My Lady of the Lantern

Figlia is now seven weeks old. Just want to put out some updates here: - Like I mentioned before, I now have a visual record of her fully awake smile...the conscious smile...not the sleep-induced one, of which there are lots of pictures. - She had her routine vaccinations and weight check on Saturday, and she has gained a little more than 350 gms in 11 days, which is fantastic....am so happy about it. Thank you, thank you people for the support on breastfeed + top feed. - I have a formula feeding schedule for her....She gets my milk through out the night...but she gets one 60 ml and one 30 ml feed in the morning, and three top feeds in the evening...in a combination of 30/60ml. Rest all feeds are from the breast. ( This changed over the last two days ) - There is a sleep pattern that is now emerging....mostly helped by my gradual realizing of what makes her sleepy, and keeps her so. - Figlia is a snuggler. I co-sleep. Once the last feed of the night is done - which is around 10:30...

The first thing I remember on entering the operation theatre was that there were way too many male OT technicians... I did not need much help getting on the operation table. There was an orchestrated flurry of activity around me. The anaesthesiologist came in. He was bursting with sunshine and rainbows....he told me it won't hurt a bit....my bare back-open gown was opened further....a cold liquid was applied. I could sense the needle approaching my spine *~ . And I stared at the blobs of light right over my head. I kind of lost it at that very moment. I told myself - I won't put my body through this ever again. Never. The needle entered. The deed was done. I lied down, and everything picked up momentum. Remember, this is me....the one who was sure of wanting this again. So hubby and I are chatting a few days after Figlia is born. And he says something to the effect of,  "We can try again in a couple of years..." Remember, this is him....who has always remaine...

With the length of TTC behind me, my one dream in this journey became the wish to know what a BFP looked like. What it felt like to be sitting in a waiting room, not waiting to join the range of pregnant bellies but rather walking with one. When I did become pregnant, and felt all that I wanted to know the joy of pregnancy, and I was joyed everyday about the fact that there would be a baby at the end of this. I enjoyed my growing belly rather than feel the need to cover the bulge. I loved it. When I went for my C-section last year, my senses were focused on hearing the baby's first cry, finding out the gender and all that. Then the ground shook, and I lost the dream. I went back to the zero from where I had started. It was not even a zero. It was somewhere below. My fingers were still tingling from the fact that I had cracked my dream at the very hair-width of fruition. Then I started trying again. I became pregnant. My focus went from trying to get pregnant, to staying pregn...

Don't want to really say that there is a lot of crying happening....but when it does, I usually run the following macro to identify the problem... I want milk. I am about to poo. I want some more milk. I have peed. Jeezus Lady, get them teats ready. I am sleepy, and don't want to sleep. Is there a milk truck nearby? Grrrrripe. Gas. Grrrrripe. Milk. That's it. Milk. And today, I caught the first open-eyed smile from Figlia. She is quite the smiler, and belts out smiles regularly when she is asleep...but it was the first awake-smile I caught today morning!

I had a total facepalm moment....I wasn't party to the conversation directly...I was narrated the deal...and jeez, I am not as thick-skinned as I want to be. I know that the lady who belted this will remain a part of 'our' life always, but I would not want to remember this...I want to just sweep it under the rug. Rather, I want that by some crazy lightning miracle, the lady would gain some sense. A: I am only worried about Figlia's weight. Brazy: Oh, it is okay....girls pick up weight easily, and you know what, after a while, one must cutback the amount of food given to them or they will just keep on putting weight. Really? At some apt age, I must start keeping my daughter hungry? Really? Accccck! Also, my heart broke at Mo's news. Her precious baby boy is no more . If you haven't already, please do visit her and send your thoughts and prayers.

