Stau

One of my favorite German words is Stau. I learned it when my host-mom in Vienna told me a story about when she had her second child. She got so much Stau, or congestion, or a clogged milk duct, that she had to be hospitalized for a week. To this day I'm not sure why she told me that story. It was very out of the blue. But after that I always remembered the word Stau and started to hear it on the radio in traffic reports, too.

I've had a clogged milk duct twice now: about a month ago, and yesterday/today. It's miserable! It was too painful to have him eat on that side, so I pumped about every two hours and I put a heating pack on it the rest of the time (this includes during the night...Zzzzzz...soooo tired...). I also popped the ibuprofen whenever I could and drank lots of water and massaged the area, which is all pretty textbook for relieving clogs.

Nothing happened though! Almost nothing would come out when I pumped, and there was no pain relief. This morning I took a nap with a heating pad on it, and thanks to some advice, let Joshua eat from that side again.

Immediate relief! I've decided to rename Joshua...Drain-o.

2 Months - Doctor Appointment, Shots

Joshua turned 2 months old on Sunday. He had his 2 month appointment on Thursday. He had to get his first round of shots at the appointment, which made him quite sad the rest of the day, but he seemed to be over it by the next day.

Stats: He is 24.5 inches tall (90%ile), 12 lbs 4 oz (55%ile), and his head is 41 cm in circumference (75%ile). His height percentage went down 5%, his weight went up 30%, and his head went up 25%. He's sure a growing baby. It makes me feel like I'm doing something right.

Eat: I think Joshua has gotten a better handle on eating, if that was at all possible. He's always been a down-to-business eater and finishes in 10 minutes or so. Now it sometimes even takes him less than that, and then he lets out a few LARGE burps (sans spit-up usually) and sometimes will eat a bit more after them, and then he's full. He doesn't seem to react too badly to things that I eat, even if it is spicy Indian food. He eats about every two to three hours during the day, and slightly more often after 5pm until bedtime.

Sleep: In the last week Joshua has really been sleeping well. He takes a few naps throughout the day, never longer than an hour and a half, usually only 45 minutes or so. He'll fall asleep if I swaddle him, pop in the binky, and put him down. If he doesn't I hold him swaddled, binky in, until he calms enough to fall asleep on his own, and then I put him down and he does so. (Of course there are exceptions when he just won't calm down enough for a nap unless he's in the swing with the music on.) The past few nights he has been sleeping a lot longer. For example, last night, he slept from 10pm until 7am, and then again from 7:30am to 10am. That's right, I got a ton of sleep and feel great! I hope he does it routinely. I think bathing him at night helps him to this.

Poop: Don't worry, I'll be brief. I think a lot more about his poop than I ever thought I would. I worry about the fact that his poop is green most of the time, but the doctor said not to worry about it. He told me that once his wife ate Trix and the baby had very brightly colored poop for a while thereafter. He seems to be getting less gassy and/or dealing with it better. I've noticed he usually lets a few rip when he's doing tummy time.

Other: Yesterday when I was getting my allergy shots, I fed Joshua because he was past the point of waiting for food. When I sat him up, he let some very large, loud burps out, and the 12 year old boy and his dad sitting across from me had quite the giggle about it. He burps like a man and could put anyone to shame in a burping contest.

I love having him around all the time, and he's smiling more and more. He even started to giggle a little bit (kind of a "huh huh huh" sound). I'm hoping he'll start learning to play with toys soon.

Goal Update

Remember how I made a post about the goals I have made? I just thought I'd do a quick update on how I'm doing on those goals.

Clean house up and out - I have started with this. I went through my clothes as I put my summer and maternity clothes away and as I got a new dresser. I also went through the shelves above our closet when we got the new dresser. My brother is living with us for a few months as he is in post-mission limbo. That should motivate me to go through the junk upstairs so that he has an actual place to stay rather than just on the couch in the living room. I started to go through the stuff upstairs last week.

Craft/Decorate - I made two curtains out of 5 for the front room. I haven't gotten anywhere on the couch cushions. I found our family picture (Dave's family), but discovered that the frame I had set aside for it was too small. I still need to hang my yearly calendars up. I did a lot of stamping and card making about a month ago, but haven't picked it up since. It's a start.

Develop schedule - If you count sleeping in every day a schedule, then I'm set. Joshua pretty much sets my schedule, yet I have a little control over his. I follow the Eat Activity Sleep pattern more or less. I have started doing laundry every Friday, which corresponds with my TV shows being on hulu, so I can watch them while I fold the clean laundry.

Save money - I guess I've done some of this. We're working on getting the heater fixed so we don't spend as much on gas every month. We discovered a gaping hole in the main duct coming from the heater, so we're heating two rooms in the basement that don't need heating rather than our house.

Get in shape - I've been trying to eat better and make healthier foods for Dave. This includes some Indian dishes I've been trying out. We've also been having better breakfasts to start our day. I literally just made an exercising group on facebook to hopefully get some moral support in getting in shape. Also I was introduced to this website by a friend, although I'm a bit intimidated by it when I get out of breath walking a few blocks these days. I bought a stroller last week, which should also help motivate me to get out and exercising.

Read lots - Check. I've been reading the book group books as well as a few from my own shelves including Hunger Games, How to Win Friends and Influence People, and...uh...that's it.

Hopefully by this time next month, I will have more to report.

Stroller!

Ok, so I check my email, facebook, and blogs that I follow almost daily, and I usually click the "new post" button about as often, but for some reason I never get around to actually posting.

