Monday, September 27, 2010

Handling Curveballs

Our boy is getting big - literally.  He had a visit with the midwife Thursday, and he had gained 13 ounces in 10 days.  Obviously, breastfeeding is going very well!  He's now up to 8 lbs, 9 oz.  Besides eating, this week has consisted mostly of little Z's parents trying to figure things out - how to get him to sleep at night, what his various little cries mean, how to give him a bath without freaking him out.  Slowly but surely, we're getting a handle on all these things, although he occasionally throws us a curveball.
Trying to avoid moments like these...

We have great sleeping nights, followed by constant-waking nights.  A classmate from our prenatal class wrote the other day, "I never knew we could survive on naps alone."  We're lucky that we do get occasional really good nights where he'll only wake up two or three times for a quick feed then go right back to sleep.  Other nights, we're not so lucky.  Shif and I have made a pretty good team, trading off wake-ups.  She feeds, and I rock/shhhush/jiggle/sing/walk him to sleep when food isn't the issue. Somehow, though, I think she usually gets stuck with the diaper changes.  We think he may have some issues with acid reflux so we're keeping upright as much as we can after he feeds and we've raised one side of his cradle.  We've also found a swaddle technique that Boy Houdini seems unable to escape from.  And we're also learning which of his many little sounds are worth getting up for and which aren't. In the meantime, we're dealing pretty well.  Shif is one of those people who can fall asleep anytime, anywhere; and my years of chronic insomnia are coming in handy - I already know how to deal with sleep deprivation!

This week was full of excursions.  Most days we got out for a walk, and we've had several errands to do, too.  So far, Zain responds to his stroller, sling, and carrier all the same way - deep sleep.
Sleeping in the sling (thanks, Aunt Lorna!)

Sleeping in the carrier (thanks, Celia!)
Saturday, we went for our longest car ride yet - half an hour or so to visit Shif's family.  This was a big test for us, because so far he hasn't been the greatest fan of his car seat.  But the trip went smoothly.  
At the beach with Mommy and Naani
Baby's first pho
All these excursions are also giving us lots of practice in logistics:  Do we feed before we leave or do we have time to make it before he wakes up and demands milk?  What order do we get boy, car seat, and stroller down the stairs to the sidewalk?  How many contingency outfits do we need to carry in the diaper bag?  Our recent-parent friends Daniel and Miriam told us that we'll start immediately scoping out bathrooms every new place we go for their diaper-change-friendliness.  This is so true.  I successfully completed my first restaurant bathroom change yesterday.
Sunday brunch with Mommy and Adrianne - at the Bloordale Pantry, which has fantastically wide bathroom counters!
Random scenes from a tiny boy's life:
Napping with Mommy
And Mommy


Do we have any pictures of him awake?
We love these feet.
A first.... pants!!!
Hanging with Uncle Paul
Diapers in the sunshine

'Guess what I'm doing???'

Monday, September 20, 2010

The Tiny Human

In Zain's second week on earth, he has been busy changing from an external fetus to a tiny human.  He's more alert and is  looking around more.  I'm not sure how much he can actually see, but he loves to stare at objects with contrasting colours.  We put him in his crib sometimes after a diaper change (right now, he sleeps in a cradle in our bedroom) and he stares at the white slats contrasted against the dark blue walls.  Other favourite visions are the yellow giraffe on the blue nursery wall and the bathroom door jamb (??).

Swinging for the first time
He's gaining more control of his body.  From about Day 2, he's had some neck/head control, but he's getting even stronger at that.  And his crazy arms, while still wildly out of control to his displeasure at times, are slightly less spastic, and he's managed to get his hands in his mouth a few times.  His arms are also much more relaxed when he sleeps now, which results in some very cute poses.

Zain is still feeding like a champ.  Shif spends probably half of her waking hours (and some of her sleeping ones!) feeding the kid (which is probably why I'm the one blogging).  At this rate, he's going to weigh 20 pounds by next week!  His previously tiny round little face is now underlined by a double chin, and we think he's working on a triple.  And he's already grown out of his newborn diaper covers. Unfortunately, he's also not quite big enough for the regular size, either; so his diapers sometimes look comically large on him.

Gapping!
He continues to be a pretty laid-back little dude.  He still sleeps pretty well compared to a lot of newborns [knocking on many pieces of wood right now...].  He did have several pretty fussy days this week, so we're still working on figuring out what works best to calm him down.  My sister had given us her copy of The Happiest Baby on the Block a few months ago and we'd heard several other people had recommended it to us, so we had both read it.  It has been incredibly helpful!  Things that seem so counterintuitive are actually so helpful in calming him down or getting him to sleep.  The theory is that for the first couple of months (the "fourth trimester"), a newborn is essentially still a fetus, so to calm him you recreate the conditions he experienced in the womb - including loud noise, constant motion, and being tightly packaged!

The burrito in his crib
There are still those moments, though, when we have no idea how to make him happy.  He has this sad little "I can't do this anymore" cry where he sort of bleats like a tiny goat. It is generally our goal to not hear that cry.  But there seem to be no patterns sometimes.  What worked last time might not work this time.  It's all about finding what's magic in the minute, I guess. 

In general, though, life is great.  We are totally in love with the little guy.  I've never felt any better feeling than when he falls asleep on my chest.  I love being a mommy and I was happy to find that I'm better at this than I thought I'd be.  :-)

Stopping for a snack along the Humber River trails

Thursday, September 16, 2010

Welcome to the World, Zain!

