Your Achievements!

22^nd of April 2011 (6 months and 4 weeks)

Hi Noah!

I’m taking some time while you’re napping to write to you. It’s been such a long time but I feel no real guilt as I’ve been constantly talking to you during the day (OH and you reply!). However, I do want to put some of your milestones in here, so that one day, you hopefully read this and know what you did and when you did it. 

Starting to coo: In December…So when you were about 3 months old, you really started to coo and to do it loudly!

 

Able to stand up while being assisted: January 25^th (5 months). Daddy would hold you and you would be able to stand up and even mimic walking. 

Able to sit: January 29^th (5 months). You were able to sit on your own without falling. 

Starting to crawl (able to crawl with hands but unable to move legs): February 17^th (4 months and 3 weeks). You figured it out pretty fast. You would go from trying to crawl to sit! (super cute).

Stand up without assistance (but holding yourself on furniture): 7^th of March (5 months 2 weeks). We left you in your bassinette (highest level) and we came back to find a suicidal baby ready to jump out of it. Heart attack….

Eating and crawling: 16^th of March (5 months and 3 weeks). We gave you some cantaloupe and broccoli though baby lead weaning (you eat by yourself) and you were fine. However, you didn’t eat too much, so we decided to try purees for a while and then we’ll move into BLW. As for crawling, you just woke up one day and you were able to crawl. Yeah, you even got better at it now…

Teething: 20^th of April (6 months and 4 weeks). Dad and I noticed a white bump on your gum on the beginning of April. However it went away. It wasn’t until the  20^th that your Godmother and grandma noticed a tooth cutting in. It’s your left bottom front teeth. 

First words: Around 4-5 months. When you were upset you would say “mamamamamamama.” Eventually you also learned to say “mum” “Dada” “Gaga” and a whole bunch of new words and syllables. 

Sleeping without needing us there all the time: Mid 6 months. And let me tell you, it’s very appreciated!

As for breast milk: you are still being breastfed exclusively.

These are some of your achievements so far. We are so proud of you and cannot wait to see you grow…but please take your time.

We love you Baby!!

Mommy

Finally some news!

27^th of December  2011 (13 weeks and 2 days)

Hey Noah,

I’m sorry for not writing as much on the blog. There is so much to write about. I’m sorry also that I won’t be writing a lot but I am currently holding you. Yep, you fell asleep on my boob- again. You seem to enjoy falling asleep that way and I enjoy it too since I can be at the computer while you’re sleeping.

I wish I could write about all the progress you have done since my last post but I don’t think that will be possible so let’s only talk about the basics. Feeding wise it’s going okay. Only okay because in late November (when you were 2 months old) you got a cold. Nothing big but your appetite dropped and so did your weight. So we had to feed you more often, well actually force you to take the breast because you didn’t want to eat. Then you got your 2 month old shots and you got a more sick. You didn’t react very well. So you wouldn’t nurse during the day, just at night. You FINALLY got better around mommy’s birthday and you started to nurse all-the-time. I can’t complain though, I am happy that you’re healthy. You gained 500 grams since you have been feeling better. Awesome.

Other than that, you started to be able to roll over from your back to your tummy in early December. Now (well today to be precise) you started to be able to roll back and forth. That means you pick your sleeping position! Love that…we don’t have to guess anymore how you want to sleep. Let’s move on to a different topic…sleeping. It’s going very well. We co-sleep and you sleep very well with us. You usually start sleeping around 11h30pm and you wake up around 11h00am…That’s actually great-thanks baby! I really love sleeping with you.

You also started to grab objects. By objects I mean anything. We have to keep you distant from everything. You also started to grab the cat… That’s well, he doesn’t like it.

You’re cooing much more and you’re actually pronouncing some syllables- just not together. To summarize it all, you’ve grown so fast. 

Mommy and Daddy love you very much Noah!

P.S. I am so sorry that I wasn’t able to keep up with this blog. Taking care of a newborn isn’t exactly relaxing hehe. Specially Noah…

5 weeks old baby!

