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Emily Mark and Me 110207

Wednesday Mar 14 2007 00:42:45

By D3bbs

11/02/2007

Emily is 5 weeks old today. She’s getting little chubby cheeks and is so cute! She slept until 7.30am this morning from about 12.30am. I actually felt worse for having a proper nights sleep! Mark is currently giving her a cuddle after her feed which was half an hour before it should have been, but we could stand the screaming no longer!

My left hip and right knee are really playing me up today, especially my hip. I have hip displacia so the pain is nothing to worry about but it’s annoying and makes me tired and tetchy. I have an appointment next month for my annual X-Ray; this one will tell us whether the pregnancy has had any effect negative or otherwise on my hips. I must admit to being concerned when I was pregnant that my hips would get much, much worse, but thankfully although they still hurt, it’s certainly bearable. Before I was pregnant, I was going to my physiotherapist nearly every week, but during the pregnancy I only went three times when the pain was very bad because I didn’t want to risk harming the unborn Emily. I haven’t been back since giving birth but mostly because of the cost and time factor, although I have to say George my physiotherapist is very reasonably priced at £17.50 per session. Most charge £40 plus. George has magic hands, which I miss, but with Emily’s osteopath costing £31 per week and eating into my “Stay at home with her for as long as possible” money, I really can’t afford it at the moment. At least I get free prescriptions for my pain killers for a while longer, until the end of the year I think.

Emily had her first trip to Corby today. Mmm yes Corby. If you’ve heard of chavs you’ve heard of Corby. The one good thing about Corby is that my best friend Michelle lives there, who incidentally I have to phone… Right, that’s done, I really have a “head like a sieve” as my Mum says, at the moment, I spoke to Michelle on the phone about ten minutes ago, had to make another call and then phone her back, so I made the other call, put the phone down and sat at the computer. I mean how hard is it to remember two things? So anyway off to Michelle’s house we went and had a lovely time. She has a new hamster who is very cute, and since I know a bit about hamsters, having kept two for nearly three years (yes that is about the maximum life expectancy and I was very proud to keep them alive so long, especially as I was also owned by first one cat, then three), I could offer her some good advice on her Lola, which she did ask me for, I’m not one of those people who go around offering advice to people willy nilly, and when I do it’s only to people I know, not strangers in the street.

I was just about to give Emily another feed before bringing her home when my mobile rang with Mark on the other end telling me that he was bleeding to death and needed to go to casualty. He was bleeding to death from his big toe which he had caught “on that box, you know the one you left out on the floor” yes that’ll be the one, similar to the bloody tool box that’s graced our kitchen floor for the last six months, which I’ve given up telling him to move back into the shed. The tool box is quite happy living in the kitchen as, when we and the cats aren’t looking, it can sneak a few biscuits from their food bowl. It also keeps eating the chocolate biscuits that I buy for Mark for work. Well it must be the tool box, because he swears blind it’s not him.

So anyway there I was with an unexploded baby about to explode into fits of laughter, oh no, my mistake, that should have read fits of hysterical screaming if she wasn’t fed in the next 5 minutes and I needed to get home, which is a half hour drive away from Michelle’s house, get Mark to the hospital, which is twenty minutes drive from there, not to mention that it takes me twenty minutes to get Emily ready to travel. What was I going to do? Thankfully Michelle, who, by the way is a manager of a nursery and someone who adores babies, offered to look after Emily while I took Mark to hospital. I thanked her, showed her where all Emily’s stuff was in the (giant) rucksack that accompanies us everywhere, kissed Emily and set off. Half way home Mark phoned me to tell me that, actually the bleeding had stopped now and the injury probably wasn’t as life threatening as he’d originally thought, so I turned around and headed back to Michelle’s house and my sweet daughter Emily.

OK so it was only for half an hour, but that was the first time I’d left Emily with someone that wasn’t Mark, and I have to say it felt very strange. I couldn’t wait to get back to her. She wasn’t at all bothered herself but I felt like I was abandoning her, although I was perfectly happy that she was safe and would be well looked after.

Next Saturday night we have arranged for Mum to have Emily for the evening so that we can go to the cinema and for a meal together. It’ll be the first time we’ve been together without Emily since we stood outside the hospital having a cigarette after she was born while my Dad was cuddling her! I was really looking forward to it, and I still am, but today has made me realise that it is also going to be hard to leave her, even though it is with the person that I trust the most outside of our little family unit.

Emily Mark and Me 100207

Wednesday Mar 14 2007 00:36:11

By D3bbs

10/02/2007

My darling husband Mark has discovered the Nappy Fairy. I know I shouldn’t write this because I know that he will read it, but it bugs me that he seems to think that changing Emily’s nappy means taking an old one off, cleaning her and putting a new one on and the fact that you then have to role up the old one wrapping up any used wipes and throw said dirty nappy in the bin. I know it’s not a big thing; it’s like not changing the toilet roll when the old one runs out, and just about as annoying. It just seems to me that if I’m going to have to follow him around tidying up after him, I may as well have done the whole job myself in the first place.

