Height: 25.5 inches (90th percentile)
Weight: 18 lbs 10.2 oz (100th1 percentile)
Head circumference: 16.5 inches (didn't bother telling us the percentile)
Shots: two in her right thigh and one in her left thigh (unhappy baby, got over it after turning red with anger and then nursing to contentment)
Development: seems to be pretty average on grabbing skills, above average on pushing up on her forearms during tummy time (but completely uninterested in rolling over), above average in standing (horrible balance), super alert (too alert?), coos and smiles appropriately, excellent eye contact
Comments from the pediatrician: "She seems old for her age."2 "I love her chubby limbs!"
Love and building immunities,
Jenna and Amelia
1 Hmm. Is there such a thing as the 100th percentile? I was always under the impression it was a mystical number, only to be obtained by sampling the ENTIRE population and to be proudly awarded to the data point with the truly largest value... Well, the pediatrician is under the impression Amelia is IT.↩
2 I think the idea she was trying to convey was that Amelia is so alert and attentive, like an older person in a baby's body. I think, anyway.↩
Monday, December 31, 2012
Sunday, December 30, 2012
2012 in Photographic Review
January
I think we announced to everyone that we were pregnant. We'd found out on Christmas 2011.
I got really sick.
James was in his second year of grad school, working toward his PhD in mathematics.
February
Like, really sick. Hyperemesis gravidarum, sick.
I had to start working very part-time.
March
Still sick. I'm still working part-time, and calling in sick fairly frequently.
We started calling the baby Pterodactyl.
April
I've given up on ever getting over the pregnancy nausea until I give birth.
I had an ultrasound, and we found out Pterodactyl is a girl.
May
Sick. Sick. Sick.
Oh, and we flew over to Pennsylvania for Peter and Katie's wedding.
June
I visited my family in Arizona. We surprised my mother with my visit.
Still sick a lot.
July
Sick. Hardly working.
A few people threw a baby shower for me and Nikky Randall, whose due date was the day after mine.
August
Sick. Quit my job.
My water broke in the middle of night on the 19th, but I did not go into labor.
We went to the hospital, and labor was induced.
And Amelia Rose Dilts was born on the 20th around 6pm.
She weighed exactly 7 pounds and was exactly 20 inches long.
She was jaundiced for a while.
Also very sleepy.
September
But things got better.
Until the jaundice and excessive sleepiness stopped.
Then she become a mightily fussy child, all the time.
My parents came to visit for Amelia's blessing on the 30th.
This was nice.
October
The fussiness continues, although there were less fussy times.
The doctor told us it was colic.
And so when Amelia had a less-fussy phase, we thought the storm was over.
This turned out not to be the case.
But we love her anyway.
November
This was a fairly good month.
Amelia got pretty chubby.
And sometimes she smiled.
We went and visited Danny and Steffanie's family for Thanksgiving.
December
Amelia continued to gain weight and was 18 pounds by the end of December.
We visited the Corbitts in Washington for Christmas.
2013 will be a surprise.
We hope it is the good kind.
Saturday, December 29, 2012
Christmas Traditions
James and I don't really have any Christmas traditions yet. We spent Christmas with my freshman roommate's family; they seemed to have plenty. They went caroling and dropped off homemade jelly. They watch the Muppet Christmas Carol every year. They decorate gingerbread men or houses. They read Christmas stories. They act out the Nativity. I think there are more, but I forgot them.
I'm not sure I want quite so many traditions just out of consideration for my own stress level, but I think I do want some.
So far, here are my ideas:
That's all. Please tell me your Christmas traditions, I am in need of ideas! :)
Love and Christmas,
Jenna and Amelia
1 We bought our first Christmas tree for $12.50 a few days ago. It is a four foot tall fake spruce. It has lights built into it. Woo! We also got some blue shatterproof ornaments and a couple pretty bead garlands for it. Maybe next year we will buy stockings for James and me.↩
2 So here's the thing. I'm a neat freak. My family had four matching stockings... and five people. There was always an odd stocking out. It bugged me so bad. And, well, I have no idea how many children I will have. I could have two. Or twelve. Or any number in between. So the only way I can guarantee that all our stockings will match would be if I bought fourteen all at once... even though I have no idea if I actually will have twelve children. So I figure letting everyone pick their own stocking will mean NONE of the stockings will match, but that's better than only a few matching in my book. I can convince myself it's okay that they don't match if each stocking was picked individually. :)↩
I'm not sure I want quite so many traditions just out of consideration for my own stress level, but I think I do want some.
So far, here are my ideas:
- Something to do with Jesus. We'll think of something, right?
- Buy Christmas decorations for half off after Christmas, then use them the following year. Abstain from buying these before Christmas.1
- Everybody gets to choose their own stocking at the store when they are old enough to reasonably do so. Before this, they get to use one of James' long socks.2
That's all. Please tell me your Christmas traditions, I am in need of ideas! :)
Love and Christmas,
Jenna and Amelia
1 We bought our first Christmas tree for $12.50 a few days ago. It is a four foot tall fake spruce. It has lights built into it. Woo! We also got some blue shatterproof ornaments and a couple pretty bead garlands for it. Maybe next year we will buy stockings for James and me.↩
2 So here's the thing. I'm a neat freak. My family had four matching stockings... and five people. There was always an odd stocking out. It bugged me so bad. And, well, I have no idea how many children I will have. I could have two. Or twelve. Or any number in between. So the only way I can guarantee that all our stockings will match would be if I bought fourteen all at once... even though I have no idea if I actually will have twelve children. So I figure letting everyone pick their own stocking will mean NONE of the stockings will match, but that's better than only a few matching in my book. I can convince myself it's okay that they don't match if each stocking was picked individually. :)↩
Friday, December 28, 2012
Goals
This particular post is inspired by two things: firstly, my friend's hilarious blog post "Resolved:", and secondly, Lesson 7 from Teaching, No Greater Call: "Developing a Personal Plan to Study the Gospel". (I'd decided to read through the teaching manual for my gospel study each day, and I'm finding it surprisingly exactly what I need right now.)
Anyway, on to my post... goals!
I'm not going to write any New Year's Resolutions. Although I could write an entire blog post about this... I feel it will merely be a reiteration of my friend's blog post I linked to above. She is wise.1 So yeah.
Here is my view on goals: you should make them all the time.
For instance, every night while writing in my journal, I write down one or more goals for the next day. It can be anything... like, say, "Get some rest. I'm so pooped." Or, "Go pick up my prescriptions, mail package, buy apples, deliver gift to friend, write and mail thank you note, do ALL the teeny tiny tasks!" Or, "Do something to learn Serbian." Or, "Go get a massage." Or, "Sleep in." Or, "Eat three meals." Or, "Eat a vegetable." Or, "Don't die." See? Little goals, but all things that will make me more awesome. (These are all things I have written in my journal as real goals, by the way.)
I also have more long term goals, of course. I have weekly goals, like "Floss at least once daily for a whole week!"2 Or things like that.
I also have less frequent goals, like "Do visiting teaching every month this year!"
And then there are the continuous goals. So, since my written-down goal from yesterday is "Make a gospel study plan", here goes:
My Super Awesome New and Shiny Gospel Study Plan!
So yeah. This is open to adjustment, of course, but I'm pretty excited. This is the first time in my life that I've ever consistently read my scriptures each night, so there's actually a chance that this will be completely successful!
That's enough about goals, I suppose. Now for updates on the baby!
We have officially become "hippie parents" as the requirements had been laid out in my head. What finally made me decide James and I qualified for this title? ... We've taken up that whole elimination communication thing I mentioned in the footnotes of a few posts. You know, the thing where the baby doesn't wear diapers and you hold the baby over a potty and they go in the potty.
