It's been a while....

I haven't updated this since February!

Now it is September and we are i the middle of our prep for our 2nd frozen embryo transfer. Our first baby is 10.5 months old and we are going for baby #2! I feel slightly crazy for going for #2 so soon, but the infertility world is so uncertain. We have 2 frozen embryos waiting for us. If neither of these take and we have to do another retrieval my eggs (which ended up being the issue: old before their time) will be even older and in worse shape. Sooo we just going to go for it and are hoping to have little babies close in age! #2under2

We will be doing our transfer in October.

For our prep I have had a new pap smear, new sonohysterogram, cultures, trial transfer, and infectious disease blood work (both myself and husband).

I started on birth control pills after my period in July. I only had 3 periods after having the baby in October. I got my first in May after weaning at 6 months. My clinic uses BCP to control the timing of cycles and to calm the ovaries.

Here is my current protocol. I'm currently in the patches/lupron phase. SO much fun! The headaches, the hot flashes, the night sweats. Love it! :)

As for non-medication related prep I'm doing a low/moderate carb - high protein diet as recommended by my RE. I want to keep my blood sugar nice and stable. The problem I'm having is getting enough calories! Losing the refined carbs isn't a problem, but replacing with enough calories is tough. I'm not trying to lose weight at all so I'm trying to figure out tasty ways to get protein in without the carbs/sugar.

I've also cut out caffeine (except for today apparently, when I forgot to make my coffee order a decaf. oops).

I will do the pomp juice, pineapple core, brazil nut, warm foods, crazy shit I did last time. It worked then, so I might as well do it again, right?!

Currently I'm still exercising, running/fast walking 45 minutes, 5 days a week. Once we do the transfer I'll stop such strenuous exercise and just do casual walking instead of the fast, blood pumping kind I'm used to.

I'm so excited, anxious, nervous, and terrified. I'm so scared our transfer won't work. Our first baby has been such a wonder and joy and we know how amazing parenting and babies can be, so if it doesn't work out I think I may be more devastated then the last time. With our first fresh and frozen transfer we were still striving for our goal. We wanted a baby and wanted to be parents but didn't know what it would be like. But now we do. I'm so hopeful it's going to work. All we can do is follow our protocol and wait.

3 Month Gear List

Another list!

3-Month List of Things I Love (In no particular order, just as I think of things while I should be working instead):

1. Oballs. These are great for little fingers and hands to hold. Baby loves holding and shaking and eating these. This was the first toy he grabbed with two hands and the first he intentionally brought to his mouth. The brand also makes other shapes!

2. Links/Rings: Such an easy toy to throw in a bag, attach to the car seat, or dangle from something. So versatile and baby loves the different textures on his mouth.

3. Kirkland Diapers: We did a diaper raffle at my baby shower and so we have used all sorts of different brands of diapers. I've found these have been the best diapers at containing blowouts! He has yet to leak out of one of these. I may actually need to get a Costco membership!

4. A&D Ointment: I said I liked this before and here I go again. Recently we've used this on his cradle cap and it cleared up very fast!

6. Fisher-Price Sit Me Up: We started sticking baby in this a little over a month ago. The high back of the seat makes it easier for smaller babies to use. A baby has to be a little bigger with better neck control for something like a bumbo seat, but the Sit Me Up let baby see the world from a new perspective and he loved it. He would get cranky being on his back all the time so this allowed him something new. It also was great for mom to get stuff done in the kitchen while he sat and watched.

5. Fisher-Price Space Saver Jumperoo: I registered for this jumper because the smaller profile. We have a smaller house and have see how much room jumpers can take up at my friend's houses.  Baby is 16 weeks old as of two days ago and recently started loving to stand (when held, obviously. He isn't that advanced haha) and last night started boucing while standing so it seemed like the perfect time to open the jumper! He is just barely tall enough for it right now (He was 25 inches at 3 months, don't know what he is now), and has just enough neck/upper body control. It's not something we can just plop him in to contain him yet. He still needs help and supervision, but he loved being able to stand bounce and was reaching for all the toys above him, though getting frustrated and mad he couldn't actually reach them. As he grows I think he'll love it more and more!

