Weekly thread, July 18-25 - Page 7

[Knitting Mama]

Inhouse Pharmacy. This is the site the BFAR mamas use on bfar.org and shipping is included in the price they quote. I'm waiting on my own shipment to get here!

Rough night last night. Cecilia woke up around 2 with super bad gas that was making her miserable. Got her back down at 4, but I didn't go back to sleep 'til 5:30, and then we were up at 7 nursing again...

[sew_crafty_girl]

I'm considering a haircut. Not sure the salon would take me though. We'll see.

[OneWithTwo]

I 2nd inhouse pharmacy..the cool thing is they give you a customer # so when you order from them again, they give you a discount. I've been using that website since 2006.

[Carita]

what do you take for dosage?

[OneWithTwo]

I take 6 a day, always have. I try to lower my dose and my body doesn't like it and won't adjust...the LC said ideally it should be 3 a day, but my body doesn't like that....

[OneWithTwo]

my friend started with 10 because her supply plummeted so low and cut down to 5 a day

[Pepper44]

LNF I wish I could mail my lecherous duck to that NICU staff in a big box.

Seriously though,

Jess, those kinds of stories make me so so sad. I saw one news story after that earthquake in China a year or two ago where the mom was found dead in the rubble, hunched over her baby. The baby was alive and still nursing. The mom had typed an I love you message to the baby on her phone for her to always remember, then died. I cried for DAYS.

AFM, I am getting DD1's cold and I am not thrilled. I have a family photo shoot in the morning and I hope I don't feel too miserable. This will be the first one since Ada has been born and I haven't decided what I'm going to do. Either I'll leave her home with DH for a few hours or I'll wear her in the mei tai and take DH along. That way if she wakes up DH can carry her around (we're going to be outside on the grounds of a historical house) or she might nurse and sleep on my chest the entire time since I scheduled right when she usually naps.

I really don't want to do bottles if I don't have to, and DH isn't very capable of baby care to be honest. He's much better with my 4 year old DD...

Oh and this is starting to concern me a bit...Ada hasn't pooped in 4 days now! Before this she hadn't even gone 24 hours without pooping. (I always have to bring up poop on these threads. ) She doesn't seem uncomfortable or anything, so I don't know what's up. She's still nursing plenty and peeing normally.

[Knitting Mama]

I've heard it's totally normal to not poop for over a week as an EBF baby. Cecilia poops more now than when she was tiny, interestingly enough, because she likes to sit up so much and it helps push things along.

DPD doses: The amount recommended to BFAR mamas like me is higher than for women with low supplies who hadn't had surgery, but I believe 160 mg a day is the maximum. I would definitely not recommend a non-BFAR mama take that much, though.

[loveneverfails]

I'm feeling better today. I struggle mostly when I let myself slip into thinking this wasn't traumatic, and when I don't remind myself that I did a really good job.

I mean, not for anything, but to top it all off I got serious hemorroids from sitting on the hard chairs in NICU. As in golf ball sized, maybe a little larger. And was wildly sleep deprived. And I still held it together and stayed there the entire time Mercy needed me to be there.

I mean, if that isn't "good enough" for me, what the heck would be? Would I be happy with myself if I did all of that *and* had a migraine, and orchestrated a peace treaty in the Middle East and decorated a cake? I did what I was responsible for to the absolute best of my ability under horrifying circumstances, with people who deserve a lecherous duck making their lives miserable. No taking responsibility and ownership for things completely outside of my control. Everything in the sphere that I had control over, I did very well.

[jenfl]

Originally Posted by loveneverfails

I mean, not for anything, but to top it all off I got serious hemorroids from sitting on the hard chairs in NICU. As in golf ball sized, maybe a little larger. And was wildly sleep deprived. And I still held it together and stayed there the entire time Mercy needed me to be there.

Yes. This. You did exactly what your baby needed. You were tremendously strong when your body was at its weakest.

(And I understand the hard-chair problem. I STILL haven't healed right because my stitches took a beating from sitting in those *&#^ chairs for days. I spent 12 hours in a plain, cheap office chair 12 hours after I gave birth!)

[loveneverfails]

I called the hospital we stayed at, and left a message for their director of day to day operations. It's Friday afternoon, so I won't hear back until Monday at least. More time to chill out.

I am asking for:

1. An apology from the neonatologist who yelled at me, because that was wildly unprofessional.

2. A plan set in place to better support NICU parents, so that anyone with a term, medically stable infant requrining minimal medical care has a much better experience than what I had.

3. Moving circumisions away from the room right next to the place where people can stay.

Jen, I'm so sorry you had those stitches problems!! It makes me so angry that NICUs are configured in such a way that very clearly communicates that the family unit is irrelevant to the wellbeing of the patient. Would it kill them to have chairs that were comfortable!?

[triony]

LNF - Good job, I hope they are responsive. I get so frustrated with the medical world these days. It makes me over-react now when I don't need to.

AFM - I was just about to make a desperate post in LWaB about sleep. T slept for a total of 45 min or so today. After a ridiculous night last night where he woke up every 30-40 minutes and had to be rocked back to sleep.
Tonight he fell asleep on my lap at 7pm, deep asleep. We moved him to DH's lap and he didn't stir. After a movie and dinner we moved him to our bed. (Though DH did jiggle him back into a deep sleep a couple of times) Still didn't stir.
It's now 9:35. What are the chances that he's going to stay asleep for the night now?

[jenfl]

Go you, lnf! I'm really interested to hear how that goes.

I've thought along similar lines. And we even got a survey a few weeks after we left, which was so tempting to write a novel to accompany. But my husband works in the same hospital system, so we decided we couldn't take the chance of stepping up.

