Six months...

I can't believe we have a six-month old! (Six and half now... but meh.) Who should be only four months... and is, gestationally, so is doing four-month old things. Like...

Gurgling, babytalking, blowing raspberries, dribbling copiously, chomping on anything he can get his hands on... all of which may escalate to shouting as he grows impatient with not being picked up/being unable to explore the world around him/sore gums/?????

Laughing his full-bellied, delighted laugh, especially for his Dad. Even when K does something as simple as walk in the room. Which I think translates as... I ADORE my Dadda. (If I was a comic-sans, every-letter-a-different-colour, blinking ClipArt kind of person, 'ADORE' would be tizzied up thus.) I love this photo, even though it looks staged (it wasn't - just an afternoon at the beach, sitting on the tailgate... he didn't even know I had the camera).

Becoming shy around strangers, including his own reflection if he is feeling a bit grumpy/out of sorts.

He has recently developed an untamed 'rodeo' arm when on the boob/bottle. Hilarious.

And still sucks the air in his half-sleep after the boob/bottle is gone. Cutest. Thing. Ever.

Is happiest in arms. And happier still, high on one of our shoulders where he can see things best.

Has one long eyelash at the outer edge of his left eye that points down. Loveheart nostrils. The cutest little random dimple between his tummy and chest. Big 'little' toes that promise to pose problems for off-the-shelf footwear. And the sweetest little excitable pant.

Loves being read to. Though if he's in play mode, the words take a back seat to getting his mitts around the book.

Is most chilled out when outdoors. Absolutely. LOVES. The beach. And can be amused for a very long time by the old pandanus in our yard which make a papery sound in the wind (of which we have plenty).

Loves watermelon... but really mostly just has eyes for milk. Speaking of which. We've been blessed with one HUNGRY little caterpillar. There is no longer a need to explain his early arrival, as people's first reaction when told he is six months is something along the lines of 'OMG, he's huge!'. He's big. Twelve-month old kind of big.

I look at photos of when he first came home, or *gasp* from hospital days, and I cannot believe how small and skinny he was. He's put on eight kilos in six months... making him around 10kg now. I find it bizarre how I get stuck in the moment, almost unable to imagine him beyond now. When he was that small we never believed he'd be this big. And now it seems impossible that he will soon sit up unassisted, or crawl, or talk or ... stand. But hindsight tells me these milestones are only heartbeats away.

Oh civilisation, how I have missed thee

Just back from eight days in the Vegas. E and I travelled over on our own and K joined us after four days - our first real time apart with E around. A few minor travel stresses - eg, scrambling to connect the car battery while the babe screameth in the blazing sun, shoehorning him into a too-small capsule in a hot car, a non-sleeping baby for the first few days - but on the whole, really positive. 

 

I got a badly needed massage, haircut and counselling (useful but I nearly swallowed my tongue when I paid the bill), a visit to the craniosacral therapist for E, and some bricks-and-mortar retail therapy. (My online procurement now verges on embarrassing and is the butt of jokes amongst the rangers who collect our mail... though is totally reasonable given I did not shop for E when pregnant. And, hello, live on an island. But I digress.)

 

The city. We stayed with friends R + J and little M for three days. We walked every day and clocked up quite a few clicks to and from the local Fountain Lakes. I even had mini-conversations with other peeps-with-prams. I procured the boy some decent bibs (why oh why are they mostly all crap? and velcro, bane of my laundering life), more clothes (hello size one!), toys (sounding the death knell to our boycott of plastic toys) and a cute owl moneybox and even cuter fairtrade owl backpack. We borrowed a playmat - one of those types with the arches which you can dangle stuff from - and an activity station that he can sit upright in. Both of which he LOVES. Why I did not get these types of things sooner... *Bats head* Other purchases: a second carseat to follow the other recently acquired one, and a cot.

