(one month update here)
WE MADE IT TO TWO MONTHS!!! Honestly, every month just keeps getting better and better. I love that about the first year of having a baby. There’s huge differences month to month that make life so much happier and more fun! There’s a lot going on this month with us, but the most notable is that after Charlie’s tongue tie healed, he became a completely different baby. He is SO much less fussy, and when he is crying it’s usually either because he is hungry or sleepy, not because of gas. I wouldn’t consider him to be very gassy at all anymore, which has been so wonderful. The only residual issues that the tongue tie created for us is a bit of nipple confusion. For the week before his tongue tie release, we were giving him bottles since he refused the boob, and it has not been much better ever since. We do about 80% bottles, and I nurse him in the middle of the night, and sometimes in the morning if he will take it in an extremely sleep state. When he is up in the middle of the day, he ALWAYS starts to scream once I let down. It’s been rough, and I do not enjoy being an almost exclusive-pumper. There’s this horrible feeling I get as I bring the pump to my boob, still a little wet from washing it off a few hours earlier. I am truly scarred, and it is one of my least favorite ways to pass my time these days, but knowing that Charlie it’s good for my baby keeps me motivated to continue doing it. In the end, I do believe that fed is best, and I know that Hudson was switched to formula around 4 months and it was fine. As long as I have milk supply, I’ll keep up breastfeeding, but also know that it’s not a huge deal if I have to stop around the same time I stopped with Hudson.
Other than feeding, Charlie has had tons of changes this month. The biggest (and best) change is that he’s finally sleeping in longer stretches! I noticed his nighttime sleep got a bit worse, so I moved his bed time a bit earlier to 9:30PM VS 10:30PM, and then he started to sleep from 9:30PM – 4AM which is sooo nice for us! I think he’ll sleep through the night soon, but because of breastfeeding I still have to wake up and pump or I am super engorged. It feels great to be getting longer chunks of sleep. I will never ever take sleep for granted. He also has longer wake periods now, where he is awake for around 2 hours, and he’s SO alert. He’s much more interactive – smiling at us, brushing things with his hands, getting stronger at tummy time, following things with his eyes. It’s amazing how quickly they go from blob to somewhat aware of what is going on. He coos in response to me talking to him, and definitely knows when he is about to be fed. His personality is very chill – when Hudson was a baby he was always 0-100 when it came to getting upset or frustrated, and he was the kind of baby that would give up if he felt he couldn’t do something. Charlie is different – if he is upset at nap time, sometimes if he cries for a minute he’ll work it out, and fall asleep. He is the same during tummy time – even if he starts off grumpy, sometimes he will pull through, and play on his tummy for a while. He isn’t super irritable at all, and he is a crier if he has an intense need, but doesn’t really cry for no reason. I feel so SO SO lucky, because Hudson was a much harder baby, and I was nervous I would have another tough baby. I get a lot of questions on instagram about his schedule, so I want to write it out below. His bottles are generally around 5oz each, and he probably is eating around 32 oz a day, give or take. I make sure to feed him every 3 hours during the day time, so he gets all of the milk he needs during his awake time and stocks up. He still generally cluster feeds in the evening, from around 4 – 9PM. Here is our current schedule at 9/10 weeks old:
7-8 AM: Wake up + feed
1-2 hours of awake time – we usually put him in the bouncer, or have some tummy time in the bed with us.
9:30AM – 10:30AM: Nap time! Our naps are not AT ALL set in stone yet, and they vary completely with times. Some naps are only 30 minutes, some are 2 hours!
11AM: Wake up + feed
1-2 hours of awake time
1-3PM: Nap time! Usually this is his longest nap of the day. Sometimes it can even go to 3 hours, but I will usually wake him around 2-2.5 so he still sleeps at night
3PM: Wake up + feed
1-2 hours of awake time
5-8PM: Cat naps + cluster feed. Around this time of night Charlie is usually in and our of napping in his bouncer, and we’ll just feed him on command.
8:30 PM: Bath time and PJ’s. We make sure to keep him awake for a solid hour before his bedtime.
9:30 PM: Night time bottle, sound machine on, and swaddled before bed.
4AM: Wake up and feed
So he is napping about 3-4 times per day, and eating about 6 times per day
Mama Update: At 2 months postpartum, I feel physically fully healed. Exercising doesn’t make me feel weak any longer, and I don’t have any soreness from the birth, which is amazing because it did feel like it took longer than this to heal after Hudson. I physically am feeling more and more capable each week – I had my first run today where my pace was faster than 10 minute miles, and I was so excited. I know that is a silly milestone, but I love to run and it feels so good to feel like I am working my way back to the kind of shape I was in before pregnancy. I’ve been focusing a lot on changing my eating habits this past month as well. I figured there is no time like the present, and I’ve been focusing on eating more “whole foods” and less processed foods, which has made me feel a lot better and more energetic.
I definitely have my days where I look at my soft tummy and mourn it a little. I feel fine wearing a two-piece swimsuit, and wearing the clothes I still love to wear, but in some alone moments when I am working out in my closet or getting ready for bed, I do wonder if my stretched skin will tighten up. If it doesn’t it’s okay, it created the two things I love most in life. But after Hudson it did go back, so I expected it would this time as well. I have been trying to see it more as my NEW body, not going back to my old one. I think it’s okay to feel a little sad about our changing bodies postpartum, but not to dwell on that sadness. It took 9 months to grow your baby, and I have been giving myself patience and time after giving birth – a lot moreso than I did after having Hudson.
I am also VERY over breastfeeding – I feel so thankful that I am able to pump milk to feed my baby, but not being able to nurse him on my boobs has been a tough pill to swallow. All of the convenience that nursing brings is gone, and some days it does feel like double the work to pump, give him a bottle, clean the bottle and by the time it’s all done, I have very little time before I have to do it all over again! I am ready to not be in that pregnancy state any longer, but I am sticking with it as long as we’re at home in quarantine. Emotionally, I feel like my obsession level with charlie is at 100. It took a little longer to feel that way with baby 2, but I am there. At the same time, I have been ceding over more trust in Matt than I did the first time around. I found myself being bossy with Hudson, and trying to tell him how to do things whereas this time I am allowing him to make up his own routines. He’s been doing amazing, and is very helpful. I couldn’t do half of what I do in a day without having him around, and the silver lining in all of what is going on in the world is just that. Having him around.