On top of that, tonight was the second night in a row that we had a “little spat” within an hour of him getting home from work. We are both very tetchy and tired at the moment and taking it out on each other which is normal I know but it doesn’t make it any nicer for either of us. Last night we bickered about me talking to Emily within his hearing of her doing a poo, which he said was “just lovely to hear while he’s cooking dinner”, which I thought was silly as he was cooking, not eating, so I strode off in a huff. Then he got upset with me about something else a little later, and, conveniently I can’t remember what that was about! Tonight he was trying to settle her and I suggested taking her into the bathroom, which is her favourite room in the house (yes I know, odd), and he snapped that I should let him try his own methods first. He later apologised because as I pointed out to him, what kind of person would I be if I could think of a way of calming her and didn’t offer it? And besides it was only a suggestion, not an order.

Emily and I have had a fairly peaceful day today, we both got up late. The feeds went 5am, 8am, 11.30am when I brought her downstairs after having been up myself for only about an hour. God I was so tired from yesterday I needed the rest.

I wrote a list of 10 minute jobs that I could do between feeding and amusing Emily today and have managed to do all but two, but also have managed to do extra bits that aren’t on the list, although I must admit to being very tempted to write them on the list and cross them off so that I can congratulate myself on how much I achieved today. Sad or what?!!

Mum and Paul came round for a visit this afternoon. Mum is brilliant with Emily, her worries when I was pregnant that she wouldn’t bond with Emily were totally unfounded as she is the best Nanny a girl could hope for and of course the best mother a woman (me) could hope for. Emily decided to christen Paul with baby sick, which was nice of her. It’s funny how I reacted to that, she couldn’t help it but I felt a bit embarrassed and said “Sorry my baby sicked on you” and then realised how ridiculous that sounds. Well I mopped him up and he wasn’t at all bothered anyway. In fact I think he was quite honoured as he is the first person other than her parents that Emily has sicked on.

Me and Mark tried “Tummy Time” with her again tonight and she was not impressed. We tried it on the firmer surface as I mentioned yesterday but she got into a really stinky mood and hasn’t really calmed down since (it was two hours ago now). She has had a feed and wind and lots of cuddles and her dummy but nothing is really impressing her! I think she might be tired, although she could just be in a sore mood… again!

I think we are going to try a bath in a minute to calm ourselves down (I’m joking), bathing Emily might calm her and then she can go to sleep for a bit. Her father has all the patience of his daughter as she’s been crying at him for twenty minutes and he’s “going for a fag”!

Better take over…

Emily Mark and Me 090207

Wednesday Mar 14 2007 00:30:59

By D3bbs

09/02/2007

I can’t believe I’m sitting here writing, I am too tired to think straight so if this chapter makes no sense it’s for that reason. It’s 22:25, I have a bath running, Mark is going to feed Emily at 11pm and then it’s bed for all of us. I can hear my pillow calling to me, I can’t wait to get to bed, please God let Emily sleep well tonight.

She’s actually been very good today, we stuck to a routine which went, 5am, 8am, 11am, 2pm, 5pm, 8pm then we’ll do 11pm again. She has had 3.5oz at each feed apart from the 5pm one when she had 4oz so she’s had a fair bit. The tantrum came at 1.30pm when one second she was smiling away on her change mat (after a cry) where I was trying to distract her for half an hour. Suddenly and for no apparent reason she started crying and no amount of the nappy song, cuddles or rattles could console her. Note, the Nappy Song goes like this, to the tune of Yummy yummy yummy I’ve got love in my tummy: Yappy, yappy, yappy Em-I-lys done a nappy, so we’ll put a brand new one on! Hm, yes, well what can I say? It keeps me amused while I’m changing Emily’s nappy!

Anyway, she did stop for a while, when I gave her some juice, which she munched on while giving me a very accusing stare which left me in no doubt that she knew damn well that this wasn’t milk. I used the word munch there because, and I don’t know if other babies do this, but when she’s angry and we give her the dummy or juice she kind of chews it while making this munching noise that can only be described as an angry munch sound. It’s quite frightening really, especially when she does the look as well, she takes on the look, and sound of a little monster, something between the Cookie Monster in a bad mood and Grouch (the one that lived in the rubbish bin or trash can if you are American). Only Emily is neither Blue nor Green, she’s Bright Red of course, like Elmo, but Elmo didn’t know what a bad mood was. Is Sesame Street still running?