I had commented that I had sensed that Amelia had a secret desire to be naked. As in, no-diaper naked. Her pleased behavior when we oblige her and give her some naked time seems to confirm that she actually did want to go diaperless, and I wasn't making up that idea. She tends to cry when we decide to put the diaper back on. (We don't let her stay diaperless most of the time.)
We bought a little infant potty for her. To my immense surprise, she is quite fond of it, and likes to hang out sitting on it. Yes, she pees and poos in it. Sometimes she'll pee right after getting settled on it. In fact, James just had to go flush a pile o' poo down the toilet. It was smelly, but a lot easier to clean up than the standard poopy diaper. I was surprised to discover that we could be successful with this even if she pees in her diaper 80% of the time.
So there you have it. We are now letting Amelia tell us when she has to pee or poo. It's kind of like how she says she's hungry, only this is the other end of that tube. We figure there is no sense in making the kid pee herself if we know it's going to happen. She doesn't want to, it seems. Why train her to sit in her own waste if we're going to have to get her out of diapers someday anyway? It just makes a lot of sense to us.3
This is how we finally became official hippie parents. We are avid attachment parenting fans. We breastfeed on demand, even if there's lots of demand. Amelia is basically always in-arms. We co-sleep, and she will sleep with us as long as she likes (or possibly sooner depending on when the next baby is). We minimize separations. We respond to her cries always. I plan to exclusively breastfeed her until she grabs food and stuffs it in her mouth, and I will continue to nurse on demand until she weans herself. And now? Now we communicate with our baby, sense when she needs to pee, and then let her pee in the toilet. Yup. Hippies. Really, though, this is all because this seems the best and easiest way to parent in this family.
Amelia is still, however, mightily fussy very, very frequently. I've decided once and for all that she does not have colic and really, never had it. They say colic goes away by four months at the very latest. And well, the fussiness is still here. There are waves of relative contentment, yes, but by and large she is still much more difficult than any other baby I've met.
So. Ixnay on the olickay. My conclusions? Amelia just has a more difficult temperament, and is what Dr. Sears and his wife call a high-need baby. I recently read The Fussy Baby Book. Oh my heck. I think they had a secret camera and spied on us in order to write the book, even though it was 1996 when they wrote it. Their fourth baby, Hayden, was almost identical to Amelia in mannerism. Amelia, like Hayden was, is intense, draining, demanding, often unsatisfied, unpredictable, super sensitive in some ways, not a self-soother, and very separation sensitive. We can't put her down (EVER). She feeds and awakens frequently. If you read that page about high-need babies I linked to, you'd have a fairly broad and accurate idea of what Amelia is like. The only bits that aren't really true are the hyperactivity and the not sleeping much. She sleeps lots, but she doesn't stay asleep for too long and we have to be with her the entire time she sleeps.
Oh my heck, it was so nice to read that someone else had a baby like Amelia. And instead of an endless list of "try this"es, there was an acknowledgement that maybe nothing was "wrong" with her and I didn't have to keep searching for a need that I wasn't fulfilling, because I was already doing everything, and I've been doing it dang well. My intuition has been telling me that Amelia is the picture of physical health, but it was hard to listen to it sometimes.
AND THEN. An acknowledgement that no one really understands what it's like to have a high-need baby until they've had one themselves... so refreshing! It got a little tiring when I'd write a blog post about Amelia's demanding behavior and then I'd receive a barrage of "Have you tried this?". Regarding their high-need baby, the Sears' wrote: "Our job was to accept Hayden's unique personality, appreciate her special traits and channel them into behavior that would work for her, and for the family. It was not to change her for our own convenience. Hayden was not the standard baby, and standard baby advice wouldn't work. Once we regarded her not as a behavior problem to be fixed but a personality to be nurtured, living with her became easier." And you know what? They gave me permission to view Amelia in a more positive light. Yes, she's loud and demanding, but she knows what she needs and is persistent. That's a good thing, in a lot of ways. I don't think I would have learned nearly as much about parenting with an easier baby.
Phew. It feels so good. I don't even mind so much when Amelia is crying. I can stay calmer and respond to her needs better. Yay!
The other book I'm glad to have found recently is The Wonder Weeks by Hetty van de Rijt and Frans Plooij. This has helped me come to terms with Amelia's even-fussier-than-normal phases. The theory is that there are specific ages when all babies get fussy because their brain just did some majorly fast and overwhelming development. Essentially, they wake up and the world seems completely different than it was before they fell asleep. Scary!
...Amelia is currently in one of these evil fussy phases. But, you know, it helps to know the increased fussiness is for a good reason. And that she will get a whole bunch of new skills after this. The bad news is, the researchers think this is a particularly long fussy phase, and will likely last anywhere from one to six weeks, but probably around five weeks. ... Holy trash, I'm not sure I can handle five weeks of this, but... one day at a time.
I should give James a break from baby. He's saying, "Ugh, two hours with baby is AWFUL." And I glare at him and remind him what I have to do when he's on campus for twelve hours. Oh, and now he's yelling that peek-a-boo is a stupid game and there's no reason Amelia should demand MORE peek-a-boo after fifty peek-a-boos. Heh. He's a wimp sometimes, but I love him. :)
Love and ear-splitting shrieks,
Jenna and Amelia
1 Speaking of this friend, I have a message for her: I think I should warn you that, in the hypothetical scenario that I die before James does and you are still single when this happens (I figure this is all highly unlikely), I have ordered James to court you. Yup. I figured if I have to die and I want some lady to help my man finish raising my offspring, I should have a say in who this woman should be. Well, dear lady, it's you. Heeheehee! Hope I haven't disturbed you too much. :)↩
2 I intensely dislike flossing. I think, perhaps, this is related to the fact that my teeth are a little too close together, so I struggle to slip that thin piece of floss between each tooth... and then, once I get past the tight spot, my floss comes down into the gums super swiftly and painfully. Grrr. If I had an extra $4000, I'd invest in some orthodontic work. I also have a major overbite which is a bit annoying. Sometimes my bottom front teeth hurt the roof of my mouth.↩
3 I saw the book Diaper-Free Baby by Christine Gross-Loh in the library. I checked it out because, honestly, both James and I were intrigued and surprised and really, really curious. After reading half of the book, James was convinced and decided to try it out right then. He kept checking every thirty seconds to see if she had peed. It was kind of cute.↩
Anyway, on to my post... goals!
I'm not going to write any New Year's Resolutions. Although I could write an entire blog post about this... I feel it will merely be a reiteration of my friend's blog post I linked to above. She is wise.1 So yeah.
Here is my view on goals: you should make them all the time.
For instance, every night while writing in my journal, I write down one or more goals for the next day. It can be anything... like, say, "Get some rest. I'm so pooped." Or, "Go pick up my prescriptions, mail package, buy apples, deliver gift to friend, write and mail thank you note, do ALL the teeny tiny tasks!" Or, "Do something to learn Serbian." Or, "Go get a massage." Or, "Sleep in." Or, "Eat three meals." Or, "Eat a vegetable." Or, "Don't die." See? Little goals, but all things that will make me more awesome. (These are all things I have written in my journal as real goals, by the way.)
I also have more long term goals, of course. I have weekly goals, like "Floss at least once daily for a whole week!"2 Or things like that.
I also have less frequent goals, like "Do visiting teaching every month this year!"
And then there are the continuous goals. So, since my written-down goal from yesterday is "Make a gospel study plan", here goes:
My Super Awesome New and Shiny Gospel Study Plan!
