I love spring!

I have so many things to be thankful for this morning....but this waking up in the morning with the windows open and the early sun and the green newness shining in? It's just awesome.

It's been a long winter. And I just wanted to say my happiness out loud.

Oh yeah...and another thing I love. 

Tulips.

A Tongue Tied Story

 

Christian just got his frenulum clipped!  His fren-u-WHAT?  You say?


Christian tried to nurse when he was in the hospital, and it seemed he might get the hang of it.  But that was back in those early days of colostrum, when all he needed was a teaspoon to fill his MARBLE-SIZED tummy. (Another lactation story for another day. lol)

I think I talked a tiny bit about the possibility of tongue-tied babies with my nurse at the hospital, but at that time it seemed like he was going to figure things out. 

When we got home and his nutrition needs increased,  it became quickly apparent that he was NOT settling into this nursing thing.    But I am fairly committed to the health benefits of breastmilk, so we pressed on...trying and trying to get him to latch. Because of my babies' traditional feeding issues, I have seen many, many lactation consultants and experts.  I have learned a lot of tricks.  I have learned a lot of information that can help understand the nursing/latching/lactating/pumping process.  But even with my determination and information, we usually both ended up crying during feedings. Actually, he screamed.  I usually only cried. : )

Finally, I realized it was time to start the pumping & bottle routine.  It was sad, but it was the right thing to do.  I hoped that he would "grow out" of his feeding issues and get stronger and learn to latch.  I started him on the Avent bottle, and he ate okay.  But he swallowed tons of air.  The screaming began.  Long, frustrating feedings and longer screamings after the feedings.  I quickly switched to the old but expensive friends, Dr. Brown bottles.

They gave IMMEDIATE relief from the worst of the gas-screaming.  But Christian still didn't seem to be an efficient eater.  I had been trained from all of my lactation consultants to listen and watch for the signs of proper or improper feeding.  Things that most nursing mammas never think about. They just stick their kid where he goes and he goes to town!  Not me.  Nursing is not like that for me.  Anyway...back to the signs and noises....He made clicking noises and such - signs of inefficient latching.  Consequently, he was swallowing tank-fulls of air.   And needed to be burped every HALF ounce.  That's a lot of burping, people.  And feedings were LONG and exhausting. And then - after I changed him and calmed him down and topped him off and he finally fell asleep - I had to pump.  Then wash the pumping gear for the next feeding.

  He also spit a lot.  I learned early on in my colic studies the anatomy of a burp...and his burps were milk-stuck-on-top-of-air-pocket burps.  Sometimes the shoot-out-and-cover-you kind.  Lots of laundry.  Lots of fussiness.

But one day when he was screaming (don't know why he was screaming at the time - he's been quite a fussy baby) I noticed that his tongue looked funny.  That string under his tongue (which is called the frenulum) looked white and tight.  His tongue looked short - kindof stuck.  My mom saw it too, and she agreed.  Between the two of us we have nursed 9 babies.  So...maybe we were on to something?

TongueTie.net

I talked to a nurse about it at my next WIC appointment.  She agreed.  Waited until Christian's next checkup...Had my pediatrician take a look.  She agreed.  She had to send me to a lactation consultant....waited for an appointment at the hospital....she agreed.  Waited for the pediatrician's office to call me back...they were sending him to an ENT (ear-nose-throat) specialist to possibly have his short frenulum clipped.  Waited for an appointment.  (During this process I was prepared to "fight" for another opinion if necessary, but all of the opinions agreed his frenulum was short so I didn't have to fight.)



Well...the appointment was Monday.  He was 5 weeks and 2 days old.  It was a breeze.  They sent me out of the room for the procedure (apparently mommas freak out a little when they see the scissors coming towards their baby....)  In less than 5 minutes, the doc came out to the waiting room and retrieved me.  Christian didn't even shed a tear, they said.  I never saw a drop of blood.  He was alert and perfectly fine, sporting a clipped frenulum.  I packed him up and took him home.

