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Not labour, or sore hips, or achy backs, or stretch marks, or heartburn, or morning sickness, or insomnia, or getting fat, or sore breasts, or saggy skin, or that strange taste in your mouth, or leaky breasts, or strange spots, or c-section scars, or sweeps, or mastitis, or stirrups, or unsympathetic midwives, or false labour, or elbows in the ribs, or needing the loo every ten minutes, or pelvic floor exercises (or the lack thereof), or not being able to eat brie...
Nope. None of those.
The thing I most dislike?
Moulting. Still.
*with a caveat that clearly I was incredibly lucky to have easy, uncomplicated pregnancies and deliveries, and much worse things than any of these do, sadly, happen to much nicer people than me.
Showing posts with label baby. Show all posts
Showing posts with label baby. Show all posts
Saturday, 3 December 2011
Wednesday, 12 October 2011
Brainwashed by the breastapo
Let's get one thing straight. Breast is not "best". Breast is "better". Unless you think there are more than two options for feeding a new born of course. Pate de foie gras? Chicken biryani? Steak and kidney pudding?
I have breastfed all of my children. I did it because I believed, as I still do, that it is better for them and for me. L, A and S consumed nothing but breast milk for the World Health Authority's recommended six months and beyond that they had it combined with food. It was good for them. They grew and thrived and enjoyed it.
But M, who is now four months, is different. He is, clearly, enjoying it, and he is, equally clearly, thriving and developing. But he is still not, really, growing. At 19 weeks he's now about twelve pounds (I think), which is significantly smaller than a friend of mine's (admittedly very large) four week old.
He has, thus far, had nothing but breast milk. And if I want him to put on lots of weight, which he is not at the moment, there is an obvious plan of action. I can see it. I can virtually smell it (unpleasant isn't it?). Formula. Formula fed babies tend to put on weight quicker. They tend to be bigger. They tend, let's face it, not all to grow up to be psychopathic killers.
But I can't do it. I have been brainwashed.
I know, logically, that formula is fine. I have many friends who have either never breast fed, for whatever reason, or who have, again for multiple reasons, moved onto formula before weaning. Their children are all just as exasperatingly, infuriatingly, lovingly, brilliant as mine (well, not as mine, but as most other people's anyway...). I also live in a country where I am fortunate enough to have clean water with which to make up my bottles. Formula is not going to damage my baby. I know this.
But I don't feel it. And what's weird is clearly nor do the health visitors. I think part of this is that although M is small we are not, now, worried about him. He is growing - just not as quickly as most other babies - and he is tracking the bottom line on the authoritarian charts. He is doing all the things a baby of his age should do and he is happy and smiley with it. But while no one is worried, we are all agreed that it would be nice if he were a bit fatter. Yet when I wondered out loud about formula, I was met with looks of horror.
What is that about? How did we all get so scared of something which, let's face it, the majority of mothers in this country use from birth? How have we, intelligent women all, become so brainwashed?
How did I allow myself to get to the point where I feel that if I introduce a bottle, I will have failed. I will be that dread being, the bad mother? And how is it that I know I am not alone in feeling like this? Why am I ashamed by the thought of giving my baby a bottle in public? Why is it that I know if I were to do so, I would be judged, and found wanting? And, most importantly, how does that help the breast feeding campaign? Is this really what they would want? How is that better for mothers or babies?
I know that formula is not going to hurt my baby, and I also know that if I choose to give it to him it will be for all the right reasons. Surely that decision, whether made by me or any other mother, should be praised and not condemned.
There is, here, an added level, perhaps. For me, dealing with three other young and demanding children, the time I spend on the sofa or in bed, M on the breast, secure in a bubble of us, is the best and most focused time I can give him. He doesn't get much of me and this is something that I can do for and with him, and for him alone. More than that, it is something that only I can do. No-one else can (given the lack of wet nurses in the Yellow Pages) do this for my baby. That feels very important. I feel, somewhere visceral (or possibly mammarian) that I need M, in years to come, to know that I did this for him, that I loved him as much as his sisters.
But that's stupid isn't it? Because loving him as much doesn't mean treating him in exactly the same way. If formula is right for him then giving it to him is as much an act of love as breast-feeding him currently feels.
So I know all this. I really do. But despite that for the moment I'm going to hang on to my time with my tiny boy, and the experience that only we can share. It just feels, perhaps against logic, right for us. Maybe I really have been brainwashed.
I have breastfed all of my children. I did it because I believed, as I still do, that it is better for them and for me. L, A and S consumed nothing but breast milk for the World Health Authority's recommended six months and beyond that they had it combined with food. It was good for them. They grew and thrived and enjoyed it.