- Begin and end each study session with a prayer
- Finish studying Teaching, No Greater Call as default study material, at least one lesson per day
- Next, study the Old Testament as default study material, at least one chapter per day
- When the Conference Ensign comes out, make this the default study material, at least one talk per day until all talks have been read
- On the appropriate Friday and Saturday nights, read the lesson material (Teachings of Presidents of the Church: Lorenzo Snow) for the following Sunday's Relief Society lesson, at least half a chapter per day
- On Sundays, replace my normal reading material with gospel reading material (such as that month's Ensign or Jesus the Christ)
So yeah. This is open to adjustment, of course, but I'm pretty excited. This is the first time in my life that I've ever consistently read my scriptures each night, so there's actually a chance that this will be completely successful!
That's enough about goals, I suppose. Now for updates on the baby!
We have officially become "hippie parents" as the requirements had been laid out in my head. What finally made me decide James and I qualified for this title? ... We've taken up that whole elimination communication thing I mentioned in the footnotes of a few posts. You know, the thing where the baby doesn't wear diapers and you hold the baby over a potty and they go in the potty.
I had commented that I had sensed that Amelia had a secret desire to be naked. As in, no-diaper naked. Her pleased behavior when we oblige her and give her some naked time seems to confirm that she actually did want to go diaperless, and I wasn't making up that idea. She tends to cry when we decide to put the diaper back on. (We don't let her stay diaperless most of the time.)
We bought a little infant potty for her. To my immense surprise, she is quite fond of it, and likes to hang out sitting on it. Yes, she pees and poos in it. Sometimes she'll pee right after getting settled on it. In fact, James just had to go flush a pile o' poo down the toilet. It was smelly, but a lot easier to clean up than the standard poopy diaper. I was surprised to discover that we could be successful with this even if she pees in her diaper 80% of the time.
So there you have it. We are now letting Amelia tell us when she has to pee or poo. It's kind of like how she says she's hungry, only this is the other end of that tube. We figure there is no sense in making the kid pee herself if we know it's going to happen. She doesn't want to, it seems. Why train her to sit in her own waste if we're going to have to get her out of diapers someday anyway? It just makes a lot of sense to us.3
This is how we finally became official hippie parents. We are avid attachment parenting fans. We breastfeed on demand, even if there's lots of demand. Amelia is basically always in-arms. We co-sleep, and she will sleep with us as long as she likes (or possibly sooner depending on when the next baby is). We minimize separations. We respond to her cries always. I plan to exclusively breastfeed her until she grabs food and stuffs it in her mouth, and I will continue to nurse on demand until she weans herself. And now? Now we communicate with our baby, sense when she needs to pee, and then let her pee in the toilet. Yup. Hippies. Really, though, this is all because this seems the best and easiest way to parent in this family.
Amelia is still, however, mightily fussy very, very frequently. I've decided once and for all that she does not have colic and really, never had it. They say colic goes away by four months at the very latest. And well, the fussiness is still here. There are waves of relative contentment, yes, but by and large she is still much more difficult than any other baby I've met.
So. Ixnay on the olickay. My conclusions? Amelia just has a more difficult temperament, and is what Dr. Sears and his wife call a high-need baby. I recently read The Fussy Baby Book. Oh my heck. I think they had a secret camera and spied on us in order to write the book, even though it was 1996 when they wrote it. Their fourth baby, Hayden, was almost identical to Amelia in mannerism. Amelia, like Hayden was, is intense, draining, demanding, often unsatisfied, unpredictable, super sensitive in some ways, not a self-soother, and very separation sensitive. We can't put her down (EVER). She feeds and awakens frequently. If you read that page about high-need babies I linked to, you'd have a fairly broad and accurate idea of what Amelia is like. The only bits that aren't really true are the hyperactivity and the not sleeping much. She sleeps lots, but she doesn't stay asleep for too long and we have to be with her the entire time she sleeps.
Oh my heck, it was so nice to read that someone else had a baby like Amelia. And instead of an endless list of "try this"es, there was an acknowledgement that maybe nothing was "wrong" with her and I didn't have to keep searching for a need that I wasn't fulfilling, because I was already doing everything, and I've been doing it dang well. My intuition has been telling me that Amelia is the picture of physical health, but it was hard to listen to it sometimes.
AND THEN. An acknowledgement that no one really understands what it's like to have a high-need baby until they've had one themselves... so refreshing! It got a little tiring when I'd write a blog post about Amelia's demanding behavior and then I'd receive a barrage of "Have you tried this?". Regarding their high-need baby, the Sears' wrote: "Our job was to accept Hayden's unique personality, appreciate her special traits and channel them into behavior that would work for her, and for the family. It was not to change her for our own convenience. Hayden was not the standard baby, and standard baby advice wouldn't work. Once we regarded her not as a behavior problem to be fixed but a personality to be nurtured, living with her became easier." And you know what? They gave me permission to view Amelia in a more positive light. Yes, she's loud and demanding, but she knows what she needs and is persistent. That's a good thing, in a lot of ways. I don't think I would have learned nearly as much about parenting with an easier baby.
Phew. It feels so good. I don't even mind so much when Amelia is crying. I can stay calmer and respond to her needs better. Yay!
The other book I'm glad to have found recently is The Wonder Weeks by Hetty van de Rijt and Frans Plooij. This has helped me come to terms with Amelia's even-fussier-than-normal phases. The theory is that there are specific ages when all babies get fussy because their brain just did some majorly fast and overwhelming development. Essentially, they wake up and the world seems completely different than it was before they fell asleep. Scary!
...Amelia is currently in one of these evil fussy phases. But, you know, it helps to know the increased fussiness is for a good reason. And that she will get a whole bunch of new skills after this. The bad news is, the researchers think this is a particularly long fussy phase, and will likely last anywhere from one to six weeks, but probably around five weeks. ... Holy trash, I'm not sure I can handle five weeks of this, but... one day at a time.
I should give James a break from baby. He's saying, "Ugh, two hours with baby is AWFUL." And I glare at him and remind him what I have to do when he's on campus for twelve hours. Oh, and now he's yelling that peek-a-boo is a stupid game and there's no reason Amelia should demand MORE peek-a-boo after fifty peek-a-boos. Heh. He's a wimp sometimes, but I love him. :)
Love and ear-splitting shrieks,
Jenna and Amelia
1 Speaking of this friend, I have a message for her: I think I should warn you that, in the hypothetical scenario that I die before James does and you are still single when this happens (I figure this is all highly unlikely), I have ordered James to court you. Yup. I figured if I have to die and I want some lady to help my man finish raising my offspring, I should have a say in who this woman should be. Well, dear lady, it's you. Heeheehee! Hope I haven't disturbed you too much. :)↩
2 I intensely dislike flossing. I think, perhaps, this is related to the fact that my teeth are a little too close together, so I struggle to slip that thin piece of floss between each tooth... and then, once I get past the tight spot, my floss comes down into the gums super swiftly and painfully. Grrr. If I had an extra $4000, I'd invest in some orthodontic work. I also have a major overbite which is a bit annoying. Sometimes my bottom front teeth hurt the roof of my mouth.↩
3 I saw the book Diaper-Free Baby by Christine Gross-Loh in the library. I checked it out because, honestly, both James and I were intrigued and surprised and really, really curious. After reading half of the book, James was convinced and decided to try it out right then. He kept checking every thirty seconds to see if she had peed. It was kind of cute.↩
Thursday, December 13, 2012
A Day in the Life at Four Months Old
Note: I was pondering last night, and I began to wonder... How many of the itty bitty details of my daily life with Amelia will I actually remember in a year? In two years? Ten years? Fifty years? I decided not to risk it and record all these little details. I've decided to write an "A Day in the Life" post every couple months or so. These are mainly for me, then... but, as always, I am willing to share with die-hard members of the Official Amelia Dilts Fan Club.
