Sleep Training Through a Baby's Perspective...

OK, here's my situation. My Mommy has had me for almost 7 months. The first few months were great-- I cried, she picked me up and fed me, anytime, day or night. Then something happened.

Over the last few weeks, she has been trying to STTN (sleep thru the night). At first, I thought it was just a phase, but it is only getting worse. I've talked to other babies, and it seems like it's pretty common after Mommies have had us for around 6 months.

Here's the thing: these Mommies don't really need to sleep. It's just a habit. Many of them have had some 30 years to sleep--they just don't need it anymore. So I am implementing a plan. I call it the Crybaby Shuffle.

It goes like this:

Night 1--cry every 3 hours until you get fed.

I know, it's hard. It's hard to see your Mommy upset over your crying.

Just keep reminding yourself, it's for her own good.

Night 2--cry every 2 hours until you get fed.

Night 3--every hour.

Most Mommies will start to respond more quickly after about 3 nights.

Some Mommies are more alert, and may resist the change longer. These Mommies may stand in your doorway for hours, shhhh-ing. Don't give in. I cannot stress this enough: CONSISTENCY IS KEY!!

If you let her STTN (sleep through the night), just once, she will expect it every night. I KNOW IT'S HARD! But she really does not need the sleep, she is just resisting the change.

If you have an especially alert Mommy, you can stop crying for about 10 minutes, just long enough for her to go back to bed and start to fall asleep. Then cry again. It WILL eventually work. My Mommy once stayed awake for 10 hours straight, so I know she can do it.

Last night, I cried every hour. You just have to decide to stick to it and just go for it. BE CONSISTENT!

I cried for any reason I could come up with. My sleep sack tickled my foot. I felt a wrinkle under the sheet. My mobile made a shadow on the wall. I burped, and it tasted like pears. I hadn't eaten pears since lunch, what's up with that? The cat said "meow". I should know. My Mommy reminds me of this about 20 times a day. LOL. Once I cried just because I liked how it sounded when it echoed on the monitor in the other room.

Too hot, too cold, just right--doesn't matter! Keep crying!!

It took awhile, but it worked. She fed me at 4am. Tomorrow night, my goal is 3:30am.

You need to slowly shorten the interval between feedings in order to reset your Mommies' internal clocks.

P.S. Don't let those rubber things fool you, no matter how long you suck on them, no milk will come out. Trust me.

- Author unknown

I'm so cool!

Aedan has some new sporty Sunglasses to protect his eyes from the sun.... and to make him look like one happenin' little man!

Spoke too soon

I have had a couple rough nights of having the flu. Aedan still hasn't shown any signs of being sick, but it still may yet come ( I'm not bragging too loudly now that I've found my face over the toilet seat since last brag).

I'm tired, and of course Aedan is now 6 weeks old, when baby's typically have some extra growing going on, so Aedan is super hungry and feeding every hour and a half - two hours, no sleep while being sick is kinda stressful.

Hopefully a couple days of staying in bed will make me better. But staying in bed is hard when there isn't a peice of clean laundry and every dish is dirty. hmmmm....

Lets just hope Aedan stays healthy.

Yeah For Breastfeeding!!!

Drew is Sick ... Really sick. I'm guessing with some kind of flu and now he has a sius infection throat infection and chest infection to boot. So bad he woke up coughing and in pain that couldn't be tamed at 4AM. I'm thankful to our drug plan as Drew has a couple hundred dollars of drugs to make him better.

Back when I was about 25 weeks pregnant I took a "Homeopathic Flu Shot" (Made by Dolisos - About $11) while pregnant It was a homeopathic remedy that you disolve under the tounge that was made from the flu shot... this is the Second flu I have escaped that Drew has had. His first one he had back in December while on a car trip to Windsor. I'm crediting my wellness to this remedy since it's usually me who is sick and Drew who is healthy.

Thankfully, Aedan is reciving antibodies from me through my milk! So as sick as Drew is, The Dr says it is unlikley that Aedan will get it.