That's hard for me to admit.... that I could maybe fight and make things better for the next family, but have chosen not to. I just can't put my husband's job at risk.

[loveneverfails]

Jen, I don't think that there's really anything you can do there that would be productive, because it seems like that is just their culture. A horrible, restrictive, intrusive culture. But that's what is "normal" to them.

I've got more room to maneuver because the issues were *so* out of anything remotely OK by any standard. Doctors are NOT supposed to yell at the newborn's mother for asking for a consult. That's not ok, and if I don't get an apology, I will be reporting to a professional board. But I've got an undisputed inch here, and will see if I can take a mile. Or at least a foot.

In really interesting news, I looked up the record for that doctor, and he had a settlement against him last July. I know that there was another home birth family who sued that particular hospital last year after they had CPS called on them. So, probably if I had pushed much harder, I could have wound up with a much bigger mess on my hands. But this dude clearly hasn't learned either. So, interesting.

[laughingfox]

Originally Posted by jenfl

That's hard for me to admit.... that I could maybe fight and make things better for the next family, but have chosen not to. I just can't put my husband's job at risk.

I know it's not entirely related, but that's where I stood when I got laid off for being pregnant. DH and I were working for companies owned by the same people, and if I raised a stink about it, I would have been endangering the only real income source my family has left. :/

[jenfl]

Here starts the postpartum hair loss..... Handfuls and handfuls!!

[jsh7809]

Originally Posted by jenfl

Here starts the postpartum hair loss..... Handfuls and handfuls!!

me, too, for weeks now! How long does it last? It's nuts over here! Such a shame it happens right as baby is learning to grab hair... ouch!

So... after some really bumpy up and down days this week, I'm feeling concerned that the SAMe is not what was working, that it was the Zoloft after all. There are some really dark places and messages floating around my head, and I'm trying to keep some distance and just realize it's the depression and I'm not actually a total f*cked up loser... but keeping perspective is hard. So, after a lot of searching and despairing, I think I am going to try going on Prozac. It's not one of the "breastfeeding recommended" drugs, as it does get in the milk more than Zoloft or Paxil, but I have had good results on it before, with few side effects. Paxil just makes me sleep all of the time, Zoloft makes me break out into a rash. And I feel like I'm wasting time and energy messing around with other drugs that c\ould take weeks to work, not work, give me side effects, or whatever.

My psychiatrist doesn't want to prescribe it if I'm going to continue breastfeeding, although she will as it's my decision. I asked my primary care provider and he said, "Prozac/ fluoxetine is not the antidepressant of choice during pregnancy, and post-partum there is a lack of evidence regarding it's effect in developing children of breastfeeding mothers. However, it's a relatively safe medication compared to most, and we do prescribe it to children as low as 7 years old without significant adverse effects. If you requested a prescription from me, I would probably caution you that you would be taking a very small but somewhat unknow risk but that I would agree with that option if you understood that choice. I have to agree with you on the paroxetine (paxil). It's well known for those side effects. "

This is a choice that is making me feel a lot of guilt and worry, and I"m not 100% decided. But I don't want to stop breastfeeding, and I can't go through that low of a depression again, I just can't. I feel selfish and despairing that my daughter has already been exposed to way more than I would have wanted her to be - but, then again, how healthy is it for me to be sobbing and breastfeeding her? Sigh.

I'm going to talk to my therapist about it all on Tuesday. Just checking in here and hoping for support. Thanks to all for letting me work it out here (yet again)... trying to keep hopeful.

[rhiOrion]

Jess- I'd say that probably a short-term dose of the anti-depressants is especially not going to hurt her. So I say you get on them, and once your head is clear THEN decide about breastfeeding. If she's having side effects, maybe formula would be a better choice. If she's not having side effects, then maybe you keep going. But I wouldn't make any decisions until you have gotten your head clear. Either way, formula or no formula, you need something to make you feel better.

[sew_crafty_girl]

Naps are challenging. Just gave the borrowed basinette back to my friend for her sister's baby and that's where Anna would take her naps. So far today she's only napped about 20 minutes in the mei tai at 10am and she needs to sleep again but it fighting it. The success we had on day 1 of the NCSS was a fluke.

Nursing is no longer the cure all. She's so alert and interested in what's going on that I often need to take her to our room to lay down and nurse if I think she needs to chill out and relax a bit.

I really wish she loved the Mei Tai as much as I do (for short periods). No, she wants to be forward facing and the only thing I have for that is the moby.

Rolling back to front is her new favorite thing. Loves floor time but not too interested in the exersaucer yet.

Since Anna is in the higher percentiles for height/weight/head I think it's unwise to try and buy anything a season ahead which sucks with all the summer clearance on right now! I got a few hats for her that I bought for fall and next summer but I'm pretty sure her big ole 95% head isn't going to fit them.

In a few weeks we're going camping locally. I'm not going to stay overnight in the campsite though. I don't want to buy a portable bed for anna and don't think it's safe to have her on the air mattress with us.

[jenfl]

Jess -- I think either taking the risk with breastfeeding or going to formula is worth it to find a medication that works for you. In your position, I'd be considering a move to formula, too, but that's a really personal choice. I don't think it's a terrible trade-off, though.

Sprout's been having a really, really fussy few days. I think there's a bunch going on -- he caught the cold DD and I had and that hasn't quite cleared up; there's some suspicious bumps developing on his lower gums; he's just about to roll over; and he seems to be hitting a growth spurt. *whew*! Poor guy. We're just trying to figure out anything to make him happy for even a few minutes and hoping he gets through all this soon.