have asked a nurse to let me use a room or sit behind a curtain or something, but that didn’t occur to me at the moment. I was just trying to help my screaming child and find any sort of relief from the headache monster. I ended up nursing her in the bathroom (EEK, I know!) and almost cried from the thought of her breathing in those germs (along with all the germs she probably breathed in from the waiting room).

Eventually we were given a room in the ER. Blood draw, urine sample, CT scan (just to be thorough). I was eventually diagnosed with postpartum hypertension and started on magnesium treatment (to prevent seizures) and medication to lower my blood pressure. No relief from the migraine yet. We spent at least 4 more hours in the ER, and of course, my newborn daughter needed to nurse about two more times during those hours. The problem was that the ER nurse placed my IV port at the inside of my elbow so I wasn’t able to bend my arm to hold her, let alone nurse her. Chris is now an expert on nursing and could probably become an excellent lactation consultant, should he so desire, because of all that he had to do to help me. It was certainly a learning experience.

We were finally told we would be admitted and we were moved up to the Labor and Delivery department where they could better monitor my progress and were better equipped to handle preeclampsia issues. My nurse immediately moved my IV port to my forearm so I could move my arms a little better, saying “Those ER nurses don’t know nothin’ about nursing mamas and their babies”! Bless her. I was hooked up to a magnesium drip for more ‘seizure management’. Unfortunately, my body wasn’t able to process the magnesium very well because by the next morning I had magnesium toxicity. I don’t recall this because I guess I was ‘out of it’ but Chris tells me that when the morning nurse came in after shift change she freaked out and began unplugging things, hooking up other things and called for a doctor (I’m pretty sure the word “STAT” was shouted in a very Grey’s Anatomy sort of way). The nurse told me later that when she saw that I was white as a sheet (even my lips) and limp as a rag doll that I gave her 20 gray hairs. My doctors decided that the risk from more magnesium treatment was greater than the risk of seizure so they discontinued the magnesium. Because it was still in my body, though, I was on a strict ‘liquid only’ diet (due to aspiration risk), which, roughly translated meant my nurse got to decide how many ice chips I could eat. Sad day for a girl who loves food.

To add to all of this, the doctors noticed that my creatinine levels (That’s some kidney lingo for those of you out there who don’t know) were very high and they were not sure if it was caused by the stress of the hypertension on my body or if it was something that was pre-existing. More blood draws, urine samples, ultrasounds of my kidneys, etc. No real answers. (Even as I’m writing this 4 weeks later, the nephrologist just told me at my outpatient visit “Well, something is jacked up with your kidneys, but we don’t really know what it is”).

This drama with hypertension, magnesium toxicity, and questionable kidney function went on for 4 days.  Also, there was a catheter involved. Vomiting (apparently pregnancy + me = vomiting). Some tears. Begging for food. More tears. Hair and face a mess from not being able to shower (well whole body a mess, really). Bed rest and orders from the doctors that I needed someone with me (especially when it came to taking care of Charlotte).  I am sort of able to laugh about the craziness of it now…. sort of.

Throughout all of this, though, Chris was my knight in shining armor. This was a true test of “in sickness and in health” (which oddly enough wasn’t actually a part of our wedding vows, just implied I guess). I’m not sure how he did it, but Chris managed to care for our newborn daughter and care for me (since I was on bed rest and ‘out of it’ for a bit) as well as stay emotionally strong. Not once did he complain. He kept me laughing (with episodes of Wipeout), he kept me relaxed (with a mix on my iPod), he took care of our daughter, and he very smartly kept me in the dark about things that would have made me freak out had I known what was going on at the time. He is truly an amazing husband and I couldn’t be more proud to be his wife.

God truly provided for us throughout this whole ordeal. We actually had to tell people they shouldn’t come visit in order to keep the atmosphere ‘calm’ and less stress-inducing. That’s how awesome our family, friends, and church are… we had to turn them away! There are no words to express how grateful we are for all of the support we received through meals, visits to the hospital, prayer, and family and friends willing to stay and ‘supervise’ me so Chris could have a break.

I guess all I can say is ‘thank you’.