She slept for most of the day but then that’s what she is actually supposed to do, which is good, the reason I am so tired I think is that the interrupted sleep is finally getting to me, I woke up at 3am this morning thinking that Emily needed feeding, came downstairs, boiled the kettle went to the loo, then looked at the clock, read the time and realised that she wouldn’t want feeding for another 2 or 3 hours, and hang on, she wasn’t crying anyway, so what the hell was I doing awake and out of bed??? Then of course 2 hours later I was up and feeding for real, for a good 40 minutes and then up and dressed and downstairs by 8am. I used to stay upstairs after this feed and go back to bed but I thought it best to get out of that habit and to get Emily into the habit of being up at eight. Right at this minute the reasoning behind this escapes me but I know there was a good reason… I think it had something to do with when I go back to work and Emily has to go to a nursery. It has just occurred to me though that she won’t care where she is as she’ll sleep in the car anyway and where ever else she pleases.

Right tomorrow I shall give Emily her second morning feed and leave her to sleep upstairs while I come down and get on with some stuff. Like finding the rogue birth certificate. That makes sense.

The thing is I do all the night feeds because Mark has to go out to work and he has to drive and so needs to have had a good night sleep to stay safe whereas I only need a good night sleep to stay sane! I think I’ll ask Mark to do it next time he has a day off the next day which is eight more days away (I’m crying into my keyboard right now).

We tried Tummy Time today, but as with most firsts I did it all wrong and she didn’t really enjoy it. The osteopath suggested I put her on a pillow but this didn’t work as she kept putting her face in it, so I had to help her. Tomorrow I’m going to try using the (thin) mattress from her Moses basket on top of her changing mat, that way it’s firm enough for her to not feel suffocated but soft enough if she drops her head. I’m actually looking forward to trying again with this tomorrow, I shall do a better job and hopefully Emily will enjoy it more.

I’m now going to luxuriate in my bath while Mark gives Emily her last feed for the day and then I’ll hit the sack.

Emily Mark and Me 080207

Sunday Mar 11 2007 23:18:50

By D3bbs

08/02/2007

I can’t believe that Emily is a month (and a day) old already. I love her so much! I fell in love with her exactly one week ago today. I know that sounds really strange but I think it took me that long to adjust and then to see her as a person and not a “baby“. She is the most impatient and bad tempered person I know but she has the most gorgeous eyes and her smile is to die for. Yes her smile! She started smiling properly 3 days ago. She had smiled before that but it was a bit random. The only problem is, she is very sparing with these smiles as though she doesn’t want to spoil us (her parents) just in case we think that we are doing too good a job and the standards start slipping.

Yesterday was a pretty horrible day as Emily didn’t like anything very much at all and cried a lot and slept not at all. The only two good things were that Mark had a days holiday and so could share in the joy that was our red faced, screaming, overtired daughter. The second good thing was finding out at the health visitors that she’d put on another 8oz over the week which takes her up to 8 and a half pounds. She was quite nice and peaceful before we went but as soon as I put her into her snow suit (which incidentally makes her look like Avid Merrions rude bear, which I am NOT happy about), she started crying. She cried all the way to the doctors in the pram, yes even in the pram, everyone I told this to said “What? In the pram?” So yes in the bloody pram. When we got to the surgery waiting room Emily thought she would try out the acoustics there by screaming and crying alternately, varying in pitch but not volume, the volume stayed on maximum throughout. By the way in case you are interested the acoustic test found the waiting room to have quite an echo if you’re loud enough! There was already someone in with the health visitor and another little person was in the queue before us so we had a good 15 - 20 minutes of Emily’s dulcet tones to endure enjoy. Other Mums and their (quiet and calm) little ones kept coming into the waiting room and sitting as far away from Emily and her pacing, shushing, swaying machine (me) while shooting me that “sympathetic but relieved it’s not them” look. Worryingly the only time Emily stopped crying was when I took off all her clothes and put her on the scales. Now correct me if I’m wrong but should this not be the other way around? I thought babies hated those scales. They are cold and hard. But not our Emily, she positively grinned, then started crying again as soon as the clothes started going back on. The clothes are fine, she’s worn them before and I haven’t changed washing powder and anyway they were different to the clothes I took off of her which she was screaming in pre naked time. So noting the cheerful naked Emily I thought I would keep this titbit of information for the next day… later… back to yesterday. She cried all the way round the Co-op (which I don’t really blame her for as the service in there is appalling) and all the way home and didn’t really stop (except to eat) until 10.30pm, by which time I was far too exhausted to do anything constructive, but still managed to sort her bottles and do a few other bits and then give her a dream feed at midnight before me and Mark retired. Oh I should point out that the achievement part of this was that she went to sleep on her own in our bedroom at 10.30pm!! I should also point out that while this is an achievement of very high order it took me an hour and a half up there with her to settle her.

