here's a pic from s's first bath.

i've been too busy to blog lately - don't often have two hands free to type.
what have we been up to? two weekends ago we had lots of visitors (m, r, & c) who brought us food, and two (d & j) made us brunch two sundays ago! what a treat. last weekend brought a couple more visitors (a & k), and j & i went wine tasting on sunday. we visited archery summit, bergstrom (our first time), and argyle. i definitely felt the wine - a little too much, and perhaps not the way to usher in j's first full days at work. my friend s came over monday & brought lots of food, which helped, and friend v brought food mon evening. we had play dates tues & wed afternoons, but man... life has been hard. s's reflux is really bad.
i had a lactation appointment on tuesday - my 4th - because s will just not latch well. she keeps destroying my nipples, so i end up having to take a break and pump/bottle feed, which takes so much more time, leaving me with less sleep. doris determined her bad latch is due to her reflux - she feels the food coming up, so she clamps down to try to keep it down (or something like that - i don't quite understand the particulars). doris called s's pediatrician to get us in to be seen right away in order to get her meds adjusted. dr. thomas was reluctant to change anything until i broke down in tears - it's been absolutely exhausting pumping, feeding, bottle feeding, and managing z. he suggested more frequent feedings, but that's impossible while watching a 3 year old & a 1 month old. he finally agreed to let us do the prilosec 2 times a day, along with the zantac 2 times a day. this way she has something approximately every 6 hours. the doctor suggested we put z in preschool full time as a way to help manage his behavior and give me more of a break, which i think is ridiculous. that wouldn't help the behavior, but just postpone it. z is a delicate kid... putting him in full time preschool would make this transition even harder for him. the doctor did not agree with doris, that her latch is due to her reflux. i am more inclined to believe doris. i'm thinking of switching pediatricians, or perhaps taking her to a pediatric gastroenterologist. not quite sure what to do, but the current situation is not sustainable because i'm losing my sanity. she feeds, spits up, then feeds again, then spits up, then feeds again, repeated ad nauseum with pooping thrown in. she is managing to gain weight well because of our hard work with the continuous feeding. both doris and dr. thomas said i'm welcome to try formula, and dr. thomas even sent me home with two sample containers, if it becomes even more difficult to produce enough breast milk (since she spits so much of it up & then just wants more). i don't want to go that route, though, because formula is not digested as easily as breast milk, and i'd think it would hurt her even more to spit up formula.
i am hoping the increased dosages will help decrease the spitting up, solving the supply issue & improving her latch, so that i don't have to pump so much.
on top of all of that, z has been complaining of a sore tummy this morning. i cannot take one more thing!!!!!!

z's behavior is marginally better, so i chalk it up to the steroids that were making him incredibly bad. however, he's still acting out. throwing hammers at the window, dumping water out of glasses, throwing books (once in the toilet), etc. i'm exhausted from dealing with it, from trying to give him special time with just me, from ignoring the small bad behavior when he's just trying to get a rise out of us. i'm tired of sore breasts from breast feeding and pumping. i'm tired of them waking me up when i need to feed or pump again. i'm tired of getting less than three hours of sleep in one stretch. i'm tired of a baby that spits up incessantly and doesn't sleep when i have the time and ability to sleep. the zantac is doing nothing for her. and we're out of cloth diapers already, which work the best for all the spit up. lots of tears today. now i have a killer headache.

losing my mind

z is being so incredibly badly behaved. for example - he hit his sister with a bottle three times before i could get him away from her. we were on a walk and he overturned somebody's bucket of recyclable glass bottles (halfway up a steep hill), so we had to chase down the bottles & pick up broken glass. every little thing we ask him to do, he turns into a battle - getting dressed, eating, using the potty - you name it, he battles. i was doing bath time last night and he refused to get out of the tub. i'm not allowed to lift him, so he sat there without water for about 10 min. the other night he refused to take his medicine - j had to pry his mouth open to get it in. we have taken away so many privileges, and it doesn't seem to do a damn thing. we don't believe in spanking, but believe me, i feel like throwing him halfway around the world. i will try ignoring some of the behavior, because i'm sure part of it is him testing boundaries and wanting to get a reaction out of us. i don't know what else to do. some of the behavior can be attributed to steroids - prednisone- we gave him for his cough two nights ago, but he's never been this bad. i'm already worn out from a night of no sleep & a day of appointments... i don't know how i'm going to survive if this behavior continues. along with s spitting up - and so far the zantac has done nothing for her... thank goodness j let me sleep most of last night, and i was lucky that s slept for a long stretch of time during my time to be up with her. j managed to get her to sleep in the bassinet in her crib, propped up at one end - she slept from around 1 to 7am. i'm sure it will not be reproduced if i'm the one on duty... sigh. awful. just awful.

a little update... and a halloween video

here's a little video from halloween.

a cute thing i can't remember if i've documented yet... z always says "no, not simple, no" from the "simple it's not to make up your mind" page in the "oh the places you'll go" book by dr. seuss. it used to be his favorite book at bedtime. lately we've been reading "green eggs & ham" & 5 poems from "where the sidewalk ends." and we always have to read the poem "one sister for sale" on p. 52 first - should i be worried?

so i saw the lactation guru Doris yesterday again. i tried having s breastfeed, and learned good positioning strategies to reduce pain. we discussed some "homeopathic" ways to try to manage s's massive spitting up. we're not supposed to actively try to burp her - just to hold her upright after feeding and wait for a burp (or a toot). even after doing that she still spits up. we also put j's largest chemistry books under two legs of the crib so that she sleeps at an angle. after pumping only - no breast feeding - for five days, i breast fed only all last night until, unfortunately, at 5am my nipples were hurting too much to feed her anymore. they're destroyed again. i'll try just pumping for the rest of today, and see if they can handle her latching again tonight. aside from the pain, it was so much easier just breast feeding because i could just sleep until she cried, instead of having to worry about waking up every 3 hours to pump, and coordinating feeding s on top of that, & getting her back to sleep. i woke up feeling pretty rested this morning for the first time in awhile. we have another appointment with doris on tuesday. if her spitting up has not improved significantly, we're hoping something official written by doris will help convince s's pediatrician - whom we see the next day - to let us try zantac to combat the reflux. i think it's beginning to cause her pain, as she was crying a lot last night after spitting up. she is managing to gain weight, so she's not spitting up 100% of what she takes in.
my belly is getting smaller, and i've lost most of the swelling. i have 17 lbs to go before i'm back to my normal weight. i'm finally trying out wearing normal underwear & maternity jeans today for the first time, instead of wearing pajamas & a robe & j's boxers.