One month, already?

This past week marked one month for Lucas. Technically, since he was born on a Wednesday, Wednesday was the one month mark. But Joe is trying to say that since he was born on the 27th, yesterday, May 27th, is the one month mark. Whatever day we use, he's a month old now.

His eyes are still blue but I googled it and apparently if they change, it's usually around month 6-9 so I guess that doesn't mean anything. His hair hasn't gotten any darker (yet?) either. After a bath, it sticks up a little on his head like peach fuzz.

He's sleeping pretty good, albeit, on my chest. We are up at either 10 or 11, 12 or 1, 3 or 4, and 5 or 6. Every once in awhile he'll sleep from 12 to 4:45, (or tonight we took a 'nap' at 10 and made it till 1) which almost feels like a full night of sleep when it happens. It took a week or two to get used to this, but now I'm pretty much programmed into the schedule anyway so I don't really care if he sleeps through the night anytime soon as long as I get some sleep in between feedings.

 I'm really not in a hurry to move him off my chest to sleep but I suppose it's not really a great idea to get him programmed into sleeping on his stomach, (probably too late) so we'll probably start working on making the move back to the bassinet this week. (The thing is, I'm as paranoid as ever, so I like him being asleep on my chest because I can feel him breathing without even opening my eyes. The move to the bassinet, even with him right beside me, is going to require a breathing monitor for sure or I'll never sleep.) When I was pregnant, I thought I wouldn't worry that much about SIDS because statistically a baby is 7x more likely to be stillborn than die of SIDS. It turns out, having a baby die makes you paranoid about everything, period. And I probably would have been paranoid anyway, but not as paranoid, considering I worked in daycare for years and it never even occurred to me that I might lay a baby down and go back later to find them not breathing (and it never happened), but now, I know it actually is a possibility. That being said, it's a lot easier to hold his warm healthy body close and relax, than listening to his heartbeat on the doppler when he was still inside me. Still, I find myself praying at least once a day please let him stay.

Feeding is going a lot better. There are times when he eats for 15-20-30 minutes and then is good for a couple hours, then there are times when he wants to eat for 2 hours straight it seems like. Luckily, the middle of the night feedings have went from taking an hour to about 10-15 minutes, so that makes the long feedings (usually during the middle of the day and early evening) easier. He's growing well and I'm not especially worried about it, it just makes it tough to get anything done, but I'm pretty content hanging out on the couch with the baby all day (though quick outings mixed in are nice too, I have been getting a little stir crazy this week). We're estimating his weight at around 9.5 lbs and he's getting too long for a lot of his newborn sleepers and footed outfits, they still fit around his waist but he can't stretch his legs out in them-see pics below, we love the giraffe outfit but he can't stretch his legs out all the way anymore in it. And he doesn't quite fit in most of the 0-3 month sleepers yet and extra fabric around his face= way too paranoid mommy. Luckily, we have some gown sleepers that work pretty well, except Joe keeps saying, "let's pull up your dress" when changing his diaper, etc. , poor kid. (And Joe changes way more diapers than I ever anticipated that he'd change, basically, if he's home, he'll do it without really complaining, which is really nice.) I suddenly like Joe being off more than I ever have before because he really does help a lot, too bad those days are too few.

 We've moved on the size 1 diapers, some brands(Target) are still too big even though they say 8-14 lbs, but other brands with the same weight (Pampers) fit perfectly. We ran out of newborn diapers and I didn't want to buy more at that size not knowing how much longer he'll be fitting in them, since the size sort of overlaps with size 1. I'm not ready to start transitioning to cloth diapers anytime soon, we're still easily changing him 15ish times a day and he's eating too often and for too long for me to be willing to take it on just yet, but I'm hoping maybe by the end of the two month mark I'll figure out what kind of cloth diapers I want to use and start getting and using them at least some of the time.

His head control is definitely get stronger still, he's awake (luckily mostly during the day) for longer, still not smiling or laughing all that much but he definitely spends more time looking around. He still screams his face off for diaper changes and i'm considering buying a wipes warmer, which I always thought was a waste of money and unnecessary (and a fire hazard) before but the way he hates diaper changes I'm thinking it might make it better. So I'm keeping an eye on craigslist. The dogs still mostly avoid him though occassionally one of them will come up and smell his feet or blanket or whatever, and every once in awhile they'll lay near where he is crying.

We did one month pictures at Babies R us yesterday (mainly because I had a coupon), he was ridiculously cooperative considering he was due to eat and how much we messed with him while he was sleeping, changing his outfit and putting him in a bunch of different poses. The pictures turned out pretty good, so I'll leave on that note with them below, and I have a special Olivia blog post coming soon, hopefully tomorrow.