This is about She...someone in the family. I generally like She, except that I had forgotten her potential for bull crap. What I remember is that her kid was on Lac.togen from almost day one. So, I was having some lactation related conversation and this is what she told me: ".... and kiddy arrived four days before the due date, and so my milk came only five days after the due date. Also, I am very thin, so the milk dried a month after it came, so I had to go onto Lacto.gen...." Puhleeeease! Which brings me to how I am. The same attitude that I had about sharing my infertility struggles, is what has kind of spontaneously extended to my lactation/baby's weight issues. As experience taught me, talking freely about my cycles did not offer more than gossip value to most people around me. I see the same happening for lactation as well. I want to save myself the ' judging '. Even though I can always quote the fact that my doc made me do it, there will be some of ...

Because I did not want to clutter her story with any more tidbits than the bites I added, I would just like to add that we would have wanted Figlia weighing a little higher than she did at her birth. (And then she lost some weight, as all neonates do, and she got slotted in the LBW kids, which irritates me.) Surprisingly, the lagging weight, and lagging AC was visible in the ultrasounds. Nothing awfully wrong happened to exist with my daily diet and nutrition. However, I had some fluctuations in my weight during the end, and even though the baby continued to put on weight, it did not happen the way it should have. In the end weeks too, Figlia gained on an average about 100 gms every week. In the very end, when the mystery for the weight issues did not get solved, my met.formin intake was halved. Figlia gained 100 mgs in 4 days flat! I am not saying that ultrasound weight measurements are perfect, but there was general sense of progress/status with it.... Since then, I have been goo...

It's a February day, and I am attempting to write a birth story for Figlia. I wrote and posted a birth story last year too, and it did not end the way this one will end. T - 4 days: Doppler for fetal weight and parameter check....SuperGyn would have liked to take out the baby now as per original plan (there were many original plans this pregnancy); bub is active, but weighs lower than what would be expected. My metformin intake is halved; tentatively, a date is set which happens to be CBub's birthday. T - 2 days: routine CTG in the morning; tachycardia noticed; FHR comes out raised when I use the monitor at home. Back for CTG in the afternoon, but it comes out as usual. T - 1 days: Admitted for observation; evening CTG normal. T: I feel excess movements early morning; CTG shows tachycardia; afternoon C-section - it's Figlia! No loop of cord, but baby has had a good fill of the liquor; there is yellow staining - cleaned and put in the NICU - there is tachypnea, grun...

I want to address some of the comments plus the fact that what inspired the move to formula + breastfeeding. - Figlia was put on my bre@st the second day post-birth, and guess what she took to it, immediately. - I was 'helped' plus given Regl.an initially to establish lactation. - Figlia seems satisfied with the nursing. But she tends to sleep while feeding, and sometimes, will just not take a full feed inspite of having been at it for a while. - Even though she continued to wet diapers/nappies about 5 - 6 times a day, she stopping pooping regularly. In the initial days, it could happen as much as 3 - 4 times within a day, but lately it had gone down to once in two-three days, and that too would happen sometimes with help from suppositories...and well there was crying and crankiness all the time. - Figlia has physiological ja.undice, and it will disappear only with weight gain. It should have happened already, but given the fact that her weight gain is not as super...it is...

...thanks for the fenugreek suggestion. I have been on shatavari for the past few days, lots of unsweetened milk since I came home, porridge, lentil soup....the works. And baby girl gained a smashing 90 gms in the last 10 days. :-(

"Insufficient" Supplementing with formula.

Friday was a cluster-feeding * day. Figlia skipped on the afternoon sleep. (Somehow all my posts refer to her sleep, huh?) And I was seriously done in. Initially in the hospital, I did add formula to her feed, but the second time around, she would have none of it at all. Since then, she has been completely on my milk. And then the feeding continued the same way yesterday. She tends to take over at 11:30 in the afternoon and we go on with it till evening. By the time it is evening, I want a break badly. I am currently not willing to add formula to her feeds, but I might think of it eventually. My supply is sufficient, and because her output corresponds with her intake, well it all seems to be fine. A friend has offered me her breast pump. I am more than willing to take it. Only, there does not seem to be a timeline on when it would come to me. Also, like diapers and bottles and blah-blah, there is a disparity on the use of the pump as well (in my circle of IRL friends and family). ...