 

Some interesting stuff. The craniosacral therapist felt inside E's mouth and knew he didn't take a dummy. Huh. She said he had a very high palate. And because of that, probably wasn't drawing so well during breastfeeding. Huh. And that would affect my supply. Huh. Wow. She also said his gums were very inflamed. Which we knew. But at the back too. Hmm. Odd. This week molars, next week puberty? She also thinks he should have some relief soon from his reflux. We live in hope.

Our craniosacral visit was followed by a very satisfactory hour of book browsing and purchases at Riverbend and Lifeline in Bulimba, punctuated with caffeine and facilitated by a long-sleeping baby.

I also met up with a girl who was interested in donating breastmilk. At my fave cafe in Paddington, from the days when I lived down the street and around the corner. She had a little boy, the same age as E, and it was so good to chat about baby stuff with someone of similar ilk. We traded birth stories and ate breakfasts in the early afternoon. And the boy? Surprisingly OK - even smiling across the table at the other baby. Not sleep deprived/crying/a vomiting volcano/crazed with hunger/cranky/high maintenance as I'd feared. Holy crap! I felt human! And walked away with just over a full feed of milk for E. Happy!

What else? We had a visit to premmie playgroup at the hospital, which I've never been convinced we learn anything from, but we go anyway just in case. Got the boy registered with Medicare, FINALLY, after months of dodging inquisitions at the doctor's/hospital ("uh, we've just lodged the form..."). But most exciting, E had his first food - watermelon. Did his eyes pop out of his head or what? Totally not what I had planned but it just sort of unfolded at R + J's. Probably nice for him in the stupendous heat anyway.

 

And. Underscoring my reconnection with civiliation, the girls who were in my midwifery group are planning their first meet up. And kindly scheduled it to coincide with our next trip over! Will be my first official 'mothers group'.

And the learnings. Yes, I realised I have been way too isolated. That I can do this trip on my own. That it's hard work, alone or not. That I have a couple of willing babysitters that I totally need to call on. That the boy will refuse to sleep, and cry, and cry, and cry. And though I will also miss out on sleep, this is not too dissimilar to being at home. And EVERYTHING WILL BE OK. And I LOVE living on an island, at a lighthouse, away from people and the crazy, concreted, smelly, loud, shopping-malled world, but I also need people and the crazy, concreted, smelly, loud, shopping-malled world, sometimes. (But not too often.) And E does too. For all the non-sleeping, he thrived in new environments. He charmed people wherever we went with his huge cheeky grin and screechy giggles. And got to spend time with his Nana and other little people. 

It felt like we were away forever. The house is a festering mess, but it's good to be home. We picked zucchini and tomatoes and basil and rocket from the garden and had a late dinner of fritatta. The boy slept well but woke in the pre-dawn. Life chugs on. I will be taking mental health breaks more often, methinks.

The only way is up - or life in the land of vomit and depression

My aspiration to write here more regularly (dare I declare, weekly) has wafted into the babyland ether. Then there was an app without a 'save' function (wtf?) which wafted away my draft, leading to large clumps of hair being pulled*. At least I am holding on to my other new year aspirations - yoga and walking - thus far. I even did a solo walk to the beach, followed by yoga on the shore as the sun set and a rainbow fell upon our house! Has to be some sort of omen! (Bigtime thanks to K for the suggestion, and for baby wrangling.) Anyway, all those blog posts I quasi write in my head... poof, gone. So here's a list of sorts. Just a warning, what follows is not exactly bathed in positivity. Hint: look away now if this is likely to upset. The next one will be positive, I promise.

1. Sometimes I just long to put the boy in the pram and go for a long fast walk. Or even a short fast walk. Alas, we have one 'sealed' (and I'm being VERY generous) road, and that's our driveway. We do a bumpity cross-country meander down to the heli-pad most days, but oh, to burn off some energy with a proper walk. (The kind of walk I'm talking about is not the kind that can be accomplished with an almost-10-kilogram baby in the Ergo, though I do need to figure out how to put him on my back in it so he can look around.)

2. When I lament like this, I make myself look out the window. It's easy to become blase about where we live. Especially when some days it's hard to leave the house. For explanation, refer to roads issue (see point one), add vomity, heavy baby, stupendous heat and non-stop rain. 