7. Toy straps/tethers: These are the ones I have from Amazon. They make it so easy to attach toys to things! I attach his oball to his glider and to his car seat. I attach toys to his playmat so when he flings them I don't have to go running for them. They will be great for attaching things to highchairs so baby can't throw things around restaurants.

 

Tether toys to the elephants nose!

8. Books: Little Blue Truck is my favorite. It's a fun story to read and the story has a good heart.

Beep Beep Beep!

9. Full Size Bath Towels: After years of reading blogs and baby recommendations and registries I decided to register for full sized towels and not baby towels. But of course we received quite a few baby towels at our shower. I decided to try them because, why not? Well I'll tell you why not. Because they are very thing and not absorbent. When we would take Baby out of the bath and wrap him in a baby towel he would cry and cry because he was cold and wet. I finally switched to the full sized towels (one lovely person did buy them for us!) and since then he hasn't been nearly as upset after his bath. The towels are much warmer and really dry him off well. Get full sized towels.

10. And of course. The greatest baby toy of all time:

When he gets fussy or I need a few minutes to get something done I plop him under the ceiling fan. Works like a charm every time.

16 Weeks - Breastfeeding

This Saturday Baby will be 16 weeks old! Some days I can't believe it has been this long. There are times I look at him and think oh my goodness this baby is mine! He is the best baby. Everything changes so fast I try to soak up as much as possible.

We've had some challenges for sure. Breastfeeding has been a very tough process for us. For about 10 weeks I was exclusively breastfeeding, but Baby wasn't gaining weight. He was in the 50th percentile at birth, then went down to 20th percentile at his 2 month checkup. 2 weeks after that he was down to the 6th percentile. For 2 months his normal feeding sessions would last about 40 minutes, 20 per side. But then around the end of December he started going longer and longer, the longest I let him go was an hour and 15 minutes and he was still unsatiated and crying when I took him off the boob. I made an appointment with an LC and she said his latch was fine and positioning looked good. We did a weigh/feed/weigh and he took about 2 ounces in 30 minutes. She thinks I just have a low supply. The LC recommended feeding him for 30 minutes, because going longer than that won't be very helpful, and then supplementing with formula. She said to start offering an ounce at a time until he is ok. She also suggested pumping after every nursing session, pumping every 2 hours at work, not going more than 3 hours between feedings or pumps, and taking fenugreek supplements (3 pills 3x a day) to boost my supply. 

I tried these suggestions for a month and have seen no increase in my supply whatsoever. I have also tried every other suggestion on the internet to boost supply including: oatmeal, blessed thistle, moringa, blue gatorade, brewers yeast, flax seed, chia seed, fennel seed. Nothing. I still pump one ounce after nursing and 2 during a stand alone pump session.

My last ditch effort is going to be stopping birth control I started on the mini pill after my 6-week check up. The mini pill isn't supposed to affect milk supply which is why it is prescribed for nursing moms. In some rare cases it can, though. And seeing how I've ended up on the 'rare case' side before (i.e. infertility.....), I might as well try. Looking back at my logs my supply started decreasing a few weeks after starting the pill so I might as well try!

....It's not like I actually needed it for the 10+ years I was taking it before....why would now be different......

8 Weeks Old

Baby H is 8 weeks old!

It's crazy how fast babies grown and learn. 5+ weeks brought us Baby's first smiles and also Baby's first rolls from tummy to back. At 7 weeks he started sleeping for longer stretches at night. We put him to bed around 9pm and he will sleep for 4-6 hours before he wakes up to be fed again. He will then sleep for another 2-3 hours before waking again. It's game changing! getting longer stretches of sleep has been amazing. He does have days where his sleep isn't so good (like last night when he fussed most of the night) but knowing he can go longer is great, especially because most of the time he does. 

