Diddy at 2 Months

Time flies when you’re sleep deprived!! Miss Diddy hit the 2 month milestone on Saturday, and things have definitely changed in the past month!

Two weeks ago, we discovered that my breastmilk wasn’t providing adequate nourishment for our little princess. She wasn’t gaining any weight, and was breastfeeding 17-20 hours per day just to have enough sustenance to survive on. Following this, I made the decision to switch her to full formula feeding and since then we haven’t looked back. She’s gained over a kilogram in those two weeks (as opposed to 280g in the 7 week prior) and is now fat, happy and on track. She goes nuts when she sees that bottle aimed her way, it’s pretty awesome to see!!

Pre-weight gain. Skinny little chicken with great big eyes
Photo by Captured Momentz Photography

Diddy smiles freely now at anyone who glances her way, but she reserves the biggest, brightest smiles for her big sister. If I put her in the swing and turn away to do something, I’ll hear Boo saying ‘Happy Smiles!’ and look around to find her parked in front of the swing and the two girls grinning at one another. She’s learning, slowly, how to laugh too. She laughs a lot in her sleep, which swings between precious when we’re awake and watching, and creepy when we’re asleep and hear her from the next room.

My two beautiful babies.
Another wonderful image by Captured Momentz Photography

After weeks and weeks of screaming baths, trying desperately to make bathing her in her change table tub work, Husbeast and I started jumping in the big bath with her, one of us cuddling and one support person fetching, carrying and holding the towel. Doing this has made bathtime her favourite. She kicks and laughs, tries to swim and revels in the precious time, as do her Mummy and Daddy.

Diddy has found her voice the last few days and loves to coo and chat to anyone interested in a conversation. She loves lying in her pram gurgling away to herself, her monkey, her reflection in her pram mirror and me. We walk for around an hour each day and thanks to the bassinet attachment on my Strider, she can doze, play and enjoy the time with lots of toys and comfort close at hand.

Making out with her glow worm....Why can't I produce normal children?

She’s also slowly finding her hands. Under her playgym she can now hit at her toys deliberately so they move and if you pop a squeaky friend near her, she can make them squeak herself by hitting or grasping them. She gets the most beautiful smug look on her face afterwards!

Sophie la Giraffe - Chewtoy and occasional lovey

She sleeps in her own bed, in her own room these days. I know they say to sleep a baby in your room, but her room is so close to ours that really, she’s no further away in her room than she was in the corner of ours, and I find Husbeast sleeps better this way. She sleeps between 5 and 9 hours unbroken, depending on the night and what kind of day we’ve had, and her sleeping is meaning I’m a happier, more relaxed Mama.

Babywearing like a Boss - Wasn't smiling like this a few days prior!

All in all, at two months I’m finally relaxing into being a Mum of two (occasionally three). With feeding and sleeping issues under control, I wake most days ready to take on the world and give my girls everything they need from me. And I can’t wait to see what the next day, week and month bring!

Happy 2 Months Imogen!! 

Did you know that I Blog On Tuesdays with Essentially Jess? Pop over and check the link up to read some other fantastic blogs :)

Still so Tiny

I’m a mess of emotions as I write this. Overwhelmed, worried, tired....more that I can’t think of the names of (see the third emotion).

For weeks now, Diddy has been breastfeeding pretty constantly. Out of each 24-hour period, maybe 6 of them have been spent without a baby attached to my breast. I’ve told myself that this was OK, because I was giving her the very best start in life. Visits to the Maternal and Child Health nurse were showing she wasn’t putting on much weight, but I figured any gain was good, and kept on keeping on. I was expressing and topping up occasionally, but mostly to relieve blocked ducts.

Yesterday morning, we had a 7-week weight checkup which showed my beautiful girl has gone two weeks without any weight gain at all. She’s growing tall, but not fat. As of Wednesday, she’s only 230grams over her birth weight. Not good at all, I’m totally aware.

For weeks, people have been looking at her and going ‘she’s still so tiny!’ and I’ve told myself that it was ok, sometimes breastfed babies are small. But everytime someone says it, it’s niggled at me and later on I’ve been teary about it.