In the morning, we wake up. It might be me, or maybe it's Amelia, who wakes up first, but we do both eventually wake up. When Amelia wakes up, she's in her very bestest mood: smiles everywhere! It's cute. I've also noticed that if she's the first to wake up, she doesn't really rush me. She'll chew on her fists and maybe look at the light streaming in from between the blinds, maybe make a few soft noises. And she'll certainly wiggle some. When I finally wake up, I say, "Good morning, Amelia!" and she turns to look at me and cracks open a large gummy smile as if to say, "Good morning, mom! I've been waiting for you to wake up!"
I play with her a bit before we we get up off of our mattress on the floor, usually pretending to eat her tummy with a loud OM NOM NOM NOM! Amelia sometimes laughs when I do this, but usually she just opens her mouth wide into a silly gummy grin.
I scoop her up and stumble off into the hallway where I made a makeshift changing table out of one of our cupboards. I have this sneaky suspicion that Amelia enjoys being naked, and would go diaperless1 if she was in charge. To keep her occupied during the diaper change, I sing to her. I think her favorite "diaper change song" is "Build Me Up Buttercup".2 I put her into a daytime outfit, which if things go according to plan, will last all day.3
Then, if Becca's around, I hand Amelia over to her so I can pee and eat breakfast (my top two breakfast foods are chocolate Cheerios and English muffin sandwiches). I don't usually get to do much else in this time before Amelia makes it clear it's Mommy Time, but if I do get more time, I check my email and Facebook.
By this time Amelia is a little annoyed that I was purposely ignoring her while I attempt to scarf down the remaining Cheerios in my bowl (I swear, when I poured in the milk she was super happy). Then I get comfy on the couch with Amelia on my lap. Even before I get out the boob, she knows it's coming and shuts up promptly, eagerly head-bobbing into my shirt, possibly complaining if I have difficulty getting the shirt out of the way fast enough.
I know she's done when she does one of two things... she'll either start leisurely playing with the nipple with her gums, which can hurt... or she'll do my favorite thing. With the boob still in her mouth, she'll peek up at me and smile real wide, and coo at me. "Hoo, hoo hooooo!" she'll say. And my heart will melt.
Then it's play time. We have lots of games we play. First I might put her on her back and OM NOM NOM her belly a little more. Maybe we'll play Patty-Cake, or This Little Piggy. Maybe we'll play the game where we make funny faces at each other for a whole fifteen minutes. Or similarly, we might make funny noises at each other for a whole fifteen minutes. Amelia has recently discovered that gurgling spit in a variety of ways can make a myriad sounds. She's also shrieking a lot. If I'm not paying close enough attention I might mistake this for unhappiness, but I'm realizing that often enough she is just experimenting to see what sorts of sounds she can make.
In any case, after a little play time, she'll eventually get unhappy. I don't know if it's because she's getting overstimulated, or if she's just fed up with her inability to do... whatever it is she was trying to do. I think Amelia does not find babyhood very becoming for someone such as herself. Really. I get the feeling she thinks she should be able to do everything perfectly.
I nurse her back to calmness. This takes anywhere from thirty seconds to five minutes. Then it's playtime again.
This time I might pull out a toy. It seems that Amelia has only recently become interested in toys. For a while she wouldn't even look at them... she much preferred to look at people. Just during this last week, she started reaching out for these newly-discovered toys, and she is starting to practice grasping skills.4 We also spend some time "reading" books. She has four books. One is all black and white. Two of them are soft books, and one of them is interactive and squeaks and moves and stuff. The newest book is all about red. It even has a big hole in the pages that she likes to put her hand through.
She will eventually get upset again, so I'll nurse her once more. Perhaps this time her eyes will roll back in her head and her eyelids will flutter madly. This means it's nap time. She'll nurse to sleep and nap in my lap (still attached to my chest) for maybe half an hour.
When she wakes up, maybe we'll practice standing. She is particularly fond of standing (with our help, of course). She reminds me a little of Godzilla when we play this game. She is less fond of practicing sitting up on her own, but she is warming up to the idea. James says that on Monday she sat up unsupported for an entire three seconds! Oooo!
If I'm brave, I'll do tummy time with her. She doesn't really like it very much, but if I catch her in her very, very best mood, she'll put up with it for a few minutes. Maybe. A friend just let us borrow a colorful flashy light to help make tummy time less torturous. Amelia does seem to like this toy. We can get her to do a weak mini push up for a few seconds using the flashy light method. And then she'll invariably become completely distraught and need more comforting via nursing.
Then more play time! And so on and so forth. In the afternoon, Amelia gets really cranky. She makes tired eyes, but isn't really falling asleep at the breast. She rubs her face, tries to bury her head into my chest. It's time for a real nap. Upstairs to bed we go! I lie down and let Amelia lie alongside me, nursing until she falls asleep. I'll usually fall asleep too, and if not, it is at least restful to lie down. It is not uncommon for her to sleep for three or four hours, all without letting go of the nipple.
After waking up, we do a little more of the alternating playtime and nursing (with possible nap) until James gets home. Then I eagerly pass the baby to him; it seems by now Amelia tires of my antics and is ready for something different, and James is certainly different. James is more vigorous when he plays with her... if he plays with her. Sometimes it takes him a while to wind down after a long day of using his brain. During this wind-down process, he will probably be found at the computer, bouncing a possibly completely unconscious puddle of baby.
I try to read my scriptures and such while James is on baby duty. We'll do our partner scripture study, and then when I'm all ready for bed, I settle onto our gloriously comfy mattress. James puts the baby next to me, and she nurses. There's a good chance she'll nurse herself to sleep. If not, James will usually bounce her on the ball until she falls asleep, and then redeposits her next to me.
Nighttime is calm and peaceful. Amelia is so fond of sucking that she sometimes stays attached to me the entire night. It is good that I have found a way to be comfortable lying like that all night, so I sleep through this. Sometimes, though, she falls off the nipple when she gets into a deep sleep and stays deeply asleep for many hours.
Amelia does kind of wake up in the night5, but she almost never wakes up fully. If she's still attached to me, I might wake up only because she's noisily gulping down milk. It can sound like she's happily drowning. James is less fond of this sound, because he prefers to not wake up at all in the night. Eventually, Amelia is done eating and falls back asleep, still sucking at the "empty" boob, just for the pleasure of sucking. If she lost the nipple in the night, no problem. She makes a halfhearted whimper or two, I'm instantly awake, I guide the nipple to her, she gulps happily, and I probably fall back asleep before she's even done.
We sleep soundly.