Items I love for Baby:
1. Mam pacifiers: These were the only pacifiers he would take to begin with.

2. Halo swaddles: We stick him in a body suit and a swaddle for bed every night! We use the fleece kind since it's winter and cold where we live.

3. JJ Cole Car Seat Cover: This thing keeps baby nice and warm during harsh Midwestern winters

4. Chicco Viaro Travel System: I love the three wheels of the stroller; the maneuverability is excellent. I have a friend with the Chicco Bravo (4 wheels) and when I pushed her stroller I found it so much harder to control. The click system makes it really easy to put the car seat into the stroller and the car seat base. It's also easy to get baby strapped in and then out of the seat pretty quick. The stroller isn't too heavy or hard for me to get into and out of the car. I'd definitely buy this again!
 
5. Diapers: I like Huggies the best so far! They fit Baby the best. Pampers have leaked/blown out quite a few times. Unfortunately we have mostly Pampers from our diaper shower. We'll just deal since I don't want to take a ton of boxes of diapers back when it really isn't too bad.

6. Wipes: Meijer baby wipes! They are the softest and wettest! The only thing I don't like about them is they stick together in the pack so when you pull one out you pull 5 out.

7. Diaper Genie: I registered for this on a whim. I had heard a lot of negative reviews saying it didn't do anything. I ended up getting one for our shower and we love it! Our nursery doesn't smell and it's super easy to use. The good news is Target's Up and Up refills fit and cost waaay less.



8. Gas Drops and Gripe Water: YES! We use both of these fairly regularly. They definitely help with gas and fussiness!!!
 

9. A&D Ointment - We first use the A&D ointment on Baby's circumcision and it healed really really well. Then we started using it for diaper cream. I tried Desitin since that seems to be what everyone uses but I hated the small. The A&D works really well and keeps his bottom perfect! I also have used it on his dry scalp/craddle cap and it cleared up so quick.

P.S. It's now 15 weeks post-partum and I'm just getting to post this.....I'm terrible at upkeep....

6 Weeks Postpartum - Mom

Baby is now 6 weeks old! I can't believe it's only been 6 weeks; it feels like baby has been with us for so much longer. He fills a little space we never really knew was missing :)

Here are my jumbled thoughts updates. Because thinking is hard. 

Mom Updates:




My postpartum recovery was really pretty great. I have no major complaints and recovered pretty good (I'm assuming average, but I have nothing to compare it to...). The pain was gone around 2 weeks and the bleeding stopped around 3.5/4 weeks (Also: no one tells you that lochia stinks! It's super gross). 5 days after giving birth I was 6 lbs under my starting pregnancy weight. I've been eating everything in site trying to gain a bit of weight and as of this AM at my 6 week PP OBGYN appointment I am up 4 lbs, hooray! I literally sleep with a clif bar next to my bed and eat it in the wee hours of the morning during one of Connor's early AM feeds. I need to keep the calories coming for breastfeeding!

The Dr. gave me clearance to have sex and workout again. I'll also start taking a BC pill so we don't have an oopsie baby. We've already discussed baby #2, but not quite yet :)


Breastfeeding is still going well, though I actually can't stand it. We haven't had any latch/pain problems since those first few days. I have had a few clogged ducts though and those are miserable! I've started taking the supplement sunflower lecithen which is supposed to help with clogged ducts. But breastfeeding is just boring and it feels like such a chore. I'm still doing it because of all the benefits for mom, baby, and our wallet, but formula sounds so much better. Good for the people that seem to love breastfeeding, but I'm not one of them.

I've been trying to pump once everyday to build a stash of breastmilk, but being home alone it can be really hard to do so. Some days I can feed and plop baby in the rock n play and take the 20 minutes to pump. But other times he cries bloody murder when I put him down and pumping is out of the window for that day. The internet says you get more milk pumping in the morning but I haven't found that to be the case. No matter what time of day I pump I get between .5 and 1.5 ounces. But any extra milk is ok with me.