I'm biting the bullet and posting about SOMETHING to hopefully get myself back into the groove.

Today I bought a stroller. I am very excited for it to come so I can go out on walks and *gasp* even runs. I'm a little nervous about getting back into shape since I'm the least in shape I've been since ever, literally. So far this year if I walk anywhere, I do so slowly, since I'm usually carrying Joshua, either in my arms or in my baby bjoern, and I don't want to jostle him too much.

I was super excited for my new stroller to come on Thursday so I could test it out. Turns out I forgot to click the final "place order" button on amazon until about an hour ago, so it won't be arriving until Friday. At least the shipping is still free!

So, here's the link to the stroller that I purchased. (Thank you Grammy and Papa, who never read this!...yes I will write them a thank you note, too.)

And here's a picture, if you don't feel like clicking on the link.

Giveaway

Ok, I know everyone loves reading posts about giveaways, but I'm really hoping to win this one. (I never win any!) I get an extra entry if I blog about it. Here's the giveaway:

http://windhula.blogspot.com/2011/02/novica-giveaway.html

Go check it out!

6 Weeks

Dear Tuesday,

I thought that you would be the day that my life started to look normal again. Isn’t life supposed to get easier after 6 weeks? Well you are the exact day after the 6 week mark. I guess my hopes were too high, yet not unfounded:

Sunday and Monday night, Joshua slept 6 hours at a time, followed by a 3 hour nap and helped me notice that morning is that foggy time frame that happens between when the sun comes up and noon. I actually got up, out of bed, showered, and breakfasted before 11am! I felt great. It was sunny even.

Joshua ate at 11pm last night, went to sleep at midnight, and didn’t wake up until 6am. (Silly me didn’t go to bed until 1am though…I have to work on that.) I’m really hoping that Joshua sticks to this schedule so my body gets used to not producing milk at night. I woke up completely full and soaked; it was fun. That’s the main reason I got up and showered, so maybe it’s a good thing that I get drenched.

The morning and early afternoon progressed well with Joshua sticking to a nice schedule of eating, burping, pooping, being changed, playing for a little while, fussing a tiny bit to signal nap time, being swaddled, and falling asleep on his own in his bassinet and sleeping for an hour or so.

*menacing music*

Then the actual afternoon came. He started into his “grouchy” or “gassy” routine which involves falling asleep on me, scream crying when he woke, eating some, farting some, burping after a long time, scream crying some more, eventually calming down enough to fall asleep on me again (don’t. move. a. muscle. or. he. might. wake. up.), rinse, repeat, sigh, throw something, punch the pillow, cry a little, eat chocolate, mope.

My only thing to hope for, as Joshua is still asleep on me, is that he will wake up soon, eat, poop (this is crucial to the following), and go to sleep for a good 6 hours. I was also hoping to get some cleaning done as our house looks more and more like a disaster zone. It doesn’t help that Monkey’s favorite toy is a rope that she tears to pieces all over everywhere.

Ok, so maybe I just needed to vent a little. Sorry. I’m posting it anyway. (No, Carrie, I don’t think I’m one to reserve blogging/journaling for good moods.)

Sincerely,

Post-Partum Me

1 Month Old

Joshua turned 1 month old last week. I figured I'd do an update on how things are going.

Stats: I don't have any official stats this month, but I should have some next month, since he has a doctor's appointment. I did weigh him by weighing myself and then weighing myself while holding him, and according to our scale, he's 9.5 lbs! I know our scale isn't completely accurate, but even so, I knkow he's more than 8 lbs, which is about where he was at 2 weeks, so at least he's growing. I put him on my cloth cutting mat to measure him, and according to that, and my unprofessional opinion, he's 23 inches long, which is only 1/4 inch longer than at 2 weeks, so a) he isn't growing length-wise (yeah, right!), b) the doctor's office wasn't very accurate, or c) my measurements weren't very accurate.

Sleep: He's always been a pretty good sleeper (for a newborn). He seems to have his night and day figured out. He doesn't sleep as long, often, or deeply during the day--usually only an hour or so, tops. During the night he will sleep 3 to 5 hours straight, wake up to eat, poop, be changed, and then will go right back to sleep, unless I haven't gotten all the bubbles out. He's getting pretty good at falling asleep on his own. He'll toss and turn and grunt for a few minutes, but will eventually fall asleep if left alone.

Eat: He definitely has the hang of nursing. He never eats longer than 10 minutes. I think that has to do with how my milk supply comes. If he stops eating at all during that first 5 minutes, he gets sprayed all over his face. It's actually really funny. After he's done eating, it takes anywhere from 1 minute to 30 minutes to get the burps out. If he falls asleep while being burped, it usually takes longer, which means he's more unhappy about it by the time they surface.

Poop: Ok, I'll be brief about this one. He's been gassy lately, which means more fussiness, and more blowouts. I'm trying to avoid dairy products this week to see if that helps him digest better. It's going to be a long week. I'm hoping it's related to some caffeinated beverages I had last week, and not the dairy.

Other: When he's awake, he's awake. There is no in between stage for him. When he's awake during the day, I try to make sure he's mentally stimulated. I've been putting him in his cow chair. It has a vibrator on it, and when he's in it with the vibrator on, he blows lots of bubbles.

He had his first official tummy time today. He gets plenty of "tummy time" because he takes so long to burp, so he has already been developing his neck muscles. Today was his first flat-on-the-floor tummy time, proceeded by some time with the boppy pillow. We only did a few minutes of tummy time today, but here are some videos if you really want to watch them: