So much so fast!

Wow-a moment of peace. Fin just fell asleep for his morning nap. We have not had to be on any kind of rigorous schedule yet b/c I am not back to work. So I let him fall asleep whenever he wants. Unfortunately this makes things very unpredictable b/c sometimes he sleeps for 3h, sometimes 30 min, sometimes not at all. So needless to say I am typing fast.

I can hardly keep up with everything that is changing in Fin's life as well as my own. I keep thinking I should blog about all the things Fin is doing and the developmental milestones etc b/c I am already forgetting so much from the first 2 months that now that we are well into the 3rd momth I know this time will soon be foggy too.

So let's see what are all the things I've wanted to blog about but keep forgetting.....well I think this will take a very long blog but I will at least start by describing a few things I really want to remember about breastfeeding.

Breastfeeding joy & pain.

since birth Finley has been such a particular eater. He is very loud and grunty and breathey. He makes these super cute little comfort sounds as he gulps the milk as well as grunts alot-everyone nearby is always surprised at how noisy he is as he eats. Also he often poops while he is eating and he has done this since birth. His poops are VERY LOUD and everyone laughs. Sometimes he is even surprised by it. As soon as 1 week after he was born we noticed he had a very active TONGUE! even the lactation consultant at the hospital was suprised and she called it "tongue thrust" behavior b/c of a short frenulum. this is one of the reasons why we had so much trouble with breastfeeding-especially during the first month. This definitely contributed to the origin of my bilateral mastitis. I had much advice as to what to do about the difficulty we had with the feeding.....the lactation consultant gave me nipple shields and the Leche League book showed several exercises I could do with Fin (tongue depression etc.) but I found it all to be too cumbersome and I just could not get myself to do anything extra on a regular basis-basically I gave up and let Fin destroy my nipples as he ate.

It was painful for many many weeks but he was getting bigger and was healthy so I did not really care. When I as sick and in & out of the hospital for most of September- everything was such a blur on a day to day basis that I really did not care about anything-we were all living moment to moment and my brain was so mushy that I could not think straight even if I had wanted to. Once the breast infection was finally cleared (around the 1st week of October) I started to feel better and begin getting stronger again and was able to think again-sort of. The painful breasts continued to be a nuisance and sometimes very frustrating but I just kept going for some reason. Several times I really thought about weaning him but when it came down to actually doing it-I just did not-it was as if my body would not let me even though mentally I thought it was a good idea. As he got bigger and he was able to feed easier depsite the tongue thrust. Still he gagged often and choked alot and this was scarey but we fought thru it and both of us got used to it I guess. The choking happens with both the breast and bottles-so it made no difference. Also the longer we breast fed, he was less likely to take a bottle and very reluctant to ever take formula-we basically stopped supplementing with formula sometime around 6 wks b/c he was so messy with it. the most we ever supplemented was 1 feeding per day or if his dad or grandma wanted to feed him or if we were out in public during those early weeks. Fin really does not like formula and he lets it dribble and drool all over and we always have to use bibs when he takes a formula bottle-less so when he takes a bottle with breastmilk. and we don't need bibs at all when he breastfeeds-he barely lets a drop get away.

Now that we have been breastfeeding for so long we are much better at it overall. we can do it discretely out in public now fairly well. However Fin prefers that I look at him while he eats and that he is able to look around at me or the room while he eats. This is usually fine if we are at home but obviously this is not really possible if we are out or at a friends or relatives house. In that case he has to go under a blanket or under one of my nursing wraps/ponchos-this ends up serving a dual purpose b/c sometimes he gets a little overwhelmed if we are somewhere loud while he is eating-when he is under the poncho he is still able to be calm enough to eat.

Sometime around the time that Fin was 10-12 weeks old breast feeding finally became what I can call "easy". Throughout his whole experience everyone kept saying well it gets better when he is about 1 month old (NO not for me) then everyone would say well actually it is when the baby is 8wks that it goes smoothly (NO still not really for me) then people stopped saying anything b/c I did not mention my troubles anymore b/c I had decided to continue breastfeeding as long as I could stand it despite sore nipples and engorged breast at night. Then suddenly around 10-12 weeks_ I stopped thinking about it all-I just fed Fin when he was hungry without any fanfare or frustration-that is when I realized that things had finally gotten easy. I guess it just took us a while longer than most people. Now the whole process is so convenient that I do not want to stop when I go back to work in a few weeks. So our next big challenge will be figuring out how to pump on a schedule that allows the milk to continue to come in at a pace that is comfortable for me.