October 30^th 2011 (5 weeks old)

Dear Noah,

You’re growing up so fast. I can’t believe how much you’ve changed. Some of your newborn clothes don’t fit anymore and the blankets we used at the hospital are getting too small to swaddle you. I just don’t know, it seems like we just got out of the hospital and yet it also feel like I know you since ever. Weird huh? 

You currently weight 4900 grams (you’re gaining about 40 grams per day) and you’re growing very tall. Actually, the only reason why your newborn clothes still fit you is because you’re long, not big. Anyways, I know you’re young and everything but here is my first piece of advice for you; if you decide to procreate in the future, do it with someone that is very patient or be extremely patient yourself. It takes skills to handle you baby Noah…

First, YOU decide how you want to be handled. If you want to stand, you stand. If you want to sit, we must sit you. If you want to fly, we better make sure we make you fly. Here is what I don’t understand. When we make you “fly” we do the exact same movement as the very expensive swing we got you- WHY do you not like the swing but adore our arms? 

Second, when you are not happy, you’re really not happy. You seriously scream bloody murder. I don’t even know why it happens. Sometimes I seriously believe that you cry just to cry. Everything is fine with you, you’re content and all of a sudden you decide to start crying. Okay…well. We hold you (in 10000 different positions trying to soothe you) and listen to you cry. Let me tell you, I’ve heard better music.

Third, you don’t seem to enjoy sleep as much as mommy and daddy do. We put you to sleep everything seems fine when all of a sudden you wake up after 15 minutes. Seriously? 15 minutes? You think that’s enough? So we put you back to sleep. And you wake up after another 15 minutes. I don’t know if you enjoy making us go crazy but we really really like it when you sleep for 2-3 hours in a row. Keep doing that. Try to reduce the 15 minutes naps.

Forth, will you ever get off that boob? It seems like I feed you every hour for 1 hour each time. Seriously. Grow your own! 

That being said, daddy and I really enjoy having you around. Sure it’s not easy but it’s so worth it. Sometimes we’ll be exhausted or upset because we can’t figure what’s wrong with you and you just give us one of those cute smiles or you just do something cute in general (like punch yourself in the face and start crying) and we just forget all the rest. You’re getting pretty good at drinking. I just put you near the nipple and you can find it by yourself. I barely have to hold it. We are also trying new breastfeeding positions. So far so good. I can officially say that I can sleep while you’re breastfeeding. The problem with that is that when you’re no longer on the breast, I dream that you are. Oh well.

You’re also becoming much more vocal. You make a lot of new sounds and you enjoy repeating them over and over. It’s exciting! Soon you’ll be able to let us know what’s up with you and why you’re crying. Oh! And you can finally stay in your crib looking at your mobile for a good 10-15 minutes. Woohooo!!!! Mommy can actually go to the bathroom without you! Honestly, it feels great. You seem pretty happy when hear and see the mobile play. So I’m guessing you really enjoy it. The only thing left now is to like you’re swing. 

Almost forgot, you don’t scream bloody murder anymore when we give you a bath or when we change your diaper. You actually like warm (hottish) baths and you cry when we take you out- or when the water gets cold. As for diapers (by the way you’ve gone through +400 in two months- no kidding), you are okay with it. You’re not happy but you’re not crying which is a great improvement.

I can’t wait to see you grow a little more and at the same time, I don’t want time to go by so fast. 

We love you little bean, be good and sleep at night,

Mommy & Daddy

Baby Blues and Postpartum Depression

October 26^th 2011 (4 weeks 3 days)

Hi everyone!

Baby Noah is sleeping next to me as usual. I’m watching him because he’s sleeping on is stomach and yea- he’s not supposed to. We find it’s best that way since he has lots of gas and sleeping on his stomach eases the pain by a lot (he farts so much)! I thought I would write today about a serious topic that hit me very strong after birth; baby blues and Postpartum Depression.

My husband and I went to prenatal classes. There were four of them and one of them was about postpartum depression. I remember coming out of that class thinking; that was useless and boring! After all, I’m such a happy person and I have never suffered from depression, nor has anyone in my family. So we thought that class was perfectly useless to us.