So last night I decided that today would be different, I was going to start putting some structure back into our lives. I was not going to feed on demand apart from at night. I was going to feed her every 3 and a half hours as she is on 4-5oz a time now but sometimes will only have 2 - 2.5oz and then want the rest an hour later. I thought if I can make her wait, then by the second (daytime) bottle she’ll be hungry enough to have the whole 4-5oz which will keep her satisfied for the next 3 and a half hours.

So that was the nice theory in my head. I even wrote down activities that we could do together in between feeds for when she was awake, these were, Nappy Time (as I had discovered yesterday that Emily likes to go naked, but I wasn’t quite brave enough to do that with her while on my own in case she weed or worse and I had to clean it up with her screaming at me to do it faster), Tummy Time which the Osteopath has said is good for babies as it encourages them to lift their heads, Bouncer Time which we do every day anyway (this involves Emily sitting in her bouncer with Mummy waving rattles at her and talking in a high pitched voice desperately hoping for a smile). Cuddle Time and Going For A Walk If All Else Fails were also on the list.

We started well. Emily woke at 5.30am for a feed and then again at 8.30am so I only had to delay feeding for 30 minutes which is achievable. Then she wanted feeding again at about 10am so I thought “well I’ll make her wait an hour and a half” as by this time I’d worked out that every 3 hours is better during the day as she might sleep better at night. So I gave her some juice instead to help her bowel movements. Then I changed her nappy and helped her to do a number two (Helpful Hint: Help your little one go for a no. 2 if they suffer constipation, undo old nappy but leave it under them, then keep their legs in the air as if you are still changing them. This gives them something to push against and although not the most pleasant thing to witness, it gives her some relief so I don’t care about the niceties). Then I thought we’d try nappy time and took Emily into the front room and laid her down on a fleecy blanket that one of our kind relatives bought for her on top of the mobile change mat. Emily wasn’t as pleased about it as I’d hoped, there was certainly no grin. In fact she looked a bit confused, or so I thought. Instead she was sick, quite a bit sick, so I took her into the bathroom to give her a wipe with cotton wool, at which point the rest came up. The last feed obviously hadn’t digested and the juice (a tiny bit of fresh orange mixed with 5oz of water) all half an oz of it, had mixed with the milk and curdled in her tummy.

Emily was now pretty much covered all over in sick, which I have to say smelt awful. This upset her somewhat and so the lungs got another airing. At this point I resorted to my husbands favourite trick for the first time and put cotton wool in my ears, it muffled the noise just enough to help me to think calmly. Well there was no escaping it; I was going to have to give Emily a proper bath, all on my own, scary. We usually do it as a team, Mark and I, which works nicely. So I managed to calm her down and carried her with me while I filled her bath. The bathing bit was easy and she really enjoyed it, but then I had to take her out. Mmm. We have one of those changing stations that have the baby bath underneath, which was kindly donated by my cousin. These are great for space saving and fine when there are two of you, but it took me an extra 5 seconds to get Emily wrapped up in her towel than it takes me and Mark together. Five seconds is about 5 times the amount of time it takes Emily to reach top note in the screaming stakes. Thank God for cotton wool, and cotton wool factories and farmers and sheep and, well thanks to God I guess!

Having said that with the help of Fred (that’s Emily’s dummy, we are firm friends by now) she calmed down and went to sleep. At this point I decided that I would feed Emily whenever she next cried for it as she’d either be really hungry now or still feeling a bit sick so I didn’t want to push it onto her too early. As it was she slept for a few hours safe in the knowledge that she had successfully thwarted her mother’s plans for introducing a routine…

So while she slept I thought it was about time I filled out that Child Benefit form, although we wouldn’t be posting it today as it was snowing (Emily’s first snow day, but she said she wasn’t really up for building a snow man just yet) and I can’t work out how to fit the rain cover onto the pram, so we can only go out when it’s not raining, snowing or hailing. I don’t know what I’ll do if I get caught out in a surprise shower, stand under a tree for an hour probably.
I filled the form in, but can you believe it her birth certificate has wandered off. This is most distressing as I need to send it in with the form. I’ve searched everywhere for it. In the piles of bills scattered around the house that appear to be mating as there are several baby bill piles, a few teenage ones smoking in the back room, and at least two adult couple bill piles growling at each other in the front room, getting very territorial… I must get around to doing some filing.

I looked for the birth certificate in every drawer and even checked to see if Emily had hidden it in her nursery. I had this feeling that it was following me around the house all day, but every time I turned around, it hid behind a corner.

I can’t quite believe that I have already lost my daughters birth certificate. I feel so guilty. Anyway when the light started to fade the search was called off to resume again at first light (Yes I do have electricity but until I claim Child Benefit I can’t afford to use it… I’m joking of course).