He's here!  The little guy finally arrived at 9:34 pm on Labour Day.  Yes, we laboured all through Labour Day.  Zain weighed in at 7 lbs, 12 oz and a length of 52 cm (20.5 in).

We had originally considered getting out of town for a bit on the holiday weekend, maybe camping for a night or so - enjoying what would probably our last child-free weekend.  Saturday evening, though, Shifi had some contractions that seemed a little too "real" so we decided maybe staying in town would be a good idea.

We did head out to Albion Hills on Sunday for a beautiful 5K hike in the woods.  That marked our third weekend hike in a row (Shif is one tough pregnant chick), and all that hill-climbing must have done the trick.  At about 7 pm, the contractions started again, and this time they didn't go away. Appropriately enough, Stu (Zain's donor) and Paul were over for dinner.  Every five minutes or so, Stu, Paul, and I would continue our conversation while Shif zoned out in the middle of a contraction.  :-)  It was only slightly weird.

Contractions continued all night and by 4:30 am, our midwife declared her officially in active labour and decided to stay with us to monitor things.  One of the advantages of having a midwife is that you can do most of your labouring at home.  Shif was able to be a bit more relaxed, and she spent several hours in the bathtub. She was really amazing through the entire labour process.  She was very calm and focused and handled it amazingly well. 

By morning, though, things still weren't really progressing much and she was only 5 cm dilated, so we headed to the hospital to have her membranes ruptured.  We spent the rest of the day at St Joe's hospital trying to get the little guy out.  Breaking the water still didn't cause any major changes as far as dilation, but what was more concerning was that after they broke the water, Zain's heart rate start dropping every time Shif had a contraction.  They finally "augmented" with pitocin to try to get things moving, but after a couple hours of that, the cervix still wasn't dilating more and the baby's head was still too high.  So, we finally made the decision that, because of the still-dropping heart rate, the safest thing to do was to go to a c-section.  

Shif was whisked to the operating room and the c-section was underway within half an hour.  I got to be in the room with Shif.  Shif suffered from the fact that she has done many deliveries and has assisted in c-sections; she kind of knows too much for her own comfort.  She later said that listening to the surgeons ask for various instruments made her visualize what was going on inside her belly behind the drape and made her feel quite nauseous about the whole thing.

The surgery went fine, but Zain made one final statement about his reluctance to leave his cushy home of 41 weeks - he wasn't breathing when he came out.  Thus followed the longest and worst 60 seconds of both our lives.  We watched as the pediatrician and nurse tried to resuscitate a completely limp, gray baby.  Shif couldn't see much, but she could hear what they were saying and knew exactly what was going on.  I've seen enough episodes of ER to know that what they were doing indicated things were not going well.  But, after that long and terrible minute, he breathed!  He turned pink and he cried!  Within another minute, he was bundled up and in my arms - perfectly healthy, amazingly tiny, and just beautiful.  

In the recovery room
We spent the next two days at the hospital with Shif recovering from the surgery, and mom and kid figuring out breastfeeding.  We were a little worried because for the first 36 hours, he had no interest in feeding.  They surmise that he had a strong gag reflex because of the instruments put down his throat during the resuscitation.  But in the middle of day 2, it somehow all suddenly clicked and he turned into a champion breastfeeder!  He is also a champ at burping, by the way - quick and easy, sometimes while he's still on his way up to the shoulder!  

The first few days after Zain's arrival were spent in intermittent sleep and visiting.  (I've posted some pictures from his first couple days on our flickr account - if you don't have the address, ask us.)  Lots of family stopped by the hospital - including my mom, who drove 9 hours from Ohio and surprised us in the middle of the night!  The last few days have been spent settling in at home.  Zain seems to like his new place.  We've started to figure out what we need where, which diapers work best, and what his various little cries and whimpers mean.  We also successfully reprogrammed our little robot to sleep longer at night rather than during the day.  That was a happy day.  We're actually pretty lucky that he's generally pretty laid-back.  We can do most anything to him and he doesn't complain.  :-)  He's started becoming a little more fussy in the last two days, so we're trying to decode the clues and figure out what's going on.


Zain and Binda, our dog, have met and are co-existing nicely.  In general, Binda doesn't really pay much attention to him.  She'll occasionally do a drive-by sniffing and she did sneak in a lick or two the first day. She does sometimes get upset when he's crying a lot - we think it's her Lassie reflex.  But it seems there are no jealousy issues, which is something we were worried about. 


We've also made our first few excursions out of the house.  We've done a couple spins around the neighbourhood, and yesterday we hit the trails at High Park for a nice fall walk.  Zain apparently loves his carrier, because he's usually out cold as soon as we put him in it. So he seems to have enjoyed all these walks merely as a sleeping opportunity.  But we'll continue our process of converting him into an outdoorsy kid! 

At High Park
And, in other firsts, Zain got his first piece of mail!  :-)

Friday, September 3, 2010

Dear Baby

Dear baby,

So. You're a little late. We're ready for you, you know. You have clothes. Your room has been ready for weeks. We've read all the books. Frankly, we're getting a little bored. And the longer you wait, the more time I have to develop more anxieties about raising a new human being. Please consider coming soon, so all I have to worry about is diapers and crying. Thanks.

Love, 

Mommy