I will not fall asleep...Soft Momma...No! I will not fall asleep. zzzzzzDuncan was a bit confused yesterday. Those were a busy couple days. He was fussy during our rooming in, too. He doesn't appear to like change much. So we held him and told him he was safe and loved. He calmed down and we had a pretty good night. We got to bed around 11:30 and he slept until just after 3. Not too shabby! Then we got him to bed around 3:40 (I went & pumped since I was up). I got back to bed around 4 & was drifting away with the thought of, "Oh good - no brady or apnea attacks" when the monitor went off. Duncan was fine - his parents took a bit longer to calm down. But the monitor is doing what we want it to. Waking us up to make sure he's okay.
Duncan then slept until 6:30...then we fed him, put him to bed & everyone slept until 9:30. I think we may be able to do this active parenting thing!!
I can't wait until the pediatrician lets me do more breastfeeding for Duncan. Right now I bf twice daily. About 12 hours or so apart. We don't want to tire Mighty D out or make him use too much energy feeding so he doesn't gain weight. Interestingly, I'll probably never get to do all bf-ing since I'm back to work soon. But I'd get weekends :) We'll cross that bridge later, though. It would just make night feeds so much easier right now. Sit up, latch kiddo on, burp kiddo, put kiddo back to bed, go to sleep. We'll get there :)
I had my first time truly alone with Duncan today. We did good. He finished his lunch, had his diaper changed, had his diaper changed again, changed his clothes & put him down for a nap. I had my lunch then joined him. I woke up when Aaron came home from lunch. Duncan stayed asleep. Good boy.
My pump came today :) I'll probably test it tomorrow - I want to get as much milk pumped as possible before I have to return my hospital grade pump. It's a workhorse. In fact, when we left the hospital yesterday we brought home 2 boxes of frozen milk. The nutritionist said most women would give their left arm to pump half that much.
Apparently I'm an overachiever. And I don't pump 8+ times a day, either. 7 at the most when he in hospital, after his feedings now. The boy won't starve!!!
We also discovered that 12 cloth diapers (we use them for burp rags) aren't enough LOL. It's on the list for the next store trip. So is hand sanitizer (the nurse let us take some home from the NICU since we didn't have any).
And now, my boy is awake and needs to play!
We found out the burp rag thing the hard way too - but 24 of them got us through 2-3 days, even though it cut it close when G was about 3 months old because that's when his reflux got bad.
ReplyDeleteWTG on the pumping! I was a major overproducer (my record was 19 ounces in one session - I was terrified that there was something horribly wrong with me) but that was okay because G was a boobaholic. You are doing such a great thing for Duncan by providing him breastmilk! I wish all babies (especially NICU babies) got the very best start that way. What pump did you get? Were you overwhelmed when trying to pick one? Man, I was!
Yes, night feeds are a lot easier if you can just latch them on, change them, put them back to bed, etc...so I feel for you not being able to do that.
Enjoy the heck out of him because you're going to blink and he's going to be 2 and you'll wonder where in the world the last 2 years went. Trust me on this one!
You are lucky! The most I ever pumped at once is maybe 4 oz. So glad you are so committed to breastfeeding, it is not easy, that's for sure! Being a parent is a lot of work, but the payoff is amazing! So glad Duncan is home!
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