3. Still frustrated by milk issues. And time issues, while we're at it. And just getting-to-grips-with-babyland issues generally. I badly need - and want - to get over it. I am booked in to see a postnatal counsellor.

4. Mothers' groups. After much fruitless trawling, I've concluded that being more active in the blogosphere is the only way I'll get to share with other mums of similar ilk. Unless I want to haul myself off to the city for this purpose, which is such an exercise in stress and anxiety that I would much rather put up with my existing stress and anxiety in the comfort of my own home. See point five. Also on this theme, wondering how to reconcile my two online selves, as I feel the pull back to this blog...

5. Trips to the mainland do my head in and deplete my already-thin reserves of calm. With all the appointments and extensive provisioning for The Life Remote, these trips usually result in a non-sleeping baby, stress and anxiety for us and a generally unpleasant vibe. I would much rather stay at home. See point four.

6. Our first date in six months, which I'd teed up a week in advance, evaporated due to a non-sleeping baby - and therefore, non-sleeping us - and general feelings of crankiness. Also see point five. 

7. Somehow, despite knowing all this, and having just returned from Brisbane, I'm going again tomorrow. Just me and the boy. For a flurry of appointments. I have no idea how I am going to carry all our stuff, drive the car and juggle a vomity baby. It will either harden me up for future solo-travels-with-a-baby, or turn me into a blathering hermit.

8. Maybe this should have been point one. Poor E still suffers quite badly from reflux and on a hot day, will vomit after each feed, in between feeds and just randomly - so pretty much all day. It is SO frustrating and depressing seeing him in distress. And spending vast lumps of time endless days forever feeding. We took him to see a craniosacral therapist who instantly helped his neck stiffness - he'd been almost unable to look left. Hoping this will also fix his now-very flat-on-one-side head. And of course the reflux, which we were told is exacerbated or possibly even caused by his spine being slightly twisted from his birth. Which impinges on the vagus nerve which has something to do with digestion. Anyway. It feels good to be doing something about it.

9. eBay! Oh joyous rapture! See - a positive! I'm sure the rangers all think I'm holed up here at the Cape whiling away the man's hard-earned. (Our mail comes via the ranger station - and luckily I have my own hard-earned for another six months.) Latest purchases: a happy hangup for the boy (I live in denial naive desperation of prolonging the daytime catnaps), three wooden Manhattan Toy things, some books and a fancy sleep-bag.

10. I'm not sure this list even makes sense. It's late, my thoughts are mud but I'm pressing publish anyway.

*Sorry if you got an email with a blank post... I'll spare you the tribulations of useless Blogger apps.

E's first Christmas

This Christmas was my first with K's family, and our first with the boy, who celebrated five months (three months gestation) yesterday with his first laugh out loud - so cute! 

Naturally it made sense to have Xmas at the Cape, free beach house and all. We acquired a tree from the *ahem* roadside and tizzed it up with ornaments made by E's great nana (!), including a crocheted angel. There was wine, a delicious 'pot luck' lunch where everyone made a dish and which came together exquisitely under our new (and very sandbagged to prevent it flying away) gazebo on the front lawn, heritage values be-damned. 

E was thoroughly doted on and spoiled by his nana, aunties and uncles and received all manner of softies, finger puppets, a mobile, bibs, clothes, Baby Banz, a Laura Veirs CD for kiddos, and signed kids books from his kids-book-editor aunty. Santa came through with a full length rashie and sunhat, as well as some funky jeans and Baby Legs. He also left a note for E (thanks to Uncle R who had a few more clues than K about parental duties in regard to S. Claus). The editor-for-an-edgy-Melbourne-publisher (the other editor in the family) heeded a not-too-subtle tweet about book cravings which are being presently devoured, and also curated some funky new music, a foodie calendar and TV viewing for us. We also received a Nice Bottle of Red, a new coffee pot and a proper cane picnic basket. A boon all-round!