But M, who is now four months, is different. He is, clearly, enjoying it, and he is, equally clearly, thriving and developing. But he is still not, really, growing. At 19 weeks he's now about twelve pounds (I think), which is significantly smaller than a friend of mine's (admittedly very large) four week old.
He has, thus far, had nothing but breast milk. And if I want him to put on lots of weight, which he is not at the moment, there is an obvious plan of action. I can see it. I can virtually smell it (unpleasant isn't it?). Formula. Formula fed babies tend to put on weight quicker. They tend to be bigger. They tend, let's face it, not all to grow up to be psychopathic killers.
But I can't do it. I have been brainwashed.
I know, logically, that formula is fine. I have many friends who have either never breast fed, for whatever reason, or who have, again for multiple reasons, moved onto formula before weaning. Their children are all just as exasperatingly, infuriatingly, lovingly, brilliant as mine (well, not as mine, but as most other people's anyway...). I also live in a country where I am fortunate enough to have clean water with which to make up my bottles. Formula is not going to damage my baby. I know this.
But I don't feel it. And what's weird is clearly nor do the health visitors. I think part of this is that although M is small we are not, now, worried about him. He is growing - just not as quickly as most other babies - and he is tracking the bottom line on the authoritarian charts. He is doing all the things a baby of his age should do and he is happy and smiley with it. But while no one is worried, we are all agreed that it would be nice if he were a bit fatter. Yet when I wondered out loud about formula, I was met with looks of horror.
What is that about? How did we all get so scared of something which, let's face it, the majority of mothers in this country use from birth? How have we, intelligent women all, become so brainwashed?
How did I allow myself to get to the point where I feel that if I introduce a bottle, I will have failed. I will be that dread being, the bad mother? And how is it that I know I am not alone in feeling like this? Why am I ashamed by the thought of giving my baby a bottle in public? Why is it that I know if I were to do so, I would be judged, and found wanting? And, most importantly, how does that help the breast feeding campaign? Is this really what they would want? How is that better for mothers or babies?
I know that formula is not going to hurt my baby, and I also know that if I choose to give it to him it will be for all the right reasons. Surely that decision, whether made by me or any other mother, should be praised and not condemned.
There is, here, an added level, perhaps. For me, dealing with three other young and demanding children, the time I spend on the sofa or in bed, M on the breast, secure in a bubble of us, is the best and most focused time I can give him. He doesn't get much of me and this is something that I can do for and with him, and for him alone. More than that, it is something that only I can do. No-one else can (given the lack of wet nurses in the Yellow Pages) do this for my baby. That feels very important. I feel, somewhere visceral (or possibly mammarian) that I need M, in years to come, to know that I did this for him, that I loved him as much as his sisters.
But that's stupid isn't it? Because loving him as much doesn't mean treating him in exactly the same way. If formula is right for him then giving it to him is as much an act of love as breast-feeding him currently feels.
So I know all this. I really do. But despite that for the moment I'm going to hang on to my time with my tiny boy, and the experience that only we can share. It just feels, perhaps against logic, right for us. Maybe I really have been brainwashed.
Tuesday, 20 September 2011
M is for midget
So I spoke to the GP about M's weight.
Actually, that's a lie. I sent the GP a text that said "I'm a bit worried about M. I can't get an appointment with you for a week. Fancy coming round here, so that I can cook your children lunch and you can inspect my baby?"
And he said "Yes, how about Sunday?".
Sometimes I love living in a very small town.
Anyway, they all came round (his wife is also a GP), and poked at M, who smiled obligingly and looked thoroughly healthy, and we agreed that there was nothing obvious wrong, and that maybe we should come in to the surgery to have M checked out properly for the scarily vague Failure to Thrive.
Which we did, last Thursday. M was weighed and measured and prodded and listened to, and turned upside down and tickled, and had put on 8 ounces in just over a week.
Which still doesn't make him huge, but does put him back on the scale (at the 0.4th centile rather than just under it). More importantly his head circumference is still where it was at birth (75th centile - it's all those brains), and so is his length (25th). The GP and I went through the list of possible causes of Failure to Thrive (I feel it needs capitals) and none of them seemed to apply, so we are left where we were.
With a small baby. Whom I am to feed a bit more often.*
He's still not weed on me though.
*That bit obviously because one is not allowed to leave a health professional's office without having added to the layers of maternal guilt...It's one of the NHS's founding principles.