We get out of the house every day, whether it is shopping or walk. I'd go crazy if I were stuck at home all day every day. When we go on walk there is an old man that lives down the street that tell sme every time he sees us that it is too cold for a baby. Nah dude, it's not. My husband and I subscribe to the "he'll be fine" philosophy. We dress baby for the weather and that's that!

I also take a shower every day. That is another sanity thing for me. I feel like a human after a hot shower (ok, sometimes 2 or 3 showers depending on the spit up situation. I don't like smelling like vomit!). A little shower and mascara go a long way for me.

In sad news: My leave is half over which is unbelievable! This time is going too fast :(

18 days Postpartum

Wow. I wrote this ages ago and never posted it! Baby's take a lot of brain power!

Today I am 18 days postpartum and things have changed so much in the last two and a half weeks.

I will start with the rest of our hospital stay:

After the delivery we had about an hour and half for recovery before we moved to the recovery/postpartum room we'd be in the rest of our stay. The Dr. and resident were busy stopping my bleeding and stitching things up down yonder and I didn't have a care in the world. I had a beautiful baby laying on me and couldn't have been happier. We did skin to skin and he latched on and fed pretty well for the first time. My husband fed me hospital pot roast and apple juice while I nursed the baby. The nurse helped me walk to the bathroom (my legs were still half numb from the epidural. I was walking like a newborn giraffe), got me cleaned up, and showed me all of the postpartum recovery goodies I got to use: tucks, dermoblast spray, epifoam, gigantic mesh undies and even bigger pads, etc. I wasn't able to take a shower because of a broken watermain in the area which kind of sucked. It also meant I had to use cold water in squeeze bottle for my lady parts and that wasn't fun at all!

Once I was cleaned up we moved to the recovery room and we finally had visitors come in. Our families had been waiting since 3:30am and were clamoring to see the baby (and us I suppose haha). I feel like the rest of the day was a blur of feeding baby and hospital staff coming in and out. We were in the hospital for only 36 hours and were sooo ready to leave by the time we were discharged. There were constantly people coming in for my vitals, baby's vitals, bathing baby, baby testing, food service, medication, hospital admin, etc. Even though baby was sleeping long stretches we didn't get much sleep because of the revolving door of our room. It seemed like one person would leave, we would try to sleep, but then an hour later someone else would come in. Not very rest full. And then with the no shower issue as well we were completely ready for discharge! We left the hospital at 3:30pm on Sunday and made our way home!

First Days Home:

The first week home was a blur of feeding baby and very minimal sleeping. We have a bassinet for the baby (Halo Bassinest) but he wanted nothing to do with laying on his back (and who can blame him...for 40 weeks he was curled into a tiny ball). My husband and I would rotate who held the baby. I would feed him and hold him for a few hours until the next feeding and then after feeding again I would go lay down and my husband would hold him for a few hours. We rotated like this throughout the night for the first week. Once the sky started lightening I felt such a sense of relief. Like, if I could make it through the night I'd be ok. Just make it to the next day. The hours between 2am and 6am were the worst. It seemed like the night would never end. My mom was staying for a few days and did grocery shopping. laundry, held the baby while we both took a nap, etc. Everything she did was incredibly helpful.

Breastfeeding:

Breastfeeding has had it's ups and downs for sure. The lactation consultant visited us the 2nd day in the hospital (why they don't come the first day is a complete mystery to me. It would have been much for helpful! She basically told me I was doing everything wrong. But after meeting with her I felt pretty good about everything. Until we got home. Baby would latch fine on the right side but then the left side was SO painful. I have no idea why it was so different but it was awful. I was in tears. I even pumped a few times and gave him a bottle because I just couldn't bear the thought of him latching on. I desperately called the outpatient breastfeeding clinic and they didn't call me back for days. SO not helpful. But luckily whatever baby's issue was corrected itself and I never bothered calling the clinic back because I was mad at them.