Boxing Day, the wind dropped and we headed to the beach and lunched and swam in a tidal lagoon, where the boy tried out his new rashie. On our return, we wandered down the back to the Picnic Tables With a View, drank Pimms and scoffed various soft and moulded cheeses as the sky turned a golden pink. Very satisfactory! 

It all flowed very nicely, with kitchen elves making sure the cooking and washing up all happened with minimal input from me. And to top off the gains and festivities, the boy slept a whole NINE unabridged hours on Xmas eve. Woohoo! I am convinced by the new going to bed early routine (we had been quite laissez faire with bedtime, as E just seemed to sleep when he needed to as a newborn). 

The door will swing open again tomorrow for more visitors, just as we've bade the last of the Lusks fare-thee-well. 

*any errors are the result of attempting to post via iPad, and not the result of having consumed more alcohol in recent days than in the past year altogether.

dog days, and blessed relief

Hello, stranger. I miss you. I miss the other blog, too. Here's a bit of an update.

Now that the House Move to End all House Moves (and I sincerely hope it is the end of all house moving, at least for a while) is dusted (and that is a whole other post), things are settling into more of a routine. Sort of. And for the first time since E was born (nearly five months ago!), life seems, um, normal. Sort of.

*Attaches self to wooden surface and doesn't let go*

But let me backtrack. I've found it very hard to deal with (read: had high anxiety over) E being in distress a lot of the time. Since we've had him home from hospital, he has been either vomiting, distressed with gas or reflux (and there was a horrible week of constipation too), or crazed by a hunger that can't be sated despite whole days of cluster feeding (and associated vomiting). It is just the worst, not being able to help his pain, watching his eyes fold into a thousand crinkles. And then some days, for no apparent reason, he would not go in either carrier. Or the bouncer. Or bed. But would happily sleep when attached to me. I've spent untold hours on the couch with him, or pacing aimless laps of the house (with requisite scurrying around afterwards with a wet tea towel cleaning up vomit splats). I have resented the endless washing of bottles (it really is endless with a baby who feeds like this one). And I desperately missed walking (I used to get two decent walks in a day, to and from work) and yoga. My mind went spare and my body hurt.

Amidst these days I started feeling weepy again and have struggled mentally with the transition to baby-dom. I've thought horrid thoughts and wondered why the hell I'd chosen to become a mum. (And then felt sinfully guilty, just to top it off.) I've even thought longingly about going back to desk - probably because I got more done inside the bureacratic machine than I do with a baby. And that explains why doing the dishes AND laundry feels like a major accomplishment. Also, I'm someone who needs alone-time like I need air, and coffee. Not only did I have no alone-time, I did not have time to do all those basic things that come before free alone-time (shower/toilet/coffee,etc). 'Hellooo?!' Yes, I can hear you who have had babies boggling at my propensity to state the bleeding obvious. But for me, this is new.

It feels like we've turned a corner in the past week or so. Most of our gains are the result of E sleeping more during the day. Which has given me - oh holy of holies - some time to myself. Yesterday I made muffins (blueberry + oat) AND did yoga. Unheard of. I've also been able to explore more feeding options, at last. We tried (and swiftly ditched) goat's milk formula (see constipation, above) and I'm investigating breastmilk sharing and making my own formula (both exercises in complication, especially living on an island, but very much worth checking out). I'm also ending the nappy guilt arising from our unpreparedness for E's early arrival and subsequent protracted house move. I did buy half a dozen clothies early on, but these are now too small for him.

I'm also tweaking our routine. K strung a mobile above the couch where E now sleeps during the day and this is helping keep him amused once he wakes, and sometimes - *gasp* - get back to sleep! I have some 'sanity-busters' within arm's reach to keep me from going spare during the endless feeds: a book, a notepad, my phone. K usually clocks on for dadda-time when he gets home mid-afternoon, and I'm using this time to do yoga and walk. Oh, wordless rapture.