Love and lots and lots of milk (best stuff in the world, I hear),
Jenna and Amelia
1 I was surprised to learn that this is actually possible, provided you are with your baby 24/7. Before diapers were widely available (can you imagine how costly cloth diapers would be for those in poverty?), it seems that parents relied on what is now called "elimination communication" to know when their babies need to go. And then they just pulled off the baby's pants, held the baby over a good spot and let them go. They might even cue the baby by making a sound (like "psssss!" or "pee-pee!") to tell the baby it's time to relieve themselves. It still sounds to me like psychic superpowers, but apparently it's possible. It is, however, really hard to do in today's society because usually modern-day mothers unavoidably have to be gone at least some of the time. I'm too scared to try it, despite Amelia's apparent nakedness preferences.↩
2 That may sound odd, but I could swear she much prefers that I sing that song at diaper change time. She gives funny looks if I sing it when she's not naked.↩
3 Am I the only mother on planet Earth who thinks playing dress-up with baby is dumb? I think I must be. I can't count the times I've heard someone say, "Aw, such a cute outfit. Isn't it your favorite thing to dress her up in lots of cute outfits?" ...↩
4 Amelia is a test subject in a motor skills study. The researchers are particularly interesting in reaching and grasping skills. So far Amelia has not obliged the researchers even once in demonstrating her reaching abilities. One of the Relief Nursery workers who comes over once a week was telling me that before a baby actually succeeds in reaching for and grasping an object, you can see them trying to do it, but failing. Apparently they stare at the object intently then flail for it. I was watching for this, but I never saw it. Instead, I just realized that her hands often magically end up on the toy when I dangle it in front of her. Apparently she didn't want to bother with reaching until she felt she was good enough at it. Ha.↩
5 Am I the only mother on planet Earth who isn't eagerly anticipating the day when Amelia finally goes through an entire night without waking up once? One of the most common questions I get from people is: "Is she sleeping through the night yet?" I usually don't feel like launching into a long discussion about how she isn't, but I don't care, and I'm not even going to bother trying to discourage it because that will make her miserable and disturb my sleep way more than letting her sleep attached to me all night, and how else can I make this an epic run-on sentence? So, instead of having a long conversation, I just say, "Yes. From the very beginning, she's slept through most nights entirely." Even though, technically, that's not true. I imagine that if I had ever attempted to make Amelia sleep by herself in a bassinet or crib, James and I both would have gotten only two hours of sleep every night.↩
In the morning, we wake up. It might be me, or maybe it's Amelia, who wakes up first, but we do both eventually wake up. When Amelia wakes up, she's in her very bestest mood: smiles everywhere! It's cute. I've also noticed that if she's the first to wake up, she doesn't really rush me. She'll chew on her fists and maybe look at the light streaming in from between the blinds, maybe make a few soft noises. And she'll certainly wiggle some. When I finally wake up, I say, "Good morning, Amelia!" and she turns to look at me and cracks open a large gummy smile as if to say, "Good morning, mom! I've been waiting for you to wake up!"
I play with her a bit before we we get up off of our mattress on the floor, usually pretending to eat her tummy with a loud OM NOM NOM NOM! Amelia sometimes laughs when I do this, but usually she just opens her mouth wide into a silly gummy grin.
I scoop her up and stumble off into the hallway where I made a makeshift changing table out of one of our cupboards. I have this sneaky suspicion that Amelia enjoys being naked, and would go diaperless1 if she was in charge. To keep her occupied during the diaper change, I sing to her. I think her favorite "diaper change song" is "Build Me Up Buttercup".2 I put her into a daytime outfit, which if things go according to plan, will last all day.3
Then, if Becca's around, I hand Amelia over to her so I can pee and eat breakfast (my top two breakfast foods are chocolate Cheerios and English muffin sandwiches). I don't usually get to do much else in this time before Amelia makes it clear it's Mommy Time, but if I do get more time, I check my email and Facebook.
By this time Amelia is a little annoyed that I was purposely ignoring her while I attempt to scarf down the remaining Cheerios in my bowl (I swear, when I poured in the milk she was super happy). Then I get comfy on the couch with Amelia on my lap. Even before I get out the boob, she knows it's coming and shuts up promptly, eagerly head-bobbing into my shirt, possibly complaining if I have difficulty getting the shirt out of the way fast enough.
I know she's done when she does one of two things... she'll either start leisurely playing with the nipple with her gums, which can hurt... or she'll do my favorite thing. With the boob still in her mouth, she'll peek up at me and smile real wide, and coo at me. "Hoo, hoo hooooo!" she'll say. And my heart will melt.
Then it's play time. We have lots of games we play. First I might put her on her back and OM NOM NOM her belly a little more. Maybe we'll play Patty-Cake, or This Little Piggy. Maybe we'll play the game where we make funny faces at each other for a whole fifteen minutes. Or similarly, we might make funny noises at each other for a whole fifteen minutes. Amelia has recently discovered that gurgling spit in a variety of ways can make a myriad sounds. She's also shrieking a lot. If I'm not paying close enough attention I might mistake this for unhappiness, but I'm realizing that often enough she is just experimenting to see what sorts of sounds she can make.
In any case, after a little play time, she'll eventually get unhappy. I don't know if it's because she's getting overstimulated, or if she's just fed up with her inability to do... whatever it is she was trying to do. I think Amelia does not find babyhood very becoming for someone such as herself. Really. I get the feeling she thinks she should be able to do everything perfectly.
I nurse her back to calmness. This takes anywhere from thirty seconds to five minutes. Then it's playtime again.
This time I might pull out a toy. It seems that Amelia has only recently become interested in toys. For a while she wouldn't even look at them... she much preferred to look at people. Just during this last week, she started reaching out for these newly-discovered toys, and she is starting to practice grasping skills.4 We also spend some time "reading" books. She has four books. One is all black and white. Two of them are soft books, and one of them is interactive and squeaks and moves and stuff. The newest book is all about red. It even has a big hole in the pages that she likes to put her hand through.
She will eventually get upset again, so I'll nurse her once more. Perhaps this time her eyes will roll back in her head and her eyelids will flutter madly. This means it's nap time. She'll nurse to sleep and nap in my lap (still attached to my chest) for maybe half an hour.
When she wakes up, maybe we'll practice standing. She is particularly fond of standing (with our help, of course). She reminds me a little of Godzilla when we play this game. She is less fond of practicing sitting up on her own, but she is warming up to the idea. James says that on Monday she sat up unsupported for an entire three seconds! Oooo!
If I'm brave, I'll do tummy time with her. She doesn't really like it very much, but if I catch her in her very, very best mood, she'll put up with it for a few minutes. Maybe. A friend just let us borrow a colorful flashy light to help make tummy time less torturous. Amelia does seem to like this toy. We can get her to do a weak mini push up for a few seconds using the flashy light method. And then she'll invariably become completely distraught and need more comforting via nursing.
Then more play time! And so on and so forth. In the afternoon, Amelia gets really cranky. She makes tired eyes, but isn't really falling asleep at the breast. She rubs her face, tries to bury her head into my chest. It's time for a real nap. Upstairs to bed we go! I lie down and let Amelia lie alongside me, nursing until she falls asleep. I'll usually fall asleep too, and if not, it is at least restful to lie down. It is not uncommon for her to sleep for three or four hours, all without letting go of the nipple.
After waking up, we do a little more of the alternating playtime and nursing (with possible nap) until James gets home. Then I eagerly pass the baby to him; it seems by now Amelia tires of my antics and is ready for something different, and James is certainly different. James is more vigorous when he plays with her... if he plays with her. Sometimes it takes him a while to wind down after a long day of using his brain. During this wind-down process, he will probably be found at the computer, bouncing a possibly completely unconscious puddle of baby.
I try to read my scriptures and such while James is on baby duty. We'll do our partner scripture study, and then when I'm all ready for bed, I settle onto our gloriously comfy mattress. James puts the baby next to me, and she nurses. There's a good chance she'll nurse herself to sleep. If not, James will usually bounce her on the ball until she falls asleep, and then redeposits her next to me.
Nighttime is calm and peaceful. Amelia is so fond of sucking that she sometimes stays attached to me the entire night. It is good that I have found a way to be comfortable lying like that all night, so I sleep through this. Sometimes, though, she falls off the nipple when she gets into a deep sleep and stays deeply asleep for many hours.
Amelia does kind of wake up in the night5, but she almost never wakes up fully. If she's still attached to me, I might wake up only because she's noisily gulping down milk. It can sound like she's happily drowning. James is less fond of this sound, because he prefers to not wake up at all in the night. Eventually, Amelia is done eating and falls back asleep, still sucking at the "empty" boob, just for the pleasure of sucking. If she lost the nipple in the night, no problem. She makes a halfhearted whimper or two, I'm instantly awake, I guide the nipple to her, she gulps happily, and I probably fall back asleep before she's even done.
We sleep soundly.