3 weeks of awesomeness..and..not so much sleep and pictures

I can't believe it's already been 3 weeks, yesterday, since Lucas was born. He's awake a little bit more these days but still not a lot. Yesterday we both heard him laugh for the first time (and it's a good thing Joe was there for it or I would have had to pretend it didn't happen because he would have been devastated to miss it.) He's eating better, sleeping is iffy. He's holding his head up pretty amazingly well for a 3 week old, but he's spent a lot of time on his belly on our chests. He's still wearing newborn clothes and diapers, and a lot of his clothes that is supposedly newborn size is still big, so I don't see him moving up a size anytime soon.

Last Monday we trekked to the ob's office on Monday for my incision check. (I know I really had a c-section but this recovery has been ridiculously easy, I wasn't even taking tylenol by the last couple days in the hospital.) I was nervous about taking him out by myself but he mostly slept and was easy. Last Tuesday we went to his doctor for a weight check, he weighed in at 7lbs 5 ounces, which is great. And then Thursday we went to brunch with my friend Jackie and her rainbow baby Zackary. This week we've laid low at home, mostly because while eating has gotten better especially the last couple of days, we aren't quite there on sleeping at night. One day this week...I think maybe Monday...I looked at the clock as I was attempting to go to bed for the first time with him finally asleep and content and it was 5 am. Last night was better, I managed to get in bed for an hour at 2 am. It's a bit difficult, but I'm loving every minute of this anyway.  (Said baby is currently curled up on my chest which is the best way to get him to sleep.)

Breastfeeding has been...interesting. I was leaning strongly towards just pumping and giving him bottles of breastmilk because it was so frustrating and exhausting and not going so great. But we've been working on it this week and I think we've finally actually resolved the issues we've been having.  I'm pretty encouraged that we have the hang of it now and hope it continues. And a bonus, I have an oversupply, so we already have a freezer full of milk,which just relaxes me more knowing that I don't have to worry about not having enough to feed him anytime soon. Keeping up with his appetite has been a little rough, not that I don't have enough milk, just mentally, it still seems like he eats all day and night nonstop. Spend an hour feeding him and an hour later he wants to eat again, that sort of thing. Hopefully with our issues resolved and him getting older and eating better, it will get better too. We'll see.

Emotionally, it's weird. I'm happier than I've been in a very very long time. There is definitely some healing that comes with no longer being in that awkward horrible [living]childless mother stage. But the awkwardness and missing our baby girl is always there, too. Monday was the anniversary of the day that I had my positive pregnancy test with Olivia, it didn't escape us, how much we've been through in the last two years. And little things, like the nurse practitioner for my incision check asking how our daughter is doing with the baby (seriously! We just went over that when I was 30ish weeks pregnant and she asked if I'd breastfed her.) Apparently she keeps remembering that we have a daughter but keeps inconveniently forgetting that she died. Then again, I guess I'd rather Olivia be brought up like that, even as sucky as that is, then ignored as if she was never here at all. Anyway, there are no magic bandaids in the form of rainbow babies. We adore our little boy and wouldn't trade him for anything, but our baby girl is still gone, and that will always suck and there will always be someone missing no matter how many babies we have. I think of her now as much as ever. We won't just pretend like it's all better now that we have Lucas, they don't cancel each other out. And we won't pretend like she was never here now that we have a living baby. What we will do, is remember her like we always have been, and be incredibly grateful for her little brother, because we have an appreciation for him that wouldn't have been quite the same if she were here too.
Our first stop on the way home from the hospital.

Going home outfit.

A few days old.

This is how I get sleep.

3 weeks old!

`Koda still isn't sure what to think, he keeps his distance but is curious. (Rogue just keeps her distance.)

That's all for now.

Hospital pics

You can't really read it in this pic but his outfit says "thank heaven for little boys".

Even though Lucas is a week old already, we are still pretty much obsessed with him. We are probably creating a monster because the only time we set him down is to change his diaper or clothes. Otherwise, either Joe is holding him or I'm holding him or someone else is holding him. (And we set him down at night.I have slept with him on my chest a few nights but I'm trying to stick with keeping him in his bassinet.) I know this is probably going to bite us (me!) in the butt later, but right now, I don't really care. After losing Olivia, months of fertility treatments, then 300+ lovenox shots, a million doctor appointments, and months and months of expecting everything to go wrong at any moment, I refuse to feel bad about holding my baby as much as I can. He won't be this little for long. And while I'm more relaxed then I can remember being in a very long time, we know all too well that there are no guarantees. So anyway, between holding the baby, feeding the baby, pumping after almost every feeding, and changing him, we're pretty sleep deprived and exhausted and blissfully happy and overwhelmingly sad at times too. Our grief is different now. On one hand, we are so blessed and grateful and even a little bit healed in ways I can't really explain.

 But. We see so much Olivia in him and not having her here and living all the things we missed out on with her (even just leaving the hospital this time holding a baby) is really hard. Our hearts are full of love and happiness for our new little guy, but in some ways this makes the hole and everything we are missing hurt as much as ever.