But best of all, E seems to be doing better. He is more content, less prone to reflux and wind, though still vomits quite a bit (and I think this is in part due to the amount he eats, which is a LOT - at nearly 3 months gestational age, he's now in six-month old + clothes). And he is smiling and even silently giggling! And gurgling back when he is sung or talked to - way too cute. All the awesome bits that seemed like they would never arrive, finally have.

All this has given me hope that I will get to do some of the things on my spiralling wishlist. I bought some Very Expensive Wool before E was born (the fantastically named 'Squishy', in hues of seafoam and teal) and have a pattern for a rug bookmarked. I'd love to finish the paper crane mobile I started making when I was pregnant. And my mind gapes at the driftwood mobiles I could make! Our fledgling vegie garden could do with more tending. Oh and I would cook, and read more. And write. And write. And write...

Nevermind the things I should be doing. Ahem, Medicare application, healthcare rebates, mindless administrivia. La-la-la-la-laaa....

We also need to unpack the spare room of its boxes before we have K's family staying over Christmas, and a revolving door of friends to start the new year. Which I am very much looking forward to, btw, if not without some trepidation. Social minimalist that I am.

Anyway, that's all for now. See you in a bit, with any luck.

we live here

Now I have that off my chest, to share the ridiculously amazing station we find ourselves in. It is nothing short of stupendous. This place, here... 

I've mentioned it before here, and here. Thanks to an amazing stroke of luck/karma/patience/brilliance, and after battling for nearly a year to find work to complement his solo web design, K landed a ranger posting. On Moreton Island. It is so perfectly him. I've never seen a job fit anyone as well as this fits him. It's as though some godly hand reached down from the sky and granted him his lifetime's wish - though I'm sure he remembers the interview somewhat differently.

And it was all so perfectly timed. Fast forward a month from the job offer. We had a baby. Needed family-sized lodgings. And now, find ourselves in the assistant lighthouse keeper's cottage ('cottage' reflecting the heritage value of our lodgings, not the size). 

And the location? So perfectly us (though only in our wildest dreams). Living on a windswept sunny Cape, a prime whale-watching spot. On the world's third-largest sand island, all but a whisker of it national park. Remote, salty, thick with coastal heath. We'd wondered aloud before, how one goes about finding a posting at a lighthouse. In the end, it found us.

It's like I blinked and life changed. Baby. Lighthouse. I know not what, next. And it sort of doesn't matter. Life is grand :)

milk (and other catastrophies)

I have been wanting to write for so long now (writing as therapy etc) but have been utterly bereft of time. It is hard enough finding windows in the day to perform minimal personal hygiene, let alone reflect and document. Lord knows how some bloggers do it. Anyway, to catch up...

We brought E home from hospital on the second day of Spring, after three long and tres difficult nights rooming in at hospital*. K had only been back at work on the island for a day when the doctors suddenly declared, after several days of breastfeeding without tube feed top-ups during the day (babe was initially fed via naso-gastric tube as he was born before he learnt to suck), that babe was fit to go home. Naturally I was super excited, though with only 24 hours notice, barely managed to dash home between feeds and pack a bag for our hospital stay. The short notice meant K couldn't get back from the island to join us for our first night of rooming in. Which in the end was no drama as night one went really well. Thankfully he was there for the second night, which was, at best, traumatic. After a whole day and night on our own, without any tube feeds, E's hunger caught up with him by night two. By the wee hours, he was in such distress that the breastfeeding that had gone so well in the daytime in special care turned to mud. The special care nurse assigned to check in on us took one look at him and said 'that is a hungry baby'. I'd been doing everything possible to boost a low milk supply since his birth, however it was now clear I did not have nearly enough to feed him. After anguished hours, and hankies full of tears - and then some more - I gave him a bottle, thinking it would probably be the end of breastfeeding for us but at least he wouldn't go hungry nor be in such distress.

