I've been wanting to add another blog, but I'm so busy that it gets difficult to find time to even do some of the smallest things. I'm going to try and be a little better at this.
My kids have been keeping me so busy it's been a bit of a whirlwind at times.
Let's start with William who has always demanded lots of attention and we still have not gotten him straightened out. I took him to a sleep specialist at Johns Hopkins to see if they could give us any more answers than his last sleep specialist was able to give us. He still wakes up throughout the night fussing and crying. Now he's old enough to say "owie" and let me know something is hurting him, yet not old enough to really pinpoint what it is. He is having another sleep study in November to see if his Central Sleep Apnea has gotten better, and if his Periodic Limb Movement Disorder and Restless Leg Syndrome has improved at all. Lately he's been saying his "belly's owie," but when asked where it hurts he points all over and says, "yeah, owie." So who knows if that's part of his problem or not. I just hate that every morning he wakes up grouchy and fussy. One of the best moments with little ones is when they first wake up in the morning and you hear them in their room babbling away, you walk in and they sit up and just smile at you, and are so excited to see you. Not William though. He wakes up crying, you walk in to get him, and he buries his face in his pillow and squirms and cries some more. It's like he's not ready to be awake, but he doesn't want to sleep anymore either. And then he's tired and grouchy all day. Or he's extremely hyper active going 90 mile an hour. There is NO calm, happy medium with this kid!!!
Now on top of William's issues I have Isabella, who also has Reflux, like my other 3 babies and can get pretty fussy at times cause her belly hurts. Now I hate to complain about her problems because she has been by far my easiest going baby, but with William around it makes getting her to sleep even more difficult cause he is always SO loud. And his crying really seems to affect her and make her fussier. All that being said, she really is such a sweet baby, and I am so blessed to have her.
Now we have Tristan, who has been having all sorts of issues lately. For the last year or so he's had problems with headaches and stomach problems. He has been having problems with throwing up and the last month or so it has gotten way worse and he now has to have an upper GI done to see what's going on. On top of that he has sprained his ankle twice in the last 5 weeks. And if that wasn't enough for the poor boy, he now has an abscessed tooth. Which he's going to have to have it pulled, once the antibioics get rid of the infection. I feel bad for him. He has really been quite misesrable lately!
Thankfully Sierra has been extremely healthy!!
I'm so tired of Doctor's visits. And the long drives it takes to get to Many of William's specialist appointments. Either at Hopkins or Hershey. Monday we have an appointment up at Hershey with William's GI and hopefully they can tell me why William's been complaining about his belly.
I will try and post more blogs on a regular basis, so that I can share some of the good and funny stories that happen around here as well. :) It's not all bad. There are a LOT of wonderful, and funny moments to share as well.
Tuesday, October 16, 2012
Wednesday, August 15, 2012
The reflux baby
Things have been so crazy busy lately I haven't had much time to write.
We are dealing with the dreaded "R" word in this house..... AGAIN! You would think after having FOUR babies I would have at least gotten 1 happy healthy baby. No such luck. I decided to breast feed Isabella hoping it would help with the Reflux and that she would be able to digest her milk faster and not spit up so much, but no such luck. She is fussy and spits up a LOT! The one thing is, she is a little more consolable then the rest of my babies have been, but I think that might just be experience. Sierra was my screamer, and they have become more consolable the further down the line we go.
Last week, I finally had to admit to myself and the doctor that she is having the same problems as the others. He sent me out the usual prescription for Prevacid and now we just have to play the waiting game. It takes about 2 weeks to see if it helps. And none of my other children completely benefited from it. It helped some but they were still pretty fussy. Sierra outgrew her fussiness by the time she was 10 months old. Tristan was 7 months old. And William is still a GROUCH, although he has other issues as well.
So now I am just kicking it into survival mode. By now I should be an expert at it, but I am still not. I just keep telling myself that I will eventually get my cleaning caught up, and get caught up on eveything I am behind on, but it all still stresses me out. I have never been a patient.
*sigh* Here's to hoping that this Prevacid will kick in and be the answer and much needed break I need!
We are dealing with the dreaded "R" word in this house..... AGAIN! You would think after having FOUR babies I would have at least gotten 1 happy healthy baby. No such luck. I decided to breast feed Isabella hoping it would help with the Reflux and that she would be able to digest her milk faster and not spit up so much, but no such luck. She is fussy and spits up a LOT! The one thing is, she is a little more consolable then the rest of my babies have been, but I think that might just be experience. Sierra was my screamer, and they have become more consolable the further down the line we go.