Love and lots and lots of milk (best stuff in the world, I hear),
Jenna and Amelia
1 I was surprised to learn that this is actually possible, provided you are with your baby 24/7. Before diapers were widely available (can you imagine how costly cloth diapers would be for those in poverty?), it seems that parents relied on what is now called "elimination communication" to know when their babies need to go. And then they just pulled off the baby's pants, held the baby over a good spot and let them go. They might even cue the baby by making a sound (like "psssss!" or "pee-pee!") to tell the baby it's time to relieve themselves. It still sounds to me like psychic superpowers, but apparently it's possible. It is, however, really hard to do in today's society because usually modern-day mothers unavoidably have to be gone at least some of the time. I'm too scared to try it, despite Amelia's apparent nakedness preferences.↩
2 That may sound odd, but I could swear she much prefers that I sing that song at diaper change time. She gives funny looks if I sing it when she's not naked.↩
3 Am I the only mother on planet Earth who thinks playing dress-up with baby is dumb? I think I must be. I can't count the times I've heard someone say, "Aw, such a cute outfit. Isn't it your favorite thing to dress her up in lots of cute outfits?" ...↩
4 Amelia is a test subject in a motor skills study. The researchers are particularly interesting in reaching and grasping skills. So far Amelia has not obliged the researchers even once in demonstrating her reaching abilities. One of the Relief Nursery workers who comes over once a week was telling me that before a baby actually succeeds in reaching for and grasping an object, you can see them trying to do it, but failing. Apparently they stare at the object intently then flail for it. I was watching for this, but I never saw it. Instead, I just realized that her hands often magically end up on the toy when I dangle it in front of her. Apparently she didn't want to bother with reaching until she felt she was good enough at it. Ha.↩
5 Am I the only mother on planet Earth who isn't eagerly anticipating the day when Amelia finally goes through an entire night without waking up once? One of the most common questions I get from people is: "Is she sleeping through the night yet?" I usually don't feel like launching into a long discussion about how she isn't, but I don't care, and I'm not even going to bother trying to discourage it because that will make her miserable and disturb my sleep way more than letting her sleep attached to me all night, and how else can I make this an epic run-on sentence? So, instead of having a long conversation, I just say, "Yes. From the very beginning, she's slept through most nights entirely." Even though, technically, that's not true. I imagine that if I had ever attempted to make Amelia sleep by herself in a bassinet or crib, James and I both would have gotten only two hours of sleep every night.↩
Saturday, December 8, 2012
A Celebratory Post of Sorts
Those of you who know me well are aware that I struggled with depression1 and anxiety for a long time. As best I can tell, it started way back in my sophomore year of high school and continued until last year or so. That's round about eight years of awfulness.
Shortly after I moved up to Oregon with James, I decided enough was enough and went to the doctor... even though I'd been a few times in college and that experience was less than successful.2
Well, I started a different medication (Wellbutrin) which seemed to work wonders, whereas the traditional SSRIs hadn't been helping. And then I started going to therapy every week. That was back in, say... September 2011. And guess what? Last week was my last therapy visit, because I've been doing so well for so long without regressing. My psychiatrist, my therapist, and I all thought I'd probably end up with postpartum depression, but it never happened despite the enormous stress I've been under. So I don't need any more therapy.
I had also kind of expected that I'd need to take the antidepressant forever since I was severely depressed for an entire eight years. That's pretty bad... theoretically, if you let depression run its course untreated it should last two years and go away. Mine didn't, obviously. So I wasn't sure I'd ever be able to get off an antidepressant if I ever found one that worked.
But guess what? My psychiatrist thinks I will likely be able to get off of it two years after the start date. Woot! I find that very encouraging. Hopefully there will be permanent changes to the synapses in my brain so I don't go nuts any more. Woot! (I think a lot of my recovery has to do with the fact that my thyroid is also being treated successfully now. If I had to guess, my depression started when the thyroid disease started.)
Anyway, I want to celebrate. Therapy is hard work, yo. It's hard to pull yourself out of an unmotivated slump. As I've expressed in earlier posts, it's a shame I couldn't get this all figured out earlier... because then I might have gotten a 4.0 GPA, had a social life, and made more money during college. Everyone would have been blinded by awesome.
I am much more motivated now. I am especially struck by my ability to establish new habits... I was always really, really, really awful at that. Starting about the same time as the depression did (who would've thought?) I had the most difficult time keeping up with things that should have been easy... like (gasp) daily hygiene things. Those of you who've had depression understand. It was just so... hard. I'd do them maybe every other day. I had a hard time doing other daily habits like reading scriptures and writing in my journal.3 And now? Now that all is better? I can do all of these things and it's no big deal. Heck, I even look forward to them. Woot!
Love and synapses,
Jenna
1 This is a fairly good description of what depression can be like. Also funny. Be warned, though, it has three bad words in it.↩
2 The nurse practitioner wouldn't believe that I was majoring in neuroscience because it was interesting. Clearly I was majoring in that to prove to everyone that I was really smart, and I didn't major in something more sensible like English because I was afraid that others would think I was dumb. And my depression would go away if I switched to a better major like Home and Family Life. ... ... ... Wait, really? I can't help but wonder if this woman would have suggested the same thing to a guy. Yes, it was a woman who told me this.↩
3 I'm almost ashamed to admit one of the big reasons why it was so hard for me to establish habits because it was so completely irrational. I had this almost irresistible need to start at the number one, meaning, that if I missed a journal entry on Sunday, I couldn't start my journal again until the next Sunday (or the first day of the month... or January 1 of the next year) because that was the first day of the week. Even worse, I felt the need to start a new journal after I skipped a day, because I'd sullied my perfect record. It didn't really matter that I'd only filled half a page and there were eighty empty pages left. It was imperfect and needed to be trashed. It's like that for visiting teaching, too. If I miss a month, I feel so strongly like I can't start over again until January. ... I know, it doesn't really make sense, but... I just... yeah. I'm getting over it. That's a little OCD element to my depression. It's easier now to override the urge to start at number one. ... Thank goodness.↩
Shortly after I moved up to Oregon with James, I decided enough was enough and went to the doctor... even though I'd been a few times in college and that experience was less than successful.2
Well, I started a different medication (Wellbutrin) which seemed to work wonders, whereas the traditional SSRIs hadn't been helping. And then I started going to therapy every week. That was back in, say... September 2011. And guess what? Last week was my last therapy visit, because I've been doing so well for so long without regressing. My psychiatrist, my therapist, and I all thought I'd probably end up with postpartum depression, but it never happened despite the enormous stress I've been under. So I don't need any more therapy.
I had also kind of expected that I'd need to take the antidepressant forever since I was severely depressed for an entire eight years. That's pretty bad... theoretically, if you let depression run its course untreated it should last two years and go away. Mine didn't, obviously. So I wasn't sure I'd ever be able to get off an antidepressant if I ever found one that worked.
But guess what? My psychiatrist thinks I will likely be able to get off of it two years after the start date. Woot! I find that very encouraging. Hopefully there will be permanent changes to the synapses in my brain so I don't go nuts any more. Woot! (I think a lot of my recovery has to do with the fact that my thyroid is also being treated successfully now. If I had to guess, my depression started when the thyroid disease started.)
Anyway, I want to celebrate. Therapy is hard work, yo. It's hard to pull yourself out of an unmotivated slump. As I've expressed in earlier posts, it's a shame I couldn't get this all figured out earlier... because then I might have gotten a 4.0 GPA, had a social life, and made more money during college. Everyone would have been blinded by awesome.