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Emily Mark and Me 190107

Sunday Mar 11 2007 23:07:52

By D3bbs

19/01/2007 (Emily: 13 days old - is that an unlucky number?…)

So yesterday Mark came home from his first day back at work to find a nice peaceful (if rather untidy) household. Just what any man wants. So I thought I’d take the opportunity in the evening to go to Tesco. Mark practically begged me to let him go, but I needed a few minutes to myself, so I left him happily (?) feeding Emily and returned 20 minutes later to complete chaos! As I walked down the garden path I could see Mark through the window minus his shirt holding Emily in a nappy and a baby vest around her neck. At this point I actually asked myself whether I should enter the house or turn tail and run! But alas those mothering and wifely instincts are strong. I entered the house. Mark was sweating profusely while Emily was quite happy tucked up in her Dad’s arms, even though her vest was only partly on (babies have no sense of fashion you know). The bathroom looked like hurricane Edna had passed through stopping for a coffee and a chat on her way, but “no” Mark informed me, this hurricane was our Emily who, after having her bottle did a nice big poop especially for Daddy (good girl!) who proceeded to change her nappy and at about the halfway point, you know the one, you’ve taken the nappy off and are just about to put a new one on, Emily sharted (A Shart: another word for poop and a fart, basically this is a poop with velocity, and the furthest Emily’s sharts have travelled so far is about half a meter, not bad for a little girl). Then just as Mark set about cleaning that up, she puked and for her finale she did a nice big wee, which covered her, her change mat and her baby grow and vest, not to mention her clean nappy which had been waiting patiently for it’s turn to fulfil it’s life’s mission in the packet for Goodness only knows how long, poor little mite. It was at this point that my poor husband realised there were no more baby wipes to hand (my bad). So was trying desperately to clean up the whole sorry mess (well I say sorry, but Emily looked quite pleased actually) with cotton wool and toilet paper. He managed all this while at the same time keeping his head, and I was very proud of him, but when it came to putting Emily’s arms through her vest, he just fell apart. This is purely because he’s terrified of hurting her. Emily is a feisty little thing and likes to make vest time fun by punching the air with no particular regard for rhythm, speed is the important element to Emily’s dance, and you could be forgiven into thinking, “Well just move with her” but Emily does the arm dance with her hands splayed and her fingers stretched to their limits, and believe me when I tell you my daughter has big hands and piano fingers. So my Mark at 6’3” with his (also) big fingers that are hardened due to his guitar playing is terrified of accidentally breaking her long little (?) fingers. I said to him, that practice is the only way but after the trauma he’d just had he had had enough, so I took over, but we have agreed that every time her vest is changed when he’s around now, he is to do it with me talking him through. It’s now 23.31 the following night and somehow, we’ve got through the whole evening without a vest change since. I think he’s been praying again.

Last night was our first night without the bedroom lamp on, all we had all night long was a crack in the door, with the downstairs landing light on (and this is only so that I don’t trip over some unfinished cable work on the stairs when I get Emily’s bottle at night) and a tiny night light on the baby monitor. Mark came up to bed with us so that me and him could have a cuddle before he hit the couch (not the same ring as hitting the sack, but hey ho), and whether it was us talking quietly with the light off or whether it was just a rare and lucky night I don’t know but Emily slept from midnight until nearly 5am!!! WOW!! Only problem was, I just could not sleep at all, I did eventually fall asleep for a couple of hours but first I couldn’t get comfortable (not surprising considering my husband is on the sofa), then my stitches started playing up, they’re at that insanely itchy stage, like thrush, in fact I’m wondering whether that’s what it is… but sorry, too much information. Then the days events started whirling around in my brain and that bloody duvet rustles every time you blinking breath, it almost like it’s saying “shush” every 2 seconds, I am a fidgety sleeper, so me and said duvet have now fallen out. The duvet has decided that it’d rather sleep on the couch with Mark tonight, which suits me fine, I’ve kidnapped the polite one for tonight that Mark shouldn’t have snuck downstairs in the first place.

Anyway I digress (I do that a lot). Emily had a feed at 5am followed by another one at about 8:30am and then slept until about 12pm at which point I brought her downstairs where we should have lots of noise etc. etc. Well she has been almost as unsettled as she was when we first brought her home for the rest of the day. Mark has actually resorted to taking her out in the car for a ride in a desperate attempt to settle her. I am so tired I’m not even tired anymore (just have that headache, if you have or have had a baby you know the one I’m talking about, if you are pregnant and reading this, you will soon know what headache I mean, and no you’ve not known anything comparable in your comfortable life so far, ouch that was bitter, sorry, but you will be too!!). So I don’t suppose the light thing will work tonight, but hey, it was an achievement while it lasted. I am going to take her out in her pram tomorrow for the first time on our own. I’m dreading it. So many new experiences, I’ve never been good at first time things.