Last week, I finally had to admit to myself and the doctor that she is having the same problems as the others. He sent me out the usual prescription for Prevacid and now we just have to play the waiting game. It takes about 2 weeks to see if it helps. And none of my other children completely benefited from it. It helped some but they were still pretty fussy. Sierra outgrew her fussiness by the time she was 10 months old. Tristan was 7 months old. And William is still a GROUCH, although he has other issues as well.
So now I am just kicking it into survival mode. By now I should be an expert at it, but I am still not. I just keep telling myself that I will eventually get my cleaning caught up, and get caught up on eveything I am behind on, but it all still stresses me out. I have never been a patient.
*sigh* Here's to hoping that this Prevacid will kick in and be the answer and much needed break I need!
Monday, July 2, 2012
Isabella's feeding issues
WARNING: This blog is all about my breastfeeding woes! So if you don't want to read all about my boobs, and who would really, feel free to x out of this blog.
Ok. Since Isabella has had me up since 4:30 this morning and everyone else is still sleeping I figured now would be a good time to blog.
Isabella has a doctors appointment today at 10:00 to go over her feeding problems she's been having. Let me tell you, women who breastfeed are SAINTS!! I don't know how they do it, but wow. They say once you get past 2 weeks it's easy. Well its been 6 and it just keeps getting harder!! :(
This girl from the beginning has had a terrible latch. My lactation consultant (thank god for them!!!) told me she is having problems with her upper lip curling under and needs to have her frenulum evaluated. So that's what we are doing today. And on top of that she sucks so hard her jaw cracks. And don't even get me started on the pain I've been enduring. That's a whole 'nother sob story!! She takes in more air than milk, which is causing her to be very gassy, and she is hungry 5 minutes after she's done eating and let's out a huge old man burp.
So anyway, all that being said, all this kid does is suck on my boob. I can't get anything done. My house is a disaster. My laundry is piling higher and deeper. And I don't think I have a single clean dish in my house. Ok, so that's not entirely true, I just washed a bunch last night, until she wanted to eat.... AGAIN! If someone finds a magic house elf could you please send them my way!!
I really just want to give the kid a bottle and be done this madness, but she won't take one. I've tried 3 different ones. Maybe I just haven't found the magical one yet, I don't know. But she won't take a pacifier either. I'm pretty sure she's just using me as one.
So today we have an appointment with her pediatrician to check out her mouth, and see what we can do to either fix her latch or just be done. If I have to pump for the next 10 months, I'll do it. It's time consuming. But not as time consuming as her feeding for hours at a time. And I will continue searching for that right bottle.
Now, I have to get 4 kids ready and out the door by 9:00 for her appointment. Fun stuff!!
Ok. Since Isabella has had me up since 4:30 this morning and everyone else is still sleeping I figured now would be a good time to blog.
Isabella has a doctors appointment today at 10:00 to go over her feeding problems she's been having. Let me tell you, women who breastfeed are SAINTS!! I don't know how they do it, but wow. They say once you get past 2 weeks it's easy. Well its been 6 and it just keeps getting harder!! :(
This girl from the beginning has had a terrible latch. My lactation consultant (thank god for them!!!) told me she is having problems with her upper lip curling under and needs to have her frenulum evaluated. So that's what we are doing today. And on top of that she sucks so hard her jaw cracks. And don't even get me started on the pain I've been enduring. That's a whole 'nother sob story!! She takes in more air than milk, which is causing her to be very gassy, and she is hungry 5 minutes after she's done eating and let's out a huge old man burp.
So anyway, all that being said, all this kid does is suck on my boob. I can't get anything done. My house is a disaster. My laundry is piling higher and deeper. And I don't think I have a single clean dish in my house. Ok, so that's not entirely true, I just washed a bunch last night, until she wanted to eat.... AGAIN! If someone finds a magic house elf could you please send them my way!!
I really just want to give the kid a bottle and be done this madness, but she won't take one. I've tried 3 different ones. Maybe I just haven't found the magical one yet, I don't know. But she won't take a pacifier either. I'm pretty sure she's just using me as one.