Get better soon Drew!

Keep on chugging that milk Aedan!

Purple Baby

Aedan had his Dr's apt yesterday and he is now 11lbs and 1 oz , 24 inches long, and his head is 38 cm around. The Dr commented that he is really strong and doing very well.

However my poor baby has been trying to battle a thrush infection since he was about 11 days old... First we got a prescription of nystatin... it is this yellow liquidy stuff that we have to put in his mouth 4X a day. It didn't work after the first batch so we went on to a second batch.

Near the end of the second batch I was noticing it was only keeping it at bay and not killing it all off. Sucpisious I looked at the label and saw a Feb 07 expiry date.

We went to the Dr to talk about his still exsisting thrush and mentioned the expiration date. Our Dr. wrote out a 3rd script and asked us to double check the exiration date. This stuff seemed to be working well as well . but then it halted and wasn't so great.

Well he is 5 weeks old today and still has it. Dr recomended we move onto bigger and badder stuff to try to kill it off. Either this is one tough strain or it became resistant because of the pharmacy and it's expiration daPublishtes... now we will be moving onto Gentian Violet .

Except this stuff is near impossible to find in a non alcohol blend... I'm still on the hunt I'm told to expect everything his saliva touches to look purple. So I have to look forward to purple clothes and purple nipples. Who knows how long it takes to wear off skin, but it permanantly stains fabric.

I'll try to get his 5 week picture posted BEFORE we dose him with the gentian violet.

I'm sorta mad at the pharmacy for not watching their dates... maybe all this could have been avoided if the first batch was good .

I'm not ready

But I never will be anyway.

We have introduced a bottle so he can be fed by bottle or breast. He only gets MAYBE 1 bottle a day, but goes back and forth between them very well. We did this so Drew can have a chance to feed him and have some of that bonding time with him, but also to give us the freedom should we need it to go out and let someone else care for him

I wasn't really that nervous about labour, but I'm nervous about this.

We are going to leave Aedan, for the first time, with his Nana ( my mom) for about 2 hours tomorrow night while Drew and I go see a movie. I'm sure all I will think about is him.

I'm hoping my anticipation is worse than it will actually be to leave him. Instinct just wants to keep him by my side and in my arms.

I'll never be ready, but we need to be able to trust our son with other people, and he needs to be given the chance to trust other people.

He's ready, Im not.

I'm sure the longer I leave it the harder it will be on all of us.

Aedan and his Daddy

Aedan is lucky to have such a good Dad. Over this past year I have gotten to know Drew in a whole new way. I Always knew Drew was dedicated and loyal and above all else loving and passionate. But when I told him he was going to be a father I saw a fire light inside him that has just brought it all to the surface.

Many parts of my pregnancy were hard. The worst to me was first trimester when I was so nauseous. I couldn't handle the smell of anything. He cooked, he cleaned he dealt with me patiently as I laid out on the couch trying to ride out the queezies. Although it was really hard on me, he kept reminding me this was a sign of a healthy baby. He took my nausea with a smile. My nausea made him happy.

As I got bigger and bigger I was less able to do things for myself. slowly Drew started taking the lead to take such great care of me. He ended up having to do all the bending over for me to get things off the ground, or to pull me out of a seat. I don't think I would be able to say I enjoyed my pregnancy if I didn't have him helping me through it.

The best was watching the reality of a baby boy was coming into our life. When we were told at our 19 week ultrasound that we were having a boy, it was so sweet to see tears of joy come to his eyes and hear him prattle on about all the things he will get to do with his son that he felt fortunate enough to do with his own father.

It was after that I watched Drew become very protective of "Us" - more his baby, but the baby was locked tight inside my belly. More phone calls were coming home when he was at work to remind me to eat or drink or take my vitamins or get some sleep. He also started looking at me more lovingly than he ever did.