Emily Mark and Me 180107

Sunday Mar 11 2007 23:06:43

By D3bbs

18/01/2007

My darling husband Mark went back to work today leaving me and Emily to experience the first day of the rest of our lives (well the first day of the rest of my maternity leave anyway). Last night I couldn’t sleep, partly nerves, partly missing Mark, who is sleeping downstairs until we can get a bit of a routine going as his job involves lots of driving so he needs to be alert, but mostly I couldn’t sleep because Emily didn’t really want to sleep.

Emily is now 12 days old, and it feels like we’ve had her forever in one way and then like we are complete novices in other ways, which at 12 days I guess we still are. I’ve just changed over to bottle feeding with expressed breast milk and formula as exclusive breast feeding wasn’t really working out for us. I say that, and any midwives reading this may frown, but I ask anyone who can feed for 6 hours solid one night, breaking only for boob changes and nappy changes then another 6 hours the next day followed by a 7 hour marathon the next night, any one that can do that and still feel positive about exclusive breast feeding, please step forward, you deserve a medal and a winning lottery ticket, but not until you’ve undergone a lie detector test! I phoned the maternity ward twice in that time only to be told that this kind of feeding is normal and that my boobs going soft is not a sign that there is no milk for Emily to take, and that she’s probably going through a growth spurt.

Well, is it just me or do you not look at a baby that is perhaps 50cm long and think, “There’s an awful lot of growing to do there” and a lot of growing says to me a lot of “growth spurts”. So for my sanity and ultimately my Emily’s happiness (because a tired Mum is a less useful Mum) we decided to add formula to her diet and introduce my very good friend “The Bottle”. Now the great thing for me about the bottle is that 1, I can see exactly how much Emily is feeding, 2, She finishes it in less than 10 minutes (compare 3 of these to afore mentioned breast feeds and you do the maths, well ok I did the maths and worked out that saved me about 18 and a half HOURS!) and 3, she doesn’t use the bottle as a comforter which I am beginning to suspect that that is what I was becoming.

Which brings me nicely onto rule number 2, which we broke, pretty much the minute we brought Emily home from the hospital. Dummies, you hear it all the time and we said it ourselves, “My child wont have a dummy, whoa no!” But then comes the crying and screaming and the little red face and the damaged eardrums and the fraught nerves, we just didn’t know what to do with her, we’d tried everything, and everything had failed to have an impact, so Mark (gladly) drove to 24 hour Tescos approximately 10 hours after we’d brought Emily home and came back with dummies (another good friend of mine), they worked a treat, you see, it seems that Emily likes to suckle as a comfort thing, there is so much I didn’t know about babies (and so much I still don’t know), it’s scary really, there are all these health and safety laws now about operating machinery and even walking on a wet floor, yet they let you take home a day old baby without so much as checking your references or making you do a course. That is a super idea, a course where you live in a house with a newborn baby (and close supervision) and get told some useful facts and tips, unlike the antenatal classes that lecture you on the benefits of breast feeding for three hours without warning you of the hard graft and growth spurts that lie in your path.

So my little daughter is now on bottles and a dummy, but she also gets lots more love and positive attention, so our next hurdle is night times. Emily doesn’t like the dark, which is odd considering my womb didn’t come complete with a light bulb (well not so far as I’m aware anyway). But we have to break this habit of sleeping with the light on as it’s not good for any of us, apparently there’s a sleep hormone that is affected by the light being on at night, and sleeping with it on does not bode well now or for the future. So I am absolutely dreading tonight, when I will have to deal with a wakeful Emily and an upset Emily because it’s dark. I have a few tricks up my sleeve for both such as not talking to her during her feeds, not changing her unless absolutely necessary, the Shushing noise and placing my hand on her head when she cries, and lastly a pair of earplugs, JOKE JOKE, no earplugs. I completely expect tonight to be a trial and I hope I don’t give up. I’ll let you know.

On Monday we are booked in to see the Osteopath as Emily was delivered by ventouse after being in the birth canal for 3 hours, so we are hoping that some of her temper can be put down to this traumatic delivery and can therefore be fixed, my personal assumption is that she had a headache for a few days and now just needs lots of comfort (i.e. the suckling thing). Also a routine, which is what we are hoping the bottle will help us to achieve. But again, we’ll see how it goes.

So, Mark went back to work, me and Emily stayed in bed until mid-day (we were both tired after a long night shift), then the health visitor came round for the first time and Emily was weighed for the first time since she was born. I had been warned about this, many babies can take up to 2 weeks to get back to their birth weight and so not to worry if she was smaller. So I was surprised and very proud when Emily weighed in at 7lb 3oz from her birth weight of 6lb 11oz!! I phoned Mark to let him know and felt like phoning the local, no make that national news desks so they could announce it on the evening news!

