Food, Fat, and other first world problems

Anyone who has had a baby knows that doctors, nurses, and pretty much every book you ever read really encourages breastfeeding your baby for the added health benefits it provides over formula. Being the loving mother that I am (ha!) I naturally thought I better give it a try. I have since discovered that it is not always that simple and sometimes it just doesn't work out (no judging from this mom!). Weston's health problems made him a pretty fussy baby. The antibiotics did a number on his digestive system and he was not a happy camper for a while there. But after a while I began to suspect that there might be another cause to his excessive spit up and bad gas (oh the joys of babies!). We got him on reflux medicine and I cut dairy out of my diet. That really helped with the fussiness and gas but not the spit up.. we are still needing like 5 outfit changes a day (for both of us). Soo I decided once and for all to go on an elimination diet to see if he is sensitive to anything else that I may be eating. For the about 2 weeks I ate nothing but pears, ground turkey, brown rice, and potatoes. Ugh..someone give me some ice cream!

The bad news? Im getting realll sick of rice and potatoes . The good news? I'm back to my pre-Weston weight.. yayy! Yet somehow I still look 3 months pregnant..better than looking like I swallowed a beach ball I suppose?

Anyone have experience with reflux or food sensitivities in babies? I need all the help I can get over here..who said this mothering business is all intuitive?

Thanksgiving at the beach

 This year my parents were kind enough to meet us on the east coast so those with kids did not have to fly. Between Atlanta (where we live) and North Carolina (where my brother lives) there is a lovely little beach town called Hilton Head Island, South Carolina. We spent the week relaxing, riding bikes along the darling little bike paths, seeing a REAL alligator (ahh!), playing at the beach, Black Friday shopping at some pretty sweet outlets and of course stuffing ourselves with Turkey. It was perfect.

The Beach at sunset

1.Britt at the yummy thanksgiving buffet, 2. My first plate (couldn't eat dairy or butter this year so  I stuck with meat & fruit), 3. My mom at the dessert table

Seeing my first alligator in the "wild".. it's there if you squint ..

We had a view of the harbor during Thanksgiving dinner, we even got to see a dolphin swim in!

love our little turkey

Mom on the front porch with little Weston

First bike ride & first time in the swing for Mr. W

I just LOVE the holidays..

Sick baby

It’s safe to say that there has been a lot of changes for our little family in the past few months. We graduated from college, had a baby, moved across the country, bought a house, and Jake started a new  job all within a few months. Whew.. I feel tired just thinking about it.

After shipping all our stuff to Atlanta and living out of our suitcases in our apartment for a week with our new baby, we flew to Atlanta on a Wednesday afternoon. We spent the next couple days trying to get somewhat settled and doing some minor work on our house. I hadn’t spent a lot of time taking care of Weston on my own and I was a little anxious about Jake starting work that Monday.

When I picked up Weston in the middle of the night on Sunday I noticed he felt unusually warm. I stumbled around the house looking through boxes trying to find our baby thermometer. When I finally did it looked like he had a slight fever but nothing too bad so I went back to sleep. The next afternoon I noticed he seemed really hot, so I took his temperature again and saw it was 100.9, so I called the doctor and made an appointment right away. On my way to the doctor’s office I got a call from the nurse who told me to go straight to the emergency room because a fever that high in an infant is pretty serious. She asked if I was ok to get him to the ER, and asked if I was alone. It really hit me that after 2 years of marriage and spending about 20 hours a day together, Jake was now working full time and I was alone and so far away from home. Through my tears I assured her I was ok. So poor Jake on his first day of work gets a frantic call from me telling him I need him to come with me to the ER.

When we arrived at the ER Weston's temperature had risen to 102.1 and they admitted him right away. He spent the next 7 hours or so at the emergency room while they poked and prodded our poor little boy. It was the worst kind of torture for a new mom to see the nurses trying and trying to get blood samples while I was holding his tiny little hand as he screamed through the pain.

The doctors informed us that they would have to transfer Weston by ambulance to the children’s hospital in Atlanta.I had a younger sister who died as a baby and seeing him in the transfer unit brought me right back to that time. It was so hard to be away from him knowing that he was uncomfortable and in pain. Through some of the tests they found that he had a UTI and needed to be treated with antibiotics by IV every few hours. Unfortunately his spinal tap to test for meningitis got contaminated so they thought for a while that he might have meningitis and had to treat him with extremely strong antibiotics.

So hard having to follow the ambulance with our baby in it

It was so hard holding my sweet little baby while the antibiotics filled his system. He was so uncomfortable and in pain that at times he would scream and cry for hours and nothing could console him. We spent a week in a little hospital room and Jake would come after work and leave early in the morning back to work. On top of that Weston could never get a good sleep because we constantly had nurses coming in to do tests (I’m still confused why they needed to wake us up at 2 am to measure how long he is.. am I right??). I was sleep deprived, completely overwhelmed, flooded with post baby hormones, and sick of seeing my little baby in pain. It was truly one of the hardest things I've been through. Thankfully after a late night call to my Mom, she flew out from Seattle and kept me sane.. literally may have lost my mind if it wasn't for her.

A foot IV after another vein collapsed

Something that I've come to learn is that sometimes life is hard, but it is those hard times that help us learn.  We had such great support from family and friends that really got us through. I had countless people telling me that they were praying for us. For the first time in my life I could literally feel the strength of all these people’s prayers in my behalf and I knew that my Heavenly Father knew me and blessed me with the peace that I so desperately needed and  for that I am grateful for this life lesson. 

Bringing Home baby

We were SO happy to get out of the hospital! Both Weston and I had to get our vitals checked every few hours and that equals a lot of being woken up! We brought him home to our little one bedroom apartment that was mostly packed up for our move across the country. In those first days home there was lots of diapers, lots of loving on our new baby, and not a lot of sleep. We eventually figured out that many babies are born with their days and nights confused. Once we got that straightened out we  realized we would survive.. before that we  weren't so sure. I got sick a few days after we brought him home and just getting out of bed was exhausting. I was sure grateful for the help of my loving husband and family.

Jake really surprised me with his natural talent for taking care of a baby. I thought I was going to be the one teaching him but it turns out he was a natural born swaddling--diaper changing--baby burping extraordinaire. My Mom also kept me sane by coming over every morning in the wee hours to take over baby duty. Oh how we missed our morning baby sitter when  she left!

Weston in the hospital

Recovering from labor was harder than I thought it would be! I guess it makes sense when you realize what your body just went through.. pushing out a 9lb baby is tough stuff! The first night they took Weston to the nursery for some tests. Jake made sure to follow him everywhere he went.. no one was going to switch our baby! lol

Somehow I managed to get an IV machine that liked to sound its siren alarm every few hours in the night. Between waddling to the bathroom, feeding Weston, having nurses come check on me, and staring at W every 30 minutes to make sure he was still breathing I didn't get a lot of sleep.

But we did have a lot of great visitors who made our stay much more enjoyable and it's hard to complain when you have a sweet little baby to cuddle all day long.