He was also such an amazing labour support. he was telling me in the weeks before he was really nervous to have to see me in pain through the labour. When things got intense, and there were many voices telling me what to do, encouraging me to push, it was his voice that centred me and gave me the strength to push out our son.

Now he is a Father, a real live daddy! Again, he has shown just how amazing he is. In the hospital he rarely left our side sleeping on a cot for 4 nights and surviving on Tim Horton's donuts. not a bit of vitamin C. He changed just about every diaper while we were there and cuddled him and helped the two of us learn to breastfeed.

He was there to support me emotionally. When I missed the feelings of my baby in my belly and when the two of us weren't having much success in a proper latch, helped me work through the guilt of being a "bad mommy" as I had to pump my colostrum into a bottle and feed him rather than giving my baby my breast.

Now that we are home, he squeezes as much love into that baby as he can. I still see Drew dreaming of all the things he is gonna do with his son, but treasuring these moments that he is just so small hoping that he could freeze time in these precious moments.

He makes sure I get time to myself on the days he has to work so I have the energy to keep loving my baby, and tells me everyday how proud he is of me.

Not only is Aedan lucky to have such a good daddy, I'm lucky to have such a great husband.

Diaper Explosion

I was feeding Aedan in a modified football hold where he is sitting more upright on my lap.

Well he seems to pass his gas and stools while he feeds, I guess he gets relaxed enough to let them loose.

As he was nursing he made a sudden pause, screwed up his face while staying latched then let loose a very wet sounding bunch of gas, he took 3 more sucks, then his eyes bulged as this low note trombone sound started to sound off as poop came flying out of his onesie from both legs and up out the back of the neck all over his head, all over my shirt and pants, nursing bra and even my hair!

it dripped all over the couch... the floor... we were covered.

Who knew a 10 day old baby could have that much poop in them???

I threw down Aedans burp cloth and laid my poor screaming baby on it as I quickly stripped down naked in my living room We live on a main street and once I realized the curtains were open I closed them as fast as possible.

Thank goodness I have a makeshift change table in the living room, and didn't have to run my poopy dripping baby to the upper floor.

I stripped my poor baby down and gave him a wet wipe bath. He was crying so hard , poor sad poppy baby

As soon as I got his new diaper on him I swaddled my naked crying baby and hushed him to sleep in about 2 min flat. All that crying and explosive pooping tuckered him out.

Then I started taking off the slip cover on the couch and bundling all the poopy clothes for the laundry, You can just imagine me running around in my panties and poopy nursing bra, nursing panel down on one side, poop in my hair and my strechmarked flabby post partum belly hanging over the underwear... not the most attractive sight.

I’m so happy no one was home to see it – but I can share it here!

I guess this is my first very memorable "Mommy Moment"

Aedans Birth Anouncment

My Labour

My original Due date was January 27th, however due to baby’s size from an ultrasound in December my Dr. pushed my Due date back to the 21st of January.

At the beginning of January my Dr talked about induction options available to me if my baby didn’t come on time. I Asked the Dr to take a slow and more natural approach, that I wouldn’t want pitocin if it could be helped and that my mobility was important to me and I didn’t want to be tied down to a monitor for my whole labour. We came up with a plan that I was very comfortable with. I would have a membrane sweep done the week before baby was due to be induced, if that didn’t work, then on the 31st have prostaglandin gel put in to stimulate the cervix and hopefully start labour. then if needed break the water, last resort was pitocin. We did anticipate him coming before the due date because of all the Braxton Hicks contractions I had been having as well as some signs that my cervix was well ready.

As the 21st came and went, my Dr. recommend an induction by the 31st. This would make the baby 10 days late by the revised due date, and 4 days late by actual due date. Waiting after the due date was the worst anticipation I had, looking back, I can say it was worse than labour.

Well I never really thought the induction date would come, it was surreal as the date approached. I thought I would be nervous the night before, but it all just didn’t feel real and I slept pretty well.