I am much more motivated now. I am especially struck by my ability to establish new habits... I was always really, really, really awful at that. Starting about the same time as the depression did (who would've thought?) I had the most difficult time keeping up with things that should have been easy... like (gasp) daily hygiene things. Those of you who've had depression understand. It was just so... hard. I'd do them maybe every other day. I had a hard time doing other daily habits like reading scriptures and writing in my journal.3 And now? Now that all is better? I can do all of these things and it's no big deal. Heck, I even look forward to them. Woot!
Love and synapses,
Jenna
1 This is a fairly good description of what depression can be like. Also funny. Be warned, though, it has three bad words in it.↩
2 The nurse practitioner wouldn't believe that I was majoring in neuroscience because it was interesting. Clearly I was majoring in that to prove to everyone that I was really smart, and I didn't major in something more sensible like English because I was afraid that others would think I was dumb. And my depression would go away if I switched to a better major like Home and Family Life. ... ... ... Wait, really? I can't help but wonder if this woman would have suggested the same thing to a guy. Yes, it was a woman who told me this.↩
3 I'm almost ashamed to admit one of the big reasons why it was so hard for me to establish habits because it was so completely irrational. I had this almost irresistible need to start at the number one, meaning, that if I missed a journal entry on Sunday, I couldn't start my journal again until the next Sunday (or the first day of the month... or January 1 of the next year) because that was the first day of the week. Even worse, I felt the need to start a new journal after I skipped a day, because I'd sullied my perfect record. It didn't really matter that I'd only filled half a page and there were eighty empty pages left. It was imperfect and needed to be trashed. It's like that for visiting teaching, too. If I miss a month, I feel so strongly like I can't start over again until January. ... I know, it doesn't really make sense, but... I just... yeah. I'm getting over it. That's a little OCD element to my depression. It's easier now to override the urge to start at number one. ... Thank goodness.↩
Saturday, December 1, 2012
Nursing and Raising Eyebrows
Although there have been drastic improvements, it disappoints me that our society continues to not be completely nursing-friendly. It claims to be nursing-friendly, but it isn't really. Under the facade, you see that unless you breastfeed in private and only until your baby is about one year old, it's considered taboo.
Before I get into this post, I'd like to make it perfectly clear that this is most definitely not meant as a criticism of any individual parent. There's one thing I know for sure: I will never, ever know someone else's circumstances entirely. Furthermore, I believe that almost all parents do the best they can to raise their children.
So, while not addressing any individuals, I'd like to comment on society at large while also dispelling some breastfeeding myths. Got that? I'm writing about society, not you or your dog or your grandmother. I'm not even talking about your secret casserole recipe. Er... ahem.
I am, I suppose, unusually casual when it comes to nursing. I do it everywhere without any qualms, although when there's a special place set aside to nurse, I will go there under consideration of others. But really, I can only think of one place that has a special room for nursing ladies: church. Everywhere else though? If baby is hungry, I'll find a place to sit and feed her right then and there.
I'm grateful that I'm legally allowed to feed Amelia anywhere I please, but I suppose there will always be people who think I should only do it in private. To these, I say, What would you have me do when I'm out and about? Nurse in a public bathroom stall? Heck no. That just can't be sanitary.
Still others expect me to be abashed about it. What for? At a picnic back when I was learning how to nurse, one of my friends would cover me up with a blanket in a sweet effort to be kind.1 I didn't say anything to her because she was being thoughtful, but since then I've thought about it more... I think she thought I would be mortified if anyone saw me nursing.
That little experience said to me that publicly nursing is still (deep down) considered unusual and still makes people uncomfortable, whether it be the nursing mother herself or everyone else. It is my firm opinion that you should be able to feed your baby in public without embarrassment, whether it be via breast or bottle.
I decided a while back to do my best to help others become comfortable with nursing. For me, the easiest and most effective way to make others comfortable when I nurse in their vicinity is to do so like it's no big whoop. And once they realize that I feel it's no big whoop, then it truly becomes no big whoop. And it really isn't a big whoop. Got that?
I learned something else about society at that picnic... It's apparently not okay to nurse toddlers in America. And God forbid that you should even consider nursing an older child! There was a brief discussion about when and why some people weaned, wherein I learned that there was an abundance of misinformation out there.
One woman explained that she got pregnant, so she weaned.2 Another woman got antsy when she realized her baby was growing teeth, so she weaned.3 Another woman added that her son actually bit off one of her nipples, so she understandably stopped nursing cold turkey.4
This next reason grieves me. A woman weaned her son because it disturbed her how much he loved her boobs... she interpreted it as a sexual interest in breasts that needed immediate correcting. How sad for the baby! To have nursing taken away as punishment for expressing how happy and safe he felt nursing in his mother's arms!5
Another common reason for weaning was simply that mom had much difficulty with it and the help she needed was not available. She might have even gotten misinformation. And then, to make things worse, said mothers were criticized for not breastfeeding as if it was all their fault. There's something wrong with that.
And then there were the many who stopped because their children were "too old to nurse". Ugh. That would only be an issue in a Western society coming out of the Formula-Fed Era. I really wish it wasn't like that. There's no good biological reason to think all toddlers are "too old" to nurse.
Here's the thing. I never thought I'd feel so strongly about nursing, but I do. It's Amelia's favorite thing. It is precious to me, and I wish there wasn't the pressure to stop it ASAP. It sometimes feels like everyone expects you to start the weaning process on or soon after baby's first birthday... And weaning sounds like it can be so stressful, too!
Well, I've decided. Amelia will be the one to wean herself, unless something else requires us to wean earlier. Call me a hippie mom, but that's how it will be. I'm able to nurse as long as the two of us'd like, so why shouldn't I?6
So I will be nursing for a while. Here's the part where I get a little uncertain of myself. It is so taboo to nurse toddlers and older children, that if I continue doing so in public, I am certain to attract some negative attention. Thankfully, I've got plenty of time to decide, but eventually I'll have to decide whether I'm going to closet nurse... or continue nursing in public, obstinately insisting that it's completely normal whenever eyebrows are raised. Sigh. And the worst part is, "Be the change you want to see" keeps ringing in my head. Even when I read my patriarchal blessing, this comes to mind when I read about how I'm supposed to be a powerful example. No pressure, Self, no pressure...
So yeah. There is a distinct possibility that I will someday be known as that eccentric woman who nurses her toddlers/kids, even in public. Oh well. I shall take comfort in the fact that maybe one or two others might build up the courage to do the same.
Love and milk lasers,
Jenna and Amelia
1 I hate, hate, hate, hate nursing covers. Amelia hates them. I don't use them because they're not worth the hassle unless you truly are mortified if somebody sees what you're doing. (Do whatever you have to do to feel comfortable, ladies!) Plus, I don't think they help you nurse unobserved. If anything, I feel they draw attention. Sure, they may hide boob flesh better, but let's face it... the baby's body does a pretty good job of that too.↩
2 It is a myth that pregnancy causes breastmilk to "dry up". Here's what does happen... Remember when your breasts ached during pregnancy? That happens again, so nursing can become more uncomfortable. Also, pregnancy hormones may cause your milk supply to decrease somewhat, but at this point, your little one is probably getting most of his or her nutrients from solid food anyway. So, if mom and baby are amenable, you can nurse throughout pregnancy. If you want to. And, once your next baby is born, you can nurse both kids. It's called tandem nursing.↩
3 Teeth shouldn't interfere with nursing, nor should they make nursing uncomfortable. As La Leche League explains, "It is important to understand that when a baby is latched on to the breast correctly, his lips are flanged and his gums land far back on the areola (the dark area around the nipple). His bottom teeth are covered by his tongue and do not come in contact with the mother's areola at all. For this reason, a baby who is latched on correctly and actively nursing cannot bite. However, if a baby is latched onto the nipple only, the baby can clamp down and cause pain to the mother's nipple. Good positioning and latch-on techniques can prevent painful bites."↩
4 I have been told that this is remarkably uncommon. Despite that, I have sometimes wondered what I would do in such an event. I guess I would go to urgent care or the E.R. and awkwardly explain that I need my nipple reattached. Awkwaaaaard... As for the kid's fate... a scolding. And then I would keep Band-Aids over my nipples and explain, "You broke Mom's boobs! They don't work any more!" Speaking of biting, did you know how the Milky Way, our galaxy, got its name? Juno, the ancient Roman goddess, was nursing Hercules... and then he bit her. Of course, she took him off the breast, squirting milk all over the sky in the process. Ha, it's the story of my life, minus the biting! Jets of milk going all over the place like a wild fire hose!↩
5 Both mother and baby get a hefty dose of oxytocin, the happy hormone, while nursing. It helps with milk letdown... and it also makes you thirsty.↩
6 It seems that, left to her own devices, a child will wean herself when she's ready. Researchers' best estimate for a normal weaning age is 2.5 to 7. See here.↩
Before I get into this post, I'd like to make it perfectly clear that this is most definitely not meant as a criticism of any individual parent. There's one thing I know for sure: I will never, ever know someone else's circumstances entirely. Furthermore, I believe that almost all parents do the best they can to raise their children.