I was hopeful that it would at least help with the air-swallowing issues.  And maybe the spitting up would get better.  I tried to keep my hopes low that after 4 weeks on the bottle he would have the patience to latch and nurse.  Each baby has his own feeding personality.  Christian's is the "don't-stick-that-thing-in-my-face-I'm-starving-and-I-refuse-to-latch" kind of personality.  Little or no patience, especially since his tongue would not cooperate. (Sometime when you're bored you should read about all of the technical things a tongue does during feeding.  It's truly amazing.)

But yesterday, he nursed!  He was pretty ticked off at first that the bottle wasn't dumping it down his throat and he actually had to exert some effort, but we kept at it and he nursed.

Only a mama who desperately wants to be able to nurse and carries a $200.00 Medella double pump on her shoulder when she goes out instead of a cute purse can understand how happy-a-day it was.

We're still not out of the woods, but we are working on it.  He still gets frustrated.  And nursing requires a different kind of baby-cue reading than does bottle feeding.  You can't see how much they've eaten, so you have to read the cues more carefully.  Is this a need-to-burp cry?  An I-need-changed cry?  A done-burping-and-want-more cry?  A this jug is empty, time to switch cry?  Done, time to swaddle and snuggle cry?  Or a I'm ticked off and I want the bottle cry?  It might sound complicated and funny to those of you to whom nursing is a breeze.  But it's not funny.  At all.

At this point, I still give him a bottle at night because I can't bear to add any more time and fussing to the nighttime feedings.  I'm letting him get his latching practice first during the daytime, when I'm more awake.

I share this long and painfully detailed story with you for a couple of reasons.

One....saying things with few words is exhaustingly difficult for me and I'm not in the mood to edit, so I just let the story come out as it would.

And two:  Perhaps some mamma somewhere will gain courage from some aspect of our story.

Maybe you just want to know that you're not weird because nursing is really, really hard and not relaxing for you.  Don't let people make you feel like it's because you're "young" or "new at this"  (in other words...things are hard cuz you don't have a clue what you're doing or are doing it wrong.  grrr.)  Five babies and MANY professional appointments later, nursing is still a challenge for me.  So be encouraged and be brave.  And formula never killed anybody.  If you need to use formula to survive, DO IT!  I have proof in my household that your kids can still be smart and healthy.  : )

Maybe you are looking for some feeding solutions and tongue-tied is something to ask your doc to check out.

Maybe you just needed reminded that the medical field is necessary and wonderful, but does not even remotely replace a mother's intuition.  PLEASE trust your mamma-gut when it talks to you.  I am so thankful for a mama who continues to remind me to trust my  mommy gut.  And if there is something frustrating in any aspect of your parenting, look for solutions!  Ask for help!  Do some research!  It helps.


Maybe you are pregnant and need to just be aware that the tongue-tied issue is real, but often completely ignored, in hospitals and pediatrician offices.  There is a history to this oversight.  Midwives used to keep one fingernail sharpened to quickly swipe a short-looking frenulum at birth.  Quick, painless, and done.  But then the medical community decided that too many frenulums were being cut without need, and the pendulum swung....probably around the time bottle feeding became the norm.  Now that nursing is back in vogue, the medical community has all these crazy hoops in place you have to jump through to get that tongue fixed.  But the procedure is actually amazingly simple.  Very little blood.  Almost no risk of infection.  Very little, if any, pain for baby (though they may be ticked at the gloved hand in their mouth.)  Many babies can latch on and nurse successfully, right after the procedure. 

Being tongue-tied can also dramatically affect speech development.  A nurse told me yesterday that they found our her son was tongue tied...when he was 15!!!  I personally have a speech issue (a lisp), for which I've been to speech therapy (unsuccessfully).  After learning that short frenulums can run in the family, my mom and I are very curious if that might have been an issue for which my speech accommodated during my speech development.  (Try saying an "S" with your tongue stuck on the bottom of your mouth.  It doesn't work unless you accommodate by creating the sound incorrectly.) 