Turns out I wish I had listened. Our birth didn’t go as planned. We wanted a natural birth at home and we ended up having to be induced at the hospital. Noah was over 42 weeks and he didn’t have enough fluid left. Not only was I put under Pitocin but our birth story ended up in a c-section, so we also needed to get an epidural (that didn’t work) and then a spinal. Everything was going fine and I labored “naturally” with Pitocin for 15 hours before knowing I would have a c-section. That gave me about an hour to realize what was happening and that my dream birth wouldn’t come true. Not even a little bit. The moment I found my first instinct was not to panic and to think about Noah and my husband. I knew I would be fine but I could only imagine how my husband felt about this operation. I could almost run his thoughts through my mind and my priority was to comfort him and assure to him that everything would be okay. I would be fine, Noah was going to be fine, we would be a happy family. Maybe I shouldn’t have acted to strong. Maybe I should have let my true feelings out but at that moment, I had such an adrenaline going through my mind and body that all that mattered was to get Noah out safely and make sure the husband would be okay with me being operated and him having to take care of Noah for his first hours of life alone. 

The rest was history. Noah came out, he was perfect. I cried when I heard his first cry- I was so happy. I started breastfeeding and he latched on like a pro! We couldn’t have been happier. The next day, my midwife came to visit and asked “how I felt about the c-section.” How did I feel? Who cares! Noah is here and it had to be done anyways, right? The second day, I woke up during the night. I wasn’t able to fall back asleep… and that’s where my nightmare started. 

Before I start this, I all the readers to know that if you are in this situation- PLEASE seek help. Don’t be afraid or ashamed there is nothing wrong about asking for help. 

So, it all started at the hospital when I suddenly woke up for no apparent reason. I then looked at Noah, sleeping next to me and this strange thought came through my mind; I’m exhausted, I can’t walk because of my c-section, I can’t even grab him, I obviously will never be able to raise this child. I stayed awake all night thinking of this. Then, the next morning, the nurse came to weight Noah. She weights him and said he had lost too much weight. He had lost 10% of his weight and that was the maximum he could lose. That honestly crushed me. I was breastfeeding non-stop, on demand. He was latching on properly and everything was fine! Why the hell was he losing weight? I called my midwife and told her about the issue. She told me to get the hell out of the hospital. It would only stress me. I left a few hours later.

Then it was sleepless nights and nasty thoughts going through my mind (mainly about not wanting this baby since I wasn’t able to take care of him). The thoughts would be present mainly at night but it wasn’t rare that throughout the day I had them. I also wasn’t hungry at all. So I barely ate (bad for breastfeeding!). I remember feeling totally lost and losing control. I would talk to my husband about it but he couldn’t help. He knew that I am a good mom, a good wife, that I shouldn’t be concerned but my mind didn’t care. I didn’t want to breastfeed anymore. I was super unmotivated. I mean, what is the point of breastfeeding anyways? He can just get formula, why should I kill myself when I’m not good enough? Then, came the need to reject him. I didn’t want to look at him, didn’t want to hold him. I just didn’t want to be his mom. My husband asked me seriously “Do you want to give him up for adoption?” I thought about it and said “No.” but I wasn’t convinced. YES it’s THAT awful. My midwife had told us something about the third day being very hard mentally. So we were sure that was it…but it continued the fourth, fifth and sixth day. I didn’t know what to do anymore and decided to give a call to my midwife during a crisis at 11h30pm. She couldn’t do much over the phone but she gave me the best advice ever; “take one minute at a time.” Not…one day at a time, no no, one minute. I did. The next day, she sent a midwife that I get along with to come and talk to me. We spoke about how upset I was, about my labor that went awfully wrong. It felt good. I cried, I laughed, then cried again and laughed because I didn’t know what was going on. She said that it was most likely baby blues but that she would be honest with me; she didn’t know if it would go away. If I still felt that way after 2 weeks I would need medication. Meanwhile, she told me that sleeping and eating would help a lot. She also weight baby to reassure me that he was gaining weight. He was, he gained 120 grams in a day which is almost impossible but it made me feel so good. He was back to his birth weight. 