TgLady: What are you doing? Me: Feeding the baby TgLady: Are you sure that she is taking milk? Me: Yeah, I think so. She seems to be sucking pretty well. TgLady: You should (manually) express your milk in a bowl and feed it to her by spoon. Me: Umm..what? Who will hold the baby while I express a bowlful of milk? Topic Changed by TgLady immediately!!!! Now that TTC is over, there is a new range of hoohaa cats to deal with, it seems.

It still takes only one day & night from Figlia to make me start questioning the sleep progress. Currently, she dozes off in the night around 10:30 and wakes up an hour after midnight. Post-that, there is a milk booth open in the room every hour. It's not open because she isn't getting satiated in one go. We have a pee-poo fest also up....her eyes are wide open, and any delay takes us to Mount Cranky. And there are brief spells of light sleeping in between. My mum tends to take over at 6:30 (because I beg her everyday) and she takes Figlia downstairs so that I can manage 1-2 hours of sleep after that. However, that happens only when the tummy is full. Yesterday morning, I just could not manage to convey to Figlia that she had had her fill of supermilk. The baby did not go down with her grandma. She did not sleep. My precious sleep did not happen. We had an outing planned, and so when I saw the time roll from 6 to 7 to 8 in the morning, and I realized that I had no chance...

And the baby does too! My Friday night sleep-miracle got spoiled last night....The baby woke up, had a good feed, continued to feed till I wondered if the baby's appetite had rocketed north, and then the baby spew out all the milk she took...and started to cry. And when nothing seemed to help at all, she left a trail of yikes-smelling gas...and she got better from there. Since then, she has been cranky...and has just managed episode-next of the milk spewing about ten minutes ago. I rubbed her back good enough, and the next feed has gone well, but she is still passing gas. Since whatever nutrition she has is 100 percent momma-sourced, it is yours truly who has upset the baby's system. I am not having peas again for a while. Nuff said. And, I always found it mildly lewd when people cribbed about fluctuating numbers on FB....I had a case of see-saw FB digits a while ago, but I realized it was technical rather than people disappearing.... But it seems post-Figlia, there is a s...

Friday night was such a miracle that I might want to get used to it being a daily miracle. Figlia allowed me to sleep a good six hours - there was intermittent feeding and all, but still, she allowed me to soak up some rest. And I woke up refreshed, not-rushed or not-irritated. Strangely, my reflexes made me get up not only when I heard her stirring for a feed, but I would suddenly open my eyes, and find that either she was sleeping herself or her eyes were open, but she neither wanted to be held nor she wanted to be fed. That did not prevent me from waking up now and then.....but it was wonderful. Like I said, this was the first time, and if this be an anomaly, I wish, it becomes a daily anomaly. :-) A thing that I have started to do as a norm is to lay her vertical on my chest, after she has had a good feed (and possibly burped), and she often sleeps well like that...and sometimes when you put her down on her bed after it, she won't wake up at all! Sweet! But remember the opera...

A story I sometimes share with my class is of a father and son who decided to go to a neighbouring village to sell their donkey. They wanted a good price for the donkey, so they decided that rather than have the donkey walk down the distance, they would tie its legs onto a strong wooden pole, and carry it on their shoulders, so that the donkey won't appear tired. Early morning, they set on their journey. As they passed, a group of people made a fuss of how stupid the father-son were because they were walking when they could comfortably travel on the donkey's back. Seeing some sense in that, the father and son untied the donkey and the son mounted the animal while the father walked along. Farther away, another group of people rolled eyes at how manner-less the son was, since his old father was walking while the able-bodied son rode comfortably on donkey-back. The son immediately climbed down, and the father mounted the animal. They travelled further, and again people hushed at...