Some babies can also be a bit tongue tied without any speech or feeding issues.  Sometimes the frenulum stretches as the child grows and no intervention is needed.  Probably another reason the medical community does not do a standard check in the hospital (which would be so simple!).  They wait to see if there are issues.

I am not going to pretend that the little frenulum-clipping procedure magically solved all of our life problems and washed my dishes for me.  But I am extremely grateful that we caught it when we did.  And I am thankful for the hope that it is helping.

So there you have it.  Our tongue-tied story.

*************************************

Want to learn more?  Here are some links:
Ankyloglossia
TongueTie.net (a VERY helpful picture guide!)

 note:  A word to the wise.  Be careful if googling about frenulums.  There is more than one kind. : )

I have an announcement to make:

You will be thrilled to know that baby Christian went 4.5 hours between feedings last night and I only had to get up once!!!   He ate at 11:30, then again at 4am.  And he ate about 3 ounces, burped and WENT BACK TO SLEEP!  No screaming!  No floor-walking.  Oh joy, oh bliss.  Then he stayed asleep again until 7...I even had time to finish up lunches and do the girls' hair before the morning feeding.  (A beautiful change from his usual 12-3-5:00-ish feeding pattern that stretches out almost until the kids get up at 6:30.)

With all that sleep, you never know what I might accomplish today.  It could be epic.

I'd love to sit here holding this quiet bundle of sleeping love.  I'd love to ignore the fact that there are 11 fat furry puppies with freshly filled tummies running loose in my basement preparing to poop up my world.  I'd love to pretend that I don't hear them making their chubby way up the stairs towards my kitchen.  But if I don't go catch them and cage them, I will regret it for sure.

Thank you for sharing my happy announcement. I am quite sure this means that tonight he will wake up every hour and a half and have a bad tummy.  But I'll take what I can get when I can get it.  Amen.

Have a lovely day.  And please buy a puppy.

one month

Yay for naps and a refreshed brains and productive days.

Can't believe he's a month old.

I call him "Awesome Pants."  Cuz he's awesome. 

Midnight Mentoring......Advice to Myself

Tonight I am needing a little support and encouragement.  So…I am telling myself – out loud in writing - what I wish some warm wise woman would tell me.  It's fixing to get REAL up in here. Care to listen in? 

********************

"Honey, You will not always smell like baby puke.

It’s not your fault your kids can’t sleep.  It’s probably a full moon or weird barometric pressure.  You fed them and did your routine and got them to bed at a very good hour.  You did okay. They’re just weird, weird children.

It’s okay that you didn’t get the dishes washed and the laundry finished and the house straightened tonight. You did several things right today.  Take note of what you did accomplish rather than beating yourself up for what didn’t get done:

• ·        You welcomed your neighbor into your home today.  You chose to be warm and happy and relaxed even though when she came to the door,  the house wasn’t straightened, you had to throw a robe over your ghastly nightgown, the sink was full of dishes and there was a HUGE pile of poop smeared on the bathroom floor.  You remembered to invite her to church again.
• ·        You made homemade pizza (the kids didn’t even mind too much that it was overdone and a little gross). 
• ·        You worked on preserving some family memories.
• ·        You read some fantastic literature to your 3-yr-old
• ·        You spent time with your big kids and kept most of your normal evening routines, in spite of baby screaming and pressure from outside deadlines.
• ·        You spent some time feeding your heart with inspiration.
• ·        You fed the 3 adult dogs and helped a little with the puppies.
• ·        Your new puppy ad sold a new puppy today!
• ·        You fed and changed and rocked and loved on your 4-week old baby.  That is enough.
• ·        You had meaningful conversations with your husband and talked through some weighty stuff.
• ·        You tried be gentle with your kids – even when they were mighty irritating
• ·        You accomplished 2 major projects on your “ministry outside the home” to-do list
• ·        You did laundry (it’s okay that one load is piled at the end of your bed and 2 loads are still in the washer and dryer. The process is happening.  Everyone has underwear.  It’s okay.
• ·        You answered several texts & messages….part of the process of keeping up with the neverending, stress-inducing stream of messages that come in from so many places.
• ·        You made contact with 3 of the most important friendships in your life today….taking care of the relationships.
• ·        You prayed and worshiped
• ·        You shared some great music with your kids and made happy singing
• ·        You did wash dishes!  Your bottle and pumping equipment. …over and over.  And this is exactly why you stocked up on paper goods while you were pregnant.
• ·        You tried to take a nap. (The kids forgot – multiple times -  that they weren’t to come in and wake you unless there was blood or fire.  But you tried to rest.  That counts.)
• 
  