Emily, Mark and Me 19/01/2007

Sunday Mar 11 2007 11:27:27

By D3bbs

So yesterday Mark came home from his first day back at work to find a nice peaceful (if rather untidy) household. Just what any man wants. So I thought I’d take the opportunity in the evening to go to Tesco. Mark practically begged me to let him go, but I needed a few minutes to myself, so I left him happily (?) feeding Emily and returned 20 minutes later to complete chaos! As I walked down the garden path I could see Mark through the window minus his shirt holding Emily in a nappy and a baby vest around her neck. At this point I actually asked myself whether I should enter the house or turn tail and run! But alas those mothering and wifely instincts are strong. I entered the house. Mark was sweating profusely while Emily was quite happy tucked up in her Dad’s arms, even though her vest was only partly on (babies have no sense of fashion you know). The bathroom looked like hurricane Edna had passed through stopping for a coffee and a chat on her way, but “no” Mark informed me, this hurricane was our Emily who, after having her bottle did a nice big poop especially for Daddy (good girl!) who proceeded to change her nappy and at about the halfway point, you know the one, you’ve taken the nappy off and are just about to put a new one on, Emily sharted (A Shart: another word for poop and a fart, basically this is a poop with velocity, and the furthest Emily’s sharts have travelled so far is about half a meter, not bad for a little girl). Then just as Mark set about cleaning that up, she puked and for her finale she did a nice big wee, which covered her, her change mat and her baby grow and vest, not to mention her clean nappy which had been waiting patiently for it’s turn to fulfil it’s life’s mission in the packet for Goodness only knows how long, poor little mite. It was at this point that my poor husband realised there were no more baby wipes to hand (my bad). So was trying desperately to clean up the whole sorry mess (well I say sorry, but Emily looked quite pleased actually) with cotton wool and toilet paper. He managed all this while at the same time keeping his head, and I was very proud of him, but when it came to putting Emily’s arms through her vest, he just fell apart. This is purely because he’s terrified of hurting her. Emily is a feisty little thing and likes to make vest time fun by punching the air with no particular regard for rhythm, speed is the important element to Emily’s dance, and you could be forgiven into thinking, “Well just move with her” but Emily does the arm dance with her hands splayed and her fingers stretched to their limits, and believe me when I tell you my daughter has big hands and piano fingers. So my Mark at 6’3” with his (also) big fingers that are hardened due to his guitar playing is terrified of accidentally breaking her long little (?) fingers. I said to him, that practice is the only way but after the trauma he’d just had he had had enough, so I took over, but we have agreed that every time her vest is changed when he’s around now, he is to do it with me talking him through. It’s now 23.31 the following night and somehow, we’ve got through the whole evening without a vest change since. I think he’s been praying again.

Last night was our first night without the bedroom lamp on, all we had all night long was a crack in the door, with the downstairs landing light on (and this is only so that I don’t trip over some unfinished cable work on the stairs when I get Emily’s bottle at night) and a tiny night light on the baby monitor. Mark came up to bed with us so that me and him could have a cuddle before he hit the couch (not the same ring as hitting the sack, but hey ho), and whether it was us talking quietly with the light off or whether it was just a rare and lucky night I don’t know but Emily slept from midnight until nearly 5am!!! WOW!! Only problem was, I just could not sleep at all, I did eventually fall asleep for a couple of hours but first I couldn’t get comfortable (not surprising considering my husband is on the sofa), then my stitches started playing up, they’re at that insanely itchy stage, like thrush, in fact I’m wondering whether that’s what it is… but sorry, too much information. Then the days events started whirling around in my brain and that bloody duvet rustles every time you blinking breath, it almost like it’s saying “shush” every 2 seconds, I am a fidgety sleeper, so me and said duvet have now fallen out. The duvet has decided that it’d rather sleep on the couch with Mark tonight, which suits me fine, I’ve kidnapped the polite one for tonight that Mark shouldn’t have snuck downstairs in the first place.

Anyway I digress (I do that a lot). Emily had a feed at 5am followed by another one at about 8:30am and then slept until about 12pm at which point I brought her downstairs where we should have lots of noise etc. etc. Well she has been almost as unsettled as she was when we first brought her home for the rest of the day. Mark has actually resorted to taking her out in the car for a ride in a desperate attempt to settle her. I am so tired I’m not even tired anymore (just have that headache, if you have or have had a baby you know the one I’m talking about, if you are pregnant and reading this, you will soon know what headache I mean, and no you’ve not known anything comparable in your comfortable life so far, ouch that was bitter, sorry, but you will be too!!). So I don’t suppose the light thing will work tonight, but hey, it was an achievement while it lasted. I am going to take her out in her pram tomorrow for the first time on our own. I’m dreading it. So many new experiences, I’ve never been good at first time things.