Before leaving, the midwife told me to try two things to sleep; Rescue remedy and Homeogene 46. TRY IT! Rescue remedy is really worth trying. I slept so well. I felt so good the next day. I was still depressed but I actually had the strength to take care of Noah. Then, after that, it went better. After a week, I was good. For me, baby blues reached its peak at 5 days and then decreased. By two weeks, nothing was left. If I’m really tired, I still have days where I feel more depressed but it’s normal. 

As a final advice for ladies with Baby blues, hold your baby. I know you don’t want to. I know it’s hard. I know…I just know how it feels but hold him. Tell him all that you feel. When he cries, hold him. Never let go of him. If you breastfeed, put him on the breast as much as possible. Even if you don’t want to, you’ll see that once your baby starts sucking you’ll feel better. Also, REST. Don’t be silly- when baby sleeps-SLEEP! Even if you can only sleep 10 minutes, it makes a difference. Also, eat! Find time to prepare something quick to eat…you need energy. Lastly, don’t be afraid to ask for help. Talk about it. Talk about the way you feel, how powerless you are, how bad you feel, how you don’t want this baby, how this is not the way you had things planned. Talk it out! Don’t be afraid to ask for help- do yourself and your baby a favor- ask for help. 

Good luck ladies, it’s not easy, it’s extremely hard but you can do it and most important; you are not alone.

Adapting to Baby...

24^th of October 2011 (4 weeks 1 day)

Hi Noah,

I’m writing this as you as sleeping on your stomach by my side while the cat is sleeping between my legs. See, while you sleep on your stomach, we have to constantly watch you because it’s not considered safe. So, Mommy is giving up on sleeping time to make you sleep. Isn’t that great? I prefer to be sleep deprived then to hear you cry all morning though. Just a personal choice. Daddy is gone to work and we’re here…with Soleil. Lots of things have been going on during those past weeks. Probably too much to write on here or even to remember. You’re growing so fast. You had your three week appointment with the midwife and you’re doing great. You weight almost 10lbs and you’re 56cm long. You’re growing so fast!!! 5,5cm in 3 weeks dude! You’re also learning to do some sounds and you actually have a schedule at night (much appreciated-thanks). You fall asleep at 10pm after Mommy breastfeeds you, then you wake up at 2am for a diaper change and some more food. Next feeding is at 4am and then at 6am. Not too bad, right? Usually, after that you don’t have a schedule. Sometimes you’ll sleep till 11am, other times you’ll wake up every hour. Granted that when you wake up constantly you get very fussy. Not fun for neither of us. If you sleep a lot though, you’re in an excellent mood. We love that!

In the afternoon, when daddy arrives, he usually takes care of you. He’ll take you if you’re sleeping and if you’re not, he’ll make you sleep. Recently it’s gotten difficult because you LOVE to cry yourself to sleep. There is nothing we can do. You’re changed, fed, burped, no gas, you’re not cold or hot. You just want to cry and sleep. We still try to sooth you and hold you but you just cry in our arms. It’s hard for us but we know you’re just tired and want to go to bed…It gets hard for Daddy because he doesn’t like to hear you cry. Mommy is used to it and to be honest with you, I just embrace it… One day you’ll grow up and you will be able to communicate better with us. When you’ll be tired, you’ll say “Mom, I’m tired, read me a story so I can sleep please” (or something of the sort) but right now you just do “OOIN OOIN”. It will get better. We’re still trying to figure out what you mean when you do little sounds or little movements. We’ll get there- I promise. All that matters is that we love you and you…well…you don’t love us yet. Noah, whatever what happens to you in 15 years or so, whenever you feel like we’re working against you, please don’t forget all that we’ve done for you and that we were able to deal with you when we didn’t even know what was wrong. Just let us know what you want and need. We can deal with it. There is nothing that love can’t overcome and trust me- every day that goes by, we love you more. 

That’s the update we got for now. I’ll write more to you later- you’re waking up!

We love you Baby!