So, while not addressing any individuals, I'd like to comment on society at large while also dispelling some breastfeeding myths. Got that? I'm writing about society, not you or your dog or your grandmother. I'm not even talking about your secret casserole recipe. Er... ahem.
I am, I suppose, unusually casual when it comes to nursing. I do it everywhere without any qualms, although when there's a special place set aside to nurse, I will go there under consideration of others. But really, I can only think of one place that has a special room for nursing ladies: church. Everywhere else though? If baby is hungry, I'll find a place to sit and feed her right then and there.
I'm grateful that I'm legally allowed to feed Amelia anywhere I please, but I suppose there will always be people who think I should only do it in private. To these, I say, What would you have me do when I'm out and about? Nurse in a public bathroom stall? Heck no. That just can't be sanitary.
Still others expect me to be abashed about it. What for? At a picnic back when I was learning how to nurse, one of my friends would cover me up with a blanket in a sweet effort to be kind.1 I didn't say anything to her because she was being thoughtful, but since then I've thought about it more... I think she thought I would be mortified if anyone saw me nursing.
That little experience said to me that publicly nursing is still (deep down) considered unusual and still makes people uncomfortable, whether it be the nursing mother herself or everyone else. It is my firm opinion that you should be able to feed your baby in public without embarrassment, whether it be via breast or bottle.
I decided a while back to do my best to help others become comfortable with nursing. For me, the easiest and most effective way to make others comfortable when I nurse in their vicinity is to do so like it's no big whoop. And once they realize that I feel it's no big whoop, then it truly becomes no big whoop. And it really isn't a big whoop. Got that?
I learned something else about society at that picnic... It's apparently not okay to nurse toddlers in America. And God forbid that you should even consider nursing an older child! There was a brief discussion about when and why some people weaned, wherein I learned that there was an abundance of misinformation out there.
One woman explained that she got pregnant, so she weaned.2 Another woman got antsy when she realized her baby was growing teeth, so she weaned.3 Another woman added that her son actually bit off one of her nipples, so she understandably stopped nursing cold turkey.4
This next reason grieves me. A woman weaned her son because it disturbed her how much he loved her boobs... she interpreted it as a sexual interest in breasts that needed immediate correcting. How sad for the baby! To have nursing taken away as punishment for expressing how happy and safe he felt nursing in his mother's arms!5
Another common reason for weaning was simply that mom had much difficulty with it and the help she needed was not available. She might have even gotten misinformation. And then, to make things worse, said mothers were criticized for not breastfeeding as if it was all their fault. There's something wrong with that.
And then there were the many who stopped because their children were "too old to nurse". Ugh. That would only be an issue in a Western society coming out of the Formula-Fed Era. I really wish it wasn't like that. There's no good biological reason to think all toddlers are "too old" to nurse.
Here's the thing. I never thought I'd feel so strongly about nursing, but I do. It's Amelia's favorite thing. It is precious to me, and I wish there wasn't the pressure to stop it ASAP. It sometimes feels like everyone expects you to start the weaning process on or soon after baby's first birthday... And weaning sounds like it can be so stressful, too!
Well, I've decided. Amelia will be the one to wean herself, unless something else requires us to wean earlier. Call me a hippie mom, but that's how it will be. I'm able to nurse as long as the two of us'd like, so why shouldn't I?6
So I will be nursing for a while. Here's the part where I get a little uncertain of myself. It is so taboo to nurse toddlers and older children, that if I continue doing so in public, I am certain to attract some negative attention. Thankfully, I've got plenty of time to decide, but eventually I'll have to decide whether I'm going to closet nurse... or continue nursing in public, obstinately insisting that it's completely normal whenever eyebrows are raised. Sigh. And the worst part is, "Be the change you want to see" keeps ringing in my head. Even when I read my patriarchal blessing, this comes to mind when I read about how I'm supposed to be a powerful example. No pressure, Self, no pressure...
So yeah. There is a distinct possibility that I will someday be known as that eccentric woman who nurses her toddlers/kids, even in public. Oh well. I shall take comfort in the fact that maybe one or two others might build up the courage to do the same.
Love and milk lasers,
Jenna and Amelia
1 I hate, hate, hate, hate nursing covers. Amelia hates them. I don't use them because they're not worth the hassle unless you truly are mortified if somebody sees what you're doing. (Do whatever you have to do to feel comfortable, ladies!) Plus, I don't think they help you nurse unobserved. If anything, I feel they draw attention. Sure, they may hide boob flesh better, but let's face it... the baby's body does a pretty good job of that too.↩
2 It is a myth that pregnancy causes breastmilk to "dry up". Here's what does happen... Remember when your breasts ached during pregnancy? That happens again, so nursing can become more uncomfortable. Also, pregnancy hormones may cause your milk supply to decrease somewhat, but at this point, your little one is probably getting most of his or her nutrients from solid food anyway. So, if mom and baby are amenable, you can nurse throughout pregnancy. If you want to. And, once your next baby is born, you can nurse both kids. It's called tandem nursing.↩
3 Teeth shouldn't interfere with nursing, nor should they make nursing uncomfortable. As La Leche League explains, "It is important to understand that when a baby is latched on to the breast correctly, his lips are flanged and his gums land far back on the areola (the dark area around the nipple). His bottom teeth are covered by his tongue and do not come in contact with the mother's areola at all. For this reason, a baby who is latched on correctly and actively nursing cannot bite. However, if a baby is latched onto the nipple only, the baby can clamp down and cause pain to the mother's nipple. Good positioning and latch-on techniques can prevent painful bites."↩
4 I have been told that this is remarkably uncommon. Despite that, I have sometimes wondered what I would do in such an event. I guess I would go to urgent care or the E.R. and awkwardly explain that I need my nipple reattached. Awkwaaaaard... As for the kid's fate... a scolding. And then I would keep Band-Aids over my nipples and explain, "You broke Mom's boobs! They don't work any more!" Speaking of biting, did you know how the Milky Way, our galaxy, got its name? Juno, the ancient Roman goddess, was nursing Hercules... and then he bit her. Of course, she took him off the breast, squirting milk all over the sky in the process. Ha, it's the story of my life, minus the biting! Jets of milk going all over the place like a wild fire hose!↩
5 Both mother and baby get a hefty dose of oxytocin, the happy hormone, while nursing. It helps with milk letdown... and it also makes you thirsty.↩
6 It seems that, left to her own devices, a child will wean herself when she's ready. Researchers' best estimate for a normal weaning age is 2.5 to 7. See here.↩
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)