We were asked to be at the hospital for 7:30 am to have prostaglandin gel put in. The hospital is a good solid 45 minute drive away ( we chose a hospital out of town as they are better equipped) and had to get up at 5 AM to be ready to get there in time.

We woke when it was dark and started the drive in the dark. Our drive in was quiet and excited and anxious. We didn’t talk much but I held Drew’s hand the whole way there. A good portion of the drive we drive beside the lake, I got to watch an almost full moon setting over the water and the most brilliant colours in the sky as the sun rose. I felt pretty confident that we were going to have a peaceful labor and delivery.

My husband and our baby’s godmother, Courtney, were trained by a Doula to be my support persons and I had also asked my mother to be there for more support. We knew it takes about 6 hours for the Gel to really kick in so we asked my mom to wait till the afternoon to meet us and Courtney to meet us at about 9:00 when we knew we would be told to go out and walk to get the gel and labor going,

When we arrived at the Hospital I was sent right into my delivery room. Our nurse (call her Nurse “A” ) told us it had just been freshly renovated and painted just 2 days before and that we pretty much had the nicest room there was. Nurse A sat down with me and asked me how I was feeling about the induction and asked me questions about how I hoped my labor would go and what kind of pain control measures I would use. I was very excited to have a nurse who would go over a labour plan with me. I let her know what I had planned with the Dr. ,the training Drew and Courtney had, and that my mother would be there.

She seemed so caring about every thing I said…. Then she told me to “Throw that all out the window, you can never perfectly plan a labour and I’d be better off to let the professionals handle it”

She told me that she would check my cervix, break my water, start me directly on the pitocin and recommended I get an epidural right away because first time moms can rarely handle the pitocin induced contrations.

I was dumbfounded and instantly nervous… I told her I wouldn’t let her do any of that because it was not what I discussed with my Dr. That I wanted to talk directly with my Dr before we proceeded forward. She told me my Dr wouldn’t be available for 2 more hours and we should just “Get on with it” I insisted on waiting,

During my wait they took some preliminary blood tests, threw me on the monitor and checked my blood pressure. My blood pressure was of course through the roof!

What we found out while on the monitor is I was already having regular contractions that would be considered great contractions if I was dilated enough. I refused however to let the nurse do an internal on me.

My Dr arrived an hour earlier than expected at 8:30, she asked me how I was and I told her very nervous because I found out nothing was going to the plan I had with her. She looked confused and I told her that the nurse told me there was a different plan. At this point my Dr offered me to be not induced if I didn’t want, that my Biophisical profile and Non-stress Test done a couple days earlier were great. But reiterated our original plan in front of the nurse and basically put the nurse in her place.

Nurse A came back at my Dr saying my Blood pressure was dangerously high for baby and that she thought it would be a better course of action to get me going. My Dr said that my blood pressure had always been fine in the office, being more assured with my Dr there, when my Dr checked my blood pressure it came back to normal levels.

I told my Dr that I didn’t feel qualified to make the decision about being induced or not, that I knew there were some risks to leaving a baby in too long, that I didn’t want him to pass his stool while in me or have my placenta start to break down. She told me my baby was currently as healthy as they could hope a baby could be, that if I was induced baby wouldn’t take the stress of it too badly… but what she would do is insert the gel, if it didn’t do anything we could always re-schedule the induction if I still felt uncomfortable.

I let my Dr do an internal, I was %50 effaced and almost 3 cm dilated, I was already having steady contractions but not strong enough to really get labour going. My Dr. inserted the gel and sent us on our way to wait for the gel to kick in; we were to come back at 2:30pm to decide our next steps.

I left the hospital a wreck not knowing what decision I should make.

I do have a friend , April / Kersteken,who is a maternity nurse and gave her a call and spilled my guts about all the happenings of the morning. She was great. She told me all my rights and responsibilities, let me know that if they do break the water I can refuse any IV for up to 12 hours… Long enough for “Nurse A” to be off shift – that was great to hear. My friend gave me so much strength back and made me feel I could “Own” the decisions being made for my delivery.