So today we have an appointment with her pediatrician to check out her mouth, and see what we can do to either fix her latch or just be done. If I have to pump for the next 10 months, I'll do it. It's time consuming. But not as time consuming as her feeding for hours at a time. And I will continue searching for that right bottle.
Now, I have to get 4 kids ready and out the door by 9:00 for her appointment. Fun stuff!!
Friday, June 29, 2012
My CRAZY day and it's only noon.
This morning started out busy. As pretty much every morning has been since Isabella's been born.
She is such a wonderful baby and by far my best baby. All 3 of my other babies have had such bad reflux and colic and cried all the time. I decided to breasfeed her hoping to avoid some of the GI issues that my other 3 had experienced. When Sierra was born I had planned on breasfeeding her, but with her severe reflux she had been nursing and had turned blue when her milk aspirated back into her lungs. No fun!! And I decided after that I was done. Since breastmilk is thinner then formula the doctor had told me this could happen, and told me to pump and add cereal to it. Well who has time for that when your baby is always screaming and crying in pain. :(!! But anyway..... with all of William's health problems I decided to give this breastfeeding thing another chance and let me tell you it's been a bit of a challenge.
Since Isabella's been born she has had a rough start. First off, she was constantly trying to come early. So when we went in to the hospital for the 3 time with contractions 2-3 mintes apart, they finally decided we could safely have her at 37 weeks, and boy did she come fast. After only 3 pushes she was here. And she came so fast that she still had amniotic fluid in her lungs, and wasn't really crying and just very sleepy. In fact, we had problems getting her to eat and by the time we left the hospital the next day she had lost almost a pound. When we left that day, the said she was jaundiced and we needed to follow up with her pediatrician the very next day. Well her bilirubin numbers kept going up within the next few weeks, until they finally tapered off. She still has some jaundice and is still a little yellow, but it's getting better. Then she got thrush which I also got a yeast infection in my breasts which made breastfeeding miserable for us both. :( She has been having troubles with breastfeeding and latching on which I guess has caused this and has made our issues worse. Then last week she ended up with a horrible cough, took her to the doctor and guess what? She has pneumonia. poor girl. She just can't catch a break. I'm telling you all of this to lead up to all the chaos that has lead up to my day. Now, I don't know if since she is having problems latching, or maybe it's this 6 week growth spurt they go through, or maybe since she's been sick she wants a lot more comfort, maybe I don't have enough milk coming in, who knows, but all she wants to do is nurse. For hours and hours. Which leads me to my morning.....
Isabella wakes up around 8:00 this morning wanting to eat. Which she currently is waking up at night every hour and a half to 2 hours to eat every night. So I very tiredly get up knowing the marathon eating is getting ready to start. I get up and start feeding her. She will fall asleep after about a half an hour and wake up wanting to eat again 5 minutes later. I'm sitting here in a reclined position on my couch feeding her while William is running around like crazy like always trying to get into everything he shouldn't be. Yelling and crying like he always does. We still have not gotten all of his sleep issues straightened out, and he is quite cranky and irritable a lot. He cries more than the baby does. I give him a pop tart and juice for breakfast since I don't have time to get his normal breakfast set up in his high chair, and he's dropping trails of pop tart all through out the living room which I am watching in disgust. Like I have time to vaccuum my house 20 times a day. Ugh. Anyway, it's 11:30 AM and I am still feeding Isabella when Tristan who was outside playing comes running in the house crying, tears streaming down his face, that something is in his ear. Ok. Great. I put Isabella down, so I could take care of him and look at his ear. I didn't see anything, but he is crying saying it hurts and that there is a weird vibration in his ear. So I'm wondering if maybe a bug didn't fly in his ear. Eeewww... And I ask him if that what happened and he said maybe that's kind of what it feels like, that he has a bug in his hear and it's flapping it's wings. Again... Eeeewww.... So I tell him to lay down in the bath tub and soak his ear in the water and hopefully this will help it feel better. And we will most likely have to go to the doctors. Meanwhile, Isabella is sitting in her bouncer chair, crying her eyes out, starving to death (enter sarcasm here)! Back to feeding her again. My house is a disaster, my son isn't getting the attention he wants and all I do all day long is sit around with a baby on my boob. Not exactly how I ever pictured breastfeeding to go. I'm about ready to quit this breastfeeding madness and start giving this kid a bottle. I don't have the time for all this. Sigh. So I sit here writing this blog with a baby on my chest, looking and thinking of everything I need to get done. One of these days I'm sure I will look back on all of this and laugh. One day.