Reputable breastfeeding advice says that low milk supply is rare, that all babies fuss, especially at night. I knew this was different. His crazed hunger coincided with the withdrawal of regular tube feeds, and we had only been breastfeeding solidly during the daytime (mostly) without tube-feed top ups, for a few days. I was feeding or expressing eight times a day, had been on Domperidone and fenugreek for weeks, tried (and failed) using a supply line, and read and tried everything else: protein-loading, guzzling water and herbal nursing teas, massaging pressure points and trying failing to rest and keep stress at bay. I saw enough lactation consultants to qualify as one myself. Still, I only ever expressed a mournful milli-fraction of what might be considered in the orbit of normal.

In the end, I obsessed. The whole 'trying to find a solution' thing just depressed me, to the point of utter despair. I cried and sobbed and self-diagnosed PND, the whole experience being far more traumatic than the birth, and coming on top of an already stressful time. (Oh, and did I mention we were are also moving house?) I obsessed about how tragic it was, because he breastfeeds beautifully. And my god, how I loaded my body with goodness for him when I was pregnant. The supply issue was the icing on the cake of the whole baby thing not going at all how I had expected.

In the end I let go the pursuit of a magic bullet, for my own sanity, and accepted that we would have to formula feed in the main, while I continued my supply-boosting regime. I have accepted it, but still hate it. (Other than the obvious nutritional and wellbeing differences, formula and bottles are a lot of work, give him loads of wind, and combined with breastfeeding, are mind-bogglingly time consuming.) We did buy donor milk for a while, but at $80 a pop for 20 x 100ml bottles which may or may not be full, plus a car trip or courier from the Gold Coast, probably won't continue with this. Anyway. I am grateful that my initial fears with the first bottle have not eventuated and we have been able to continue to breastfeed, even if it constitutes a small part (volume wise) of his feeds.

There has been much agonising over why, why, why. My GP reckons my body wasn't ready. My midwife reckons that's crap, though I noticed that many first-time mums in special care seemed to struggle with supply. But then others didn't. I think it's a combination of his very early arrival, blood loss at the birth, and a possible predisposition to low supply. Perhaps my body was not ready. I had not laid down any breastfeeding fat stores during pregnancy - I was possibly skinnier immediately after the birth than before I was pregnant (it annoys me when people get jealous of this because I would be happily fat to properly breastfeed). I could also be a candidate for the confidence bustingly named (excuse the pun) 'insufficient glandular tissue'. I think the early separation played a large part... it's tempting to wonder how things would have gone if I'd got to hold him after the birth, if he wasn't stuffed away in an isolette for those first weeks, if I'd been able to feed him round the clock when he first learnt, at around 34 weeks, to suck. Also, no one suggested I start expressing until at least 12 or more hours after he was born, and then the interruptions on the maternity ward meant this was nigh impossible. Anyway, a girl could go spare wondering...

As for the depression, it has all but abated. In fact I have not followed up on a referral to an antenatal psychologist - partly due to the logistical issues of living between the city and the island, and partly because I've cleared the worst of it. OK, and partly because I'm not a talker. I'm keeping a watching brief. I recently ran into an old work colleague who now has two babes - both born about a month early - and it was so good to briefly talk to someone who has had a baby in neonatal care. Because I have felt somehow an unequal member of the mummy club. All of the preparations you do, all the things other mums tell you when you're pregnant about having a newborn relate to having a full-term baby. None of this really held true for us. It's a totally different road, one we've walked with the guidance of nurses and Google searches. Apart from a few couples in hospital we gelled with, we haven't really had that peer support, I guess.

Anyway, life evolves, and I've realised it's not the worst thing that could happen. We are more preoccupied now with wind and reflux (if I can be so bold as to call it that), and when those nasties abate, enjoying E becoming more alert and interested in the world. Let it be said, I am completely over the politics of breastfeeding. And moving on...

*Stupidly, after choosing to spend two nights instead of one rooming in, we were made to spend a third night after E lost 40 grams between discharge from special care and our planned day of departure from hospital. Bitter, much. The third night is now just a blur and I think they would have discharged us regardless of any further small weight loss as they belatedly gave in to the realisation that the environment was not doing us any favours.