Emily, Mark and Me 18/01/2007

Sunday Mar 11 2007 11:21:59

By D3bbs

My darling husband Mark went back to work today leaving me and Emily to experience the first day of the rest of our lives (well the first day of the rest of my maternity leave anyway). Last night I couldn’t sleep, partly nerves, partly missing Mark, who is sleeping downstairs until we can get a bit of a routine going as his job involves lots of driving so he needs to be alert, but mostly I couldn’t sleep because Emily didn’t really want to sleep.

Emily is now 12 days old, and it feels like we’ve had her forever in one way and then like we are complete novices in other ways, which at 12 days I guess we still are. I’ve just changed over to bottle feeding with expressed breast milk and formula as exclusive breast feeding wasn’t really working out for us. I say that, and any midwives reading this may frown, but I ask anyone who can feed for 6 hours solid one night, breaking only for boob changes and nappy changes then another 6 hours the next day followed by a 7 hour marathon the next night, any one that can do that and still feel positive about exclusive breast feeding, please step forward, you deserve a medal and a winning lottery ticket, but not until you’ve undergone a lie detector test! I phoned the maternity ward twice in that time only to be told that this kind of feeding is normal and that my boobs going soft is not a sign that there is no milk for Emily to take, and that she’s probably going through a growth spurt.

Well, is it just me or do you not look at a baby that is perhaps 50cm long and think, “There’s an awful lot of growing to do there” and a lot of growing says to me a lot of “growth spurts”. So for my sanity and ultimately my Emily’s happiness (because a tired Mum is a less useful Mum) we decided to add formula to her diet and introduce my very good friend “The Bottle”. Now the great thing for me about the bottle is that 1, I can see exactly how much Emily is feeding, 2, She finishes it in less than 10 minutes (compare 3 of these to afore mentioned breast feeds and you do the maths, well ok I did the maths and worked out that saved me about 18 and a half HOURS!) and 3, she doesn’t use the bottle as a comforter which I am beginning to suspect that that is what I was becoming.

Which brings me nicely onto rule number 2, which we broke, pretty much the minute we brought Emily home from the hospital. Dummies, you hear it all the time and we said it ourselves, “My child wont have a dummy, whoa no!” But then comes the crying and screaming and the little red face and the damaged eardrums and the fraught nerves, we just didn’t know what to do with her, we’d tried everything, and everything had failed to have an impact, so Mark (gladly) drove to 24 hour Tescos approximately 10 hours after we’d brought Emily home and came back with dummies (another good friend of mine), they worked a treat, you see, it seems that Emily likes to suckle as a comfort thing, there is so much I didn’t know about babies (and so much I still don’t know), it’s scary really, there are all these health and safety laws now about operating machinery and even walking on a wet floor, yet they let you take home a day old baby without so much as checking your references or making you do a course. That is a super idea, a course where you live in a house with a newborn baby (and close supervision) and get told some useful facts and tips, unlike the antenatal classes that lecture you on the benefits of breast feeding for three hours without warning you of the hard graft and growth spurts that lie in your path.

So my little daughter is now on bottles and a dummy, but she also gets lots more love and positive attention, so our next hurdle is night times. Emily doesn’t like the dark, which is odd considering my womb didn’t come complete with a light bulb (well not so far as I’m aware anyway). But we have to break this habit of sleeping with the light on as it’s not good for any of us, apparently there’s a sleep hormone that is affected by the light being on at night, and sleeping with it on does not bode well now or for the future. So I am absolutely dreading tonight, when I will have to deal with a wakeful Emily and an upset Emily because it’s dark. I have a few tricks up my sleeve for both such as not talking to her during her feeds, not changing her unless absolutely necessary, the Shushing noise and placing my hand on her head when she cries, and lastly a pair of earplugs, JOKE JOKE, no earplugs. I completely expect tonight to be a trial and I hope I don’t give up. I’ll let you know.

On Monday we are booked in to see the Osteopath as Emily was delivered by ventouse after being in the birth canal for 3 hours, so we are hoping that some of her temper can be put down to this traumatic delivery and can therefore be fixed, my personal assumption is that she had a headache for a few days and now just needs lots of comfort (i.e. the suckling thing). Also a routine, which is what we are hoping the bottle will help us to achieve. But again, we’ll see how it goes.

So, Mark went back to work, me and Emily stayed in bed until mid-day (we were both tired after a long night shift), then the health visitor came round for the first time and Emily was weighed for the first time since she was born. I had been warned about this, many babies can take up to 2 weeks to get back to their birth weight and so not to worry if she was smaller. So I was surprised and very proud when Emily weighed in at 7lb 3oz from her birth weight of 6lb 11oz!! I phoned Mark to let him know and felt like phoning the local, no make that national news desks so they could announce it on the evening news!