Turns out, a massive dose of oral thrush has hit my poor baby, making it painful for her to suck and affecting her little body so much. It’s been 3 weeks since I noticed the white around her mouth, but I was sure it was just milky residue on the skin. No-one else was telling me to be concerned, so it was OK, right? Apparently not. She’s got blisters around her beautiful lips, and her ineffective sucking hasn’t been getting all the good stuff out of me.

Did you hear that? Pretty sure my heart breaking was audible around the world.

Yesterday, the tears fell all day. I felt inadequate. I’d been starving my baby and her sweet, content nature and my demand-feeding philosophy meant I’d been missing it for weeks. It was time to put a plan in place. Now, I’m breastfeeding, followed by a bottleful of expressed milk. Once a day, if needed, I’ll give her a formula feed, just to make sure her tummy stays nice and full. I’ve been avoiding formula, but last night when Husbeast gave her the bottle, she was ‘milk drunk’ for the first time in weeks. She was so content and satisfied, and I can’t deny my baby that happiness, especially not when she’s still getting all the good stuff I have to offer.

I’ve started treating the hideous thrush, I’m pumping after every feed (surely the Medela Swing is a gift from some higher entity? AMAZING) and I’m making sure my baby is full, happy and on the way to recovering from a crappy few weeks. It breaks my heart that it took me so long to realise something was wrong.

Yesterday, I was forced to admit something was wrong with me, too. Not just sleep deprivation (though that’s sure as hell not helping), not hormones and not my run-of-the-mill anxiety. Yesterday I admitted out loud that this time around I’ve been hit with Post-Natal Depression. 

I’m scared, I’m sad, I’m angry and I’m exhausted. But mostly I’m relieved to finally know what’s going on with my baby, why she’s ‘still so tiny’ and be working to fix it. I’m relieved to have admitted something serious is up and be taking steps to fix it. I’m glad I got there before I did something to hurt myself or either of my precious babies. And I’m glad that, even though she’s skinny, my tiny baby is still developing. She smiles now, and no matter how crappy I feel, when she hits me with that huge, gummy grin, I know I’m doing something right.

FFS Friday: Booby Bitching

Diddy is feeding C O N S T A N T L Y ...FFS

I don’t mean a feed every few hours... I mean 5 minute snacks so that each feed lasts 2 hours and they all run into one another...FFS

This would be fine, except the past 2 weeks have been school holidays, meaning Boo home all the time wanting things like food...FFS

Husbeast devised a plan – put out ALL her snacks at the start of each day and let her help herself when she’s hungry... No FFS

This was a fantastic plan until we realised that 4 year olds have no self control...FFS

She ate everything within an hour...FFS

5 minutes later, ‘Mummy, I’m starving’... Mofo FFS

Despite the constant feeding, thanks to my darling tiny girl being a lazy sucker I’m fighting a constant battle with blocked ducts...FFS

She’s 6 weeks old. I’ve had 3 bouts of the dreaded mastitis...FFS

Breastfeeding may be the best option, but it sure as shit isn’t the easiest...FFS

Luckily, I managed to score the mother of all breast pumps on eBay yesterday...No FFS

Someone else fought me like a demon to get it, but I won! ... No FFS

I may, however, have neglected the tiny screaming human for 4-5 minutes while I battled it out...FFS

Told myself it was better for her in the long run...FFS

My boobs hurt...FFS

We’re roadtripping to Melbourne to see one of my favourite friends this weekend...No FFS

And to buy the baby things our little corner of the world doesn’t seem to bother getting – ANYWHERE...FFS

3 kids, 3 hours in a car with no AC, Boo’s DS is dead... FFS

Bozo is going through a phase of antagonising me, his stepsister and everyone around him...FFS

I swear to God, I'll leave him on the side of the road...FFS

I’m stressing that Diddy won’t sleep in a strange house...FFS

Likely she’ll sleep the whole damn night while I lay awake stressing that she’ll wake at any second...FFS

Wish me luck! FFS!!?!

Linking up with the fabulousness that is Dear Baby G.