I walked with Drew and Courtney , John and our room mate Amanda for about 3 hours around the mall, then we sat down to a lunch. By about 1:30 I could feel the contractions were getting stronger and closer together. They stayed steady like that till we got back to the hospital at 2:30.

When put onto the monitor it seemed I was in a far more active state of labor I was left on the monitor till my Dr was done at her office at 4:00. My Dr came, told me I was now %70 effaced and 4 cm dilated, but my contractions were not intensifying in the 2 hours of monitoring and we broke my water. Contractions really started to pick up.

My mom Arrived and Drew and Courtney were by my side. I was pretty proud of myself for handling the labor so well, I didn’t know how well I would handle the pains. Nurse A was on shift till 7 pm and it was kind of great to show her up as not needing the pain meds. I took different positions to get the baby propped and progress the contractions. I was dilating at a very slow rate. There was progression, but it was long and slow.

At about 6 Pm Adam and Jen had shown up at the hospital and made their way to the labor and delivery room. The hospital I was delivering at has no limit to the Number of people that can visit you and didn’t stop them from wandering in, I wasn’t in any horrible kind of labor but I’m a modest person and was not too happy to have them just stop in … not that I told them so

Well I did let them stay for a little while as Jen was still expecting ( and overdue) and was not sure what to expect when she goes into labor. They took some amazing photo’s which I am so glad to have. After they left, I took another good walk around the halls and got to meet my new nurses (B & C) this is when things got a lot more comfortable. They came in to greet me with Popsicles. They looked over my history for they day, asked how I felt things were going and said they hoped to see if they could get things moving a little faster as I was only at about 5.5-6 cm and only %70 effaced. They offered to me to go into the tub. It took them till about 8:00 to get the tub ready for me.

These two nurse couldn’t have introduced themselves better… I mean Popsicles and a tub… what more could a labouring woman want???

The tub was wonderful. It was just me and Drew in there, they turned off the lights and let us be. It was actually kind of romantic. I was managing the contractions well and being in the warm water made it so easy to handle. He kept telling me how proud he was of me and that I looked so beautiful. I didn’t want that time to end but I knew my Dr wanted to examine me again and it was time to check the baby on the monitor again

At 8:30 I got out of the tub and wandered back to my room to be checked by my Dr. I was now 7.5 Cm dilated and planned to find my way back into the tub, but when they monitored my baby’s heart rate it was way up high it was ranging from the 170’s to the mid 190’s

I immediatly started deep breathing and asking my labour support to start cooling my body down with cold cloths. I guess the sudden amount of progression, mixed with the heat of the tub was too stressful on my baby. It took about an hour to bring his heart rate down to a steady safe place. We would get it down - then a contraction would come and it would go back up. It was 2 steps forward 1 step back the whole time.

It took an hour, but once his heart rate had calmed and the nurses gave us the OK to come off the monitor again it was about 11:30 at night on the 31st. another internal was done and it showed I was only 7.5 cm dilated still. No progression for 3 hours… So I got up and started walking. This intensified contractions again, enough that I had to get back to my bed. By this point it was getting emotionally stressful for me to manage the pain. I asked to be put on the nitrous oxide by 1 pm– I have to say that stuff was the best.

I had control over that gas and used it as I needed, I started to loose track of time that was passing but could still think and communicate clearly. I highly recommend Gas as a pain control if someone needs it.

The gas put me into a surreal almost dream space, between 1 and 4 pm I dilated from 7.5cm – 8.5 cm. Again a very slow progression, but progression nonetheless.

At 4 pm I was slightly disappointed at my progression and realized I had been awake for 23 hours now all of witch I had been feeling contractions. I was getting really tired. I also realized that 7AM was coming and “Nurse A” who I didn’t like would be back on shift.

Its funny the things you ask for, but I remember asking the nurses to make sure Nurse A wouldn’t be the one to take care of me if I hadn’t delivered at 7:00 They reassured me she wouldn’t be there as she was on 1 week of vacation, such relief.