• ·        You only cried once today!

It’s okay that you still feel so tired and still pretty brain- muddled 4 weeks after delivery.  You were very sick for awhile and that set you back. Your body needs sleep to function at its best.    And you aren’t getting enough sleep -  and there isn’t much you can do about that right now.  This too shall pass.  No one expects you to be any certain way right now.  You are worrying when you don’t need to.

Many of the expectations that make you nervous are either your own or your imagination.  You expect yourself to bounce back as quickly as others.  Good grief, you don’t even know how other new mothers bounce! Besides, who cares?  You are doing your best – a good job. And it’s okay to be where you are.  Let everyone else bounce. You just keep on plodding.

You WILL have time for a shower tomorrow.

Your house is beautiful.  Your kids are beautiful.  You will someday not look like an exhausted witch. 

Don’t feel guilty that your baby eats every 2hours and it takes at least an hour for each feeding/burping/puking/calming/pumping/washing process.  That doesn’t leave very many hours in your day.  But it’s a pretty big accomplishment to keep a newborn baby alive under these circumstances.

3-hour Scheduling can be good, but you KNOW it isn’t the only way in the universe to feed a baby.   It will come soon enough, when his body is ready.  You know how to schedule a baby and scream it out and all of that.  You know what you’re doing! You’re good at this! Quit worrying.  You are just blessed with fussy tummies.  Christian has a tiny stomach that can’t tolerate much more than 2.5 ounces.  You have committed to pumping since Christian can’t nurse.  Breastmilk ALWAYS digests faster than formula.  Christian is a gassy/burpy/puky/fussy baby.  This makes feedings time consuming. This is NOT YOUR FAULT.  Relax and accept that this is your life right now.

If you have to postpone going back to teaching lessons an extra week….that’s okay.  Even if someone gets slightly irritated and your students have a short semester, there will be no significant or long-term negative effects from that decision if you have to make it.  Try to speak truth to that nervousness that hits you whenever you feel pressure to hurry back into things.  It is going to be very challenging to teach with a fussy baby like this.  Don’t rush it.  Do what is right for you and your baby right now.  You don’t HAVE to do anything.  You are in charge.

Just about 3 days ago most of your house was beautifully clean and shining and company-ready.  Today it’s NOT.  But Legos on the floor and dishes in the sink happen.  It’s really not that big a deal.

It’s okay that you’re typing encouragement to yourself right now rather than making lunches for everyone for tomorrow.  If you don’t get the lunches made by 7:45, you can always drop them off by lunchtime at 11:30.

You. Have. FIVE. Children. 10 and under.  You're doing okay!

You get to go to bed soon!  Christian will probably wake to eat up in about 8 minutes, right after you finish pumping.  Then you can sleep for 2 or 3 hours in a row!!!

Don’t muddle this precious new-baby time with unnecessary guilt. (What if this is your last baby!?)  No one is going to call the police if you hang out in your pj’s.  It won’t be long until he’ll be crawling around and you can be superwoman again.   Relax and be okay with where you are.  

Hold him and feed him and kiss him and pray while you walk the floors.

Now drink your water and go make that baby a bottle....then go to bed, girl.  You're gonna be okay."