24/7 Esme

We interrupt your craft blog with a baby post:
She is keeping me really busy, but she is also so sweet and alert. Well, I caught her sleeping here ;) I'm pretty sure I couldn't ask for a better baby :) I'll have details on the birth at some other time, but that was also amazing and went 'surprisingly' well by the comments of the nurses, doctor and midwife at the birth center/hospital.


3 days old
As you can guess, we've been '24/7 Esme' since she was born, and that is a wonderful thing. I'm getting used to taking care of a baby, which I was pretty worried about. The last baby I 'took care of' was my sister's when I was eleven years old. She was eighteen, and upset/anxious about everything. She got angry really easily with everyone, even angry at the baby - so it wasn't a good experience. But Esme is ours, and that makes a world of difference.

Sleep? It is really difficult to sleep now that Esme is born. And I don't mean she is waking me up crying... sometimes she barely has time to make a noise before I'm there. Mark is helping a LOT. I admit I'm kind of 'hogging' her, though - my instincts are to always have her in sight, keep her safe and keep on the alert to take care of her next need. I keep jerking awake when I try to nap, even when she is settled. I'm surprisingly alert most of the day (and night) for a total of about three or four hours of 'jerky' sleep. All that with no caffeine involved -- which is hard for even me to believe. Mark has made sure I can get a few hours here and there to _try_ to sleep, which really does help.

I'm up and around the house, taking care of her and myself, keeping up dishes and laundry when she takes short naps - but everything else was at a standstill and might (might) pick up a little more in the next few days, but maybe not for a while. Now that I have more milk to give her she is sleeping longer at a whack - which helps on all fronts.

Jeanne's zebras were finished last Friday before Esme was born, but I have yet to take good pictures or do anything else with them. Lynn's package arrived from Canada, (THANK YOU!) and I did get to open it last night. More on that later as well. I've been asking questions on a midwifery bulletin board since we found out we were pregnant, and have been tapping away at our birth story for the ladies there but haven't gotten a good draft yet. This post itself took me all day to write in tiny pieces :}

Breastfeeding for the First Time

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We are breastfeeding, and that was quite a bit of anxiety for me but today especially things worked out much better. I learned a few things between yesterday morning and today that I'll list here just because they really helped.

• Continue drinking two teacups of Red Raspberry Leaf Tea a day to help bring in milk.
  
• Drink LOTS of water - if you're dehydrated there won't be any/enough to give baby.
  
• A very warm (not hot) washcloth before feeding for the first few days. Place it between the collarbone and the breast you'll feed from next.
  
• Feed as often as she makes the 'rooting instinct', don't wait for a certain time interval to pass. (Baby gets confused, you lose precious practice time)
  
• Aiming to make sure she has her tongue DOWN and not curled or raised up.
  
  Specific to my experience:
  
• If I swing her back and forth in my arms she throws her arms onto her tummy - which gets them out of the way. She has LONG strong arms!
• I can rub a finger behind her ear (not just on her cheek) to get her to turn that way.

Excellent breastfeeding articles:

• Storage and handling
  
• Lots of info, including breast care
  
• Nutrition for Breastfeeding mothers

As new parents we had a few questions we went to look up:

• telling if baby is too hot or too cold
  
• preventing SIDS
  
• SIDS more prevalent among infants with American Indian blood.
  
• pH of breast milk is 7.2, slightly basic or alkaline this science article says why that's important.
  
• General overview of infant healthcare
  
• Babies have 'soft spots' on their skulls. We went to find a page with a diagram of these soft spots, also called 'fontanels.'