Actually, that's a lie. I sent the GP a text that said "I'm a bit worried about M. I can't get an appointment with you for a week. Fancy coming round here, so that I can cook your children lunch and you can inspect my baby?"
And he said "Yes, how about Sunday?".
Sometimes I love living in a very small town.
Anyway, they all came round (his wife is also a GP), and poked at M, who smiled obligingly and looked thoroughly healthy, and we agreed that there was nothing obvious wrong, and that maybe we should come in to the surgery to have M checked out properly for the scarily vague Failure to Thrive.
Which we did, last Thursday. M was weighed and measured and prodded and listened to, and turned upside down and tickled, and had put on 8 ounces in just over a week.
Which still doesn't make him huge, but does put him back on the scale (at the 0.4th centile rather than just under it). More importantly his head circumference is still where it was at birth (75th centile - it's all those brains), and so is his length (25th). The GP and I went through the list of possible causes of Failure to Thrive (I feel it needs capitals) and none of them seemed to apply, so we are left where we were.
With a small baby. Whom I am to feed a bit more often.*
He's still not weed on me though.
*That bit obviously because one is not allowed to leave a health professional's office without having added to the layers of maternal guilt...It's one of the NHS's founding principles.
Thursday, 8 September 2011
Would I know if there was something wrong with my baby?
My baby is off the scale.
He is the best baby in the world. Officially. I've had three other babies so I should know.
He is three months old now. He gurgles, he smiles, he giggles. He grins at me, B, and the girls. He recognises our voices, he turns his head towards them. He rarely cries, preferring to sit and watch the chaos, smiling and nodding in non- judgemental approval.
He feeds well and happily, jaw moving strongly, eyes closed in pleasure, or wide open, framed by unfairly long lashes, as he seeks my gaze.
He sleeps, sometimes calmly and without moving, and sometimes noisily, sucking determinedly at the thumb he discovered about five weeks ago, but always deeply and solidly. For twelve hours a night and several during the day.
He has never weed on me.
He is the best baby in the world. He is off the scale of wonderful babyness. Even if he proves me wrong tomorrow and wees all over the place before wailing solidly through the night.
He does everything you would want a baby of his age to do. Only, of course, better. He is perfect.
But he is off the scale.
He is three months old and he weighs 10lb 4oz. In the last six weeks he has put on six ounces. Plotted against the newborn growth charts he is below the 0.04th centile.
He is off the scale.
If you lined up 1000 babies born on the same day as him, he would be one of the smallest four. The NHS red book says that babies of this size "will normally be referred to a paediatrician".
But M is not, yet, being referred. He is developing normally, he is doing everything a normal baby would and should do. He is not hungry. The health visitors are not worried. I am not worried.
Until we look at the charts.
One of the health visitors told me, and I don't think she was joking, that I should just stop getting him weighed. But then they looked at each other, and I could see the confusion and the tiny little edge of concern. Instinctively we all think he's fine. Small, but fine.
But what if we're wrong?
He is the best baby in the world. Officially. I've had three other babies so I should know.
He is three months old now. He gurgles, he smiles, he giggles. He grins at me, B, and the girls. He recognises our voices, he turns his head towards them. He rarely cries, preferring to sit and watch the chaos, smiling and nodding in non- judgemental approval.
He feeds well and happily, jaw moving strongly, eyes closed in pleasure, or wide open, framed by unfairly long lashes, as he seeks my gaze.
He sleeps, sometimes calmly and without moving, and sometimes noisily, sucking determinedly at the thumb he discovered about five weeks ago, but always deeply and solidly. For twelve hours a night and several during the day.
He has never weed on me.
He is the best baby in the world. He is off the scale of wonderful babyness. Even if he proves me wrong tomorrow and wees all over the place before wailing solidly through the night.
He does everything you would want a baby of his age to do. Only, of course, better. He is perfect.
But he is off the scale.
He is three months old and he weighs 10lb 4oz. In the last six weeks he has put on six ounces. Plotted against the newborn growth charts he is below the 0.04th centile.
He is off the scale.
If you lined up 1000 babies born on the same day as him, he would be one of the smallest four. The NHS red book says that babies of this size "will normally be referred to a paediatrician".
But M is not, yet, being referred. He is developing normally, he is doing everything a normal baby would and should do. He is not hungry. The health visitors are not worried. I am not worried.
Until we look at the charts.
One of the health visitors told me, and I don't think she was joking, that I should just stop getting him weighed. But then they looked at each other, and I could see the confusion and the tiny little edge of concern. Instinctively we all think he's fine. Small, but fine.
But what if we're wrong?
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