I was getting really tired and needed a break, I debated silently in my head about an epidural. I knew I hadn’t reacted well to the meds used in them before, that my body would most likely cease contracting if I got one. 6:00 am came as well as the realization that I had no energy to push this baby when the time came. I didn’t want a huge episotimy and a vacuum to get my baby out.

I asked for an internal and I was only 8.5 –9 cm dilated. I asked for a “walking epidural” One that has hardly any strength to it in the hopes it would stop my labor so I could have a nap. It took till 7:00 am for the anesthesiologist to arrive and get the epidural in me, I have to say GETTING the epidural was probably the worst part of my whole labour because I got it so late in the game my muscles couldn’t relax and it hurt so bad going in.

It took 3 tries and a lot of frustration on the Nurse and Dr., but once it was in, it did as I expected and my contractions flat lined by 7:30am… the nurses didn’t think it would do that and panicked and wanted to start pitocin immediately. I told them to wait 2 hours and let my labour support and me have a nap. They brought in a cot for Drew to sleep on. At 9:30 they started the pitocin and small contractions gradually started to pick up while I slept through them. I guess my labour is pretty unique in that we stopped it to have a nap. Not many women can say they did that!

My contractions never returned with regularity. At 10:30 I asked them to let the epidural wear off so I could feel the push, at that point I was 9.5 cm dialated. 11:30 I was 10 cm but the baby wasn’t low enough yet, we did a couple controlled pushed to see if we could get him lower. They kept upping my pitocin because my body was contracting only for 30 seconds every 3 or 4 min, my body never responded as they kept upping the dose. I was more than happy with that as it gave me a chance to rest between contractions,

My baby lowered and I felt the urge to push by noon on the 1st. It was 8 sets of 3 pushes over a period of 52 minutes. They brought in a mirror so I could watch his arrival into the world. It was amazing to see that little with head appear and grow bigger and bigger out of me. Once his head was out he was screaming before the rest of his body arrived. I pushed out his shoulders and he made his grand entrance with a full bladder released all over the Dr. His daddy cut his cord and Baby Aedan Robert Scott was born 9lbs and 4oz at 12:52 February 1st 2007.

Although my labor was long, I got to know what I had the right to control. I was in control of what pain relief I had and although labour was hard and painful, it was also graceful. The slow progression helped me to get used to each new intensity of labor. I actually was able to enjoy my labour. My labour support was amazing. They didn’t complain till after the baby was born that maybe I should have cut my nails as they showed me the indents of markings on their hands from me squeezing them so tight.

I feel so lucky to have gone through this experience and have my little boy.

Now begins my labour of love - Until I take my last breath, I will always be a mom!

I'm back and I'm a Mom

I intended to document my pregnancy on this blog, but pregnancy was somthing very strange. My body and emotions were changing at a rate faster than at puberty. I don't know how I thought I could ever document my pregnancy when I had issues telling my own mother about when I got my first period... there wern't pads in the house in the cupboard and I waited for 2 days till the cramps were unbearable and stuffing toilet paper in my underwear couldn't hold the flow... I'm just not someone who can openly talk about her body or sexuality that easily.

While I enjoyed much of my pregnancy (2nd and most of 3rd trimester) there was so much changing in my body and mind it was hard for me to even understand what was happening , let alone write it down. Now, on the otherside of pregnancy, my body is foriegn to me compared to what it was a year ago. Although it took 9 months, these changes are drastic to me.

I hope now to share my experiences of motherhood. This is somthing that feels far more natural to me than pregnancy did. I can look back now on all the effort that pregnancy was to see it was grooming my body and mind and heart ( and my husbands patience) to become the parent I am now.

I'm just so overwhelmed with love for my little baby. And amazed by how natural the process seems... even the hard moments when he's screaming in my ear for me to fix somthing that I don't understand.


I just have to get some of this out, and hope you will enjoy it in the process.