Here's to hoping the rest of my day gets better. It does help to rant and get all this out. Maybe this whole blog thing will turn out to be therapeutic. :)
She is such a wonderful baby and by far my best baby. All 3 of my other babies have had such bad reflux and colic and cried all the time. I decided to breasfeed her hoping to avoid some of the GI issues that my other 3 had experienced. When Sierra was born I had planned on breasfeeding her, but with her severe reflux she had been nursing and had turned blue when her milk aspirated back into her lungs. No fun!! And I decided after that I was done. Since breastmilk is thinner then formula the doctor had told me this could happen, and told me to pump and add cereal to it. Well who has time for that when your baby is always screaming and crying in pain. :(!! But anyway..... with all of William's health problems I decided to give this breastfeeding thing another chance and let me tell you it's been a bit of a challenge.
Since Isabella's been born she has had a rough start. First off, she was constantly trying to come early. So when we went in to the hospital for the 3 time with contractions 2-3 mintes apart, they finally decided we could safely have her at 37 weeks, and boy did she come fast. After only 3 pushes she was here. And she came so fast that she still had amniotic fluid in her lungs, and wasn't really crying and just very sleepy. In fact, we had problems getting her to eat and by the time we left the hospital the next day she had lost almost a pound. When we left that day, the said she was jaundiced and we needed to follow up with her pediatrician the very next day. Well her bilirubin numbers kept going up within the next few weeks, until they finally tapered off. She still has some jaundice and is still a little yellow, but it's getting better. Then she got thrush which I also got a yeast infection in my breasts which made breastfeeding miserable for us both. :( She has been having troubles with breastfeeding and latching on which I guess has caused this and has made our issues worse. Then last week she ended up with a horrible cough, took her to the doctor and guess what? She has pneumonia. poor girl. She just can't catch a break. I'm telling you all of this to lead up to all the chaos that has lead up to my day. Now, I don't know if since she is having problems latching, or maybe it's this 6 week growth spurt they go through, or maybe since she's been sick she wants a lot more comfort, maybe I don't have enough milk coming in, who knows, but all she wants to do is nurse. For hours and hours. Which leads me to my morning.....
Isabella wakes up around 8:00 this morning wanting to eat. Which she currently is waking up at night every hour and a half to 2 hours to eat every night. So I very tiredly get up knowing the marathon eating is getting ready to start. I get up and start feeding her. She will fall asleep after about a half an hour and wake up wanting to eat again 5 minutes later. I'm sitting here in a reclined position on my couch feeding her while William is running around like crazy like always trying to get into everything he shouldn't be. Yelling and crying like he always does. We still have not gotten all of his sleep issues straightened out, and he is quite cranky and irritable a lot. He cries more than the baby does. I give him a pop tart and juice for breakfast since I don't have time to get his normal breakfast set up in his high chair, and he's dropping trails of pop tart all through out the living room which I am watching in disgust. Like I have time to vaccuum my house 20 times a day. Ugh. Anyway, it's 11:30 AM and I am still feeding Isabella when Tristan who was outside playing comes running in the house crying, tears streaming down his face, that something is in his ear. Ok. Great. I put Isabella down, so I could take care of him and look at his ear. I didn't see anything, but he is crying saying it hurts and that there is a weird vibration in his ear. So I'm wondering if maybe a bug didn't fly in his ear. Eeewww... And I ask him if that what happened and he said maybe that's kind of what it feels like, that he has a bug in his hear and it's flapping it's wings. Again... Eeeewww.... So I tell him to lay down in the bath tub and soak his ear in the water and hopefully this will help it feel better. And we will most likely have to go to the doctors. Meanwhile, Isabella is sitting in her bouncer chair, crying her eyes out, starving to death (enter sarcasm here)! Back to feeding her again. My house is a disaster, my son isn't getting the attention he wants and all I do all day long is sit around with a baby on my boob. Not exactly how I ever pictured breastfeeding to go. I'm about ready to quit this breastfeeding madness and start giving this kid a bottle. I don't have the time for all this. Sigh. So I sit here writing this blog with a baby on my chest, looking and thinking of everything I need to get done. One of these days I'm sure I will look back on all of this and laugh. One day.
Here's to hoping the rest of my day gets better. It does help to rant and get all this out. Maybe this whole blog thing will turn out to be therapeutic. :)
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