Since it took me so long to post this I have no idea if I meant to write about anything else. I will make another update now that we are 6 weeks post baby's birthday.

Postpartum Must Haves

Today marks 12 days postpartum. And we are sleep deprived but surviving! I made a list of my postpartum must haves that have been helping me get by the last few days:

1. Leggings: self-explanatory. Comfy pants to lounge in since I've been spending most of my time sitting.

2. Button down tops: Button ups have made breast feeding much easier. I can whip a boob out as needed. I love the Mossimo flannel from Target. I have 3 of them in various colors. The flannel is soft and the shirt is a loose fit. Great for lounging! Target - Plaid Flannel Shirt

3. Nursing bras: Key for breast feeding! I ordered a no-name brand from Amazon and have loved them. They are really soft and fit really well. I also have a Bravado nursing bra that I got at my shower and I hate it! The side strappy piece (that stays after you unclip the flap/pad) is so big the entire shoulder strap falls down and gets in the way while feeding). Nursing Bras

4. Depends: This one definitely isn't for everyone, but I've been a huge fan. The pads from the hospital were huge and bulky and I felt like I was leaking off the sides of them. I've still had a fairly heavy discharge since having the baby and I've felt much more secure wearing the Depends rather than pads. I've only just switched to a pad today, but will probably still wear my lovely adult diaper at night.

5. Lansinoh Lanolin: Breastfeeding has been a challenge, and while Baby and I are both getting better at it, the nipples take a lot and the lanolin calms them and gets me through to the next feeding. I do want to try another cream like Bamboobies or Earth Mama Angel Baby. Anyone have thoughts on either of those?

 

6. Stool softener: The first postpartum poop is terrifying! The hospital started giving me stool softener and I continued taking it at home. I had some really bad constipation and also took Milk of Magnesia as well as a glycerin suppository. After getting through that phase I've still been taking the softener. Things are a mess down under and anything I can do to ease things I will do!

7. Ibuprofen: I also started taking ibuprofen while in the hospital and have kept up that regimen as well. Again, anything to ease the hot mess down under...

8. Tucks: No one told me about the hemorrhoids. I  felt prepared to be in pain from giving birth (especially because I had an episiotomy), but I was wholly unprepared for the hemorrhoids. I have never any had before and didn't realize how painful they are! I didn't even know I had any until about 12 hours after birth when the nurse went to check down there and mentioned I should get an ice pack for them. TBH I had more pain from these than from my episiotomy. Don't let up on the Tucks! 12 days later and mine aren't bothering me anymore. 

9. Snacks: I have a lot of random snacks like Clif Bars, cracker packs, fruit/veggie pouches (yes, like you pack in a 6 year old's lunch), etc. Having snacks handy at 4am when you are up feeding Baby and are hungry AF is key. Treats like m&ms are also key. Because chocolate. I hit up the after Halloween sales asap.

10. Huge water bottle: Hydration is key for making breastmilk! I have a 48oz Bubba water bottle. I drink probably 4 of these a day. I got mine for $4 on clearance at Walmart. 

11. Sitz Bath: I had no idea what this was until my nurse mom bought one for me. If you don't know: You fill it with warm water and sit in it. It provides pain relief for your underparts that just birthed a human. 

 

12. Mascara and Blush: Self care is super important! Caring for a newborn is no joke but I still need to feel good about myself. A little bit of makeup goes a long way at making me feel like myself. 

13. Daily showers: See above. Self care is important!  After a long night of being awake feeding a hungry baby a shower makes me feel human.

14. Naps: Again. See above. Self care. I can't care for a baby without any sleep at all. 

15. Help: Ok, this one is key to numbers 13 and 14. Having my mom around has been amazing. She does dishes, makes food, does laundry, etc. She also holds the baby so I can shower and nap. It's nice when it's just me and the husband and the baby, but having other hands has also been great and so good for our recovery and entrance into this parenthood thing.