Seven Weeks

Dean turned seven weeks old on Monday -- it is hard to believe it has been seven weeks since that long night of contractions and that blink-and-you-missed-it c-section. He has changed and developed so much over the past couple of weeks -- the smiles are more frequent but no less amazing, the Zantac finally seems to be helping, and his chubby little cheeks attract kisses like fat pink magnets. I wish I could report that I have started catching up on sleep, but we still have a way to go on that front. There has definitely been improvement -- we've stopped automatically changing his diaper before every feeding during the night, which means he can stay swaddled during the nursing and usually goes back to sleep pretty easily. The spitting up remains a problem, especially at night, when I either have to sit with him upright for fifteen or twenty minutes after nursing, or gamble on a major spit up after I lay him down. The frustrating thing is, he often seems to have a spit-up episode even if I have gotten a good burp out of him and kept him upright the recommended amount of time, so I am starting to experiment with the gamble. I've gone back to the Babywise basics, and he is now sleeping for longer stretches. It's amazing how much you forget in just a few years -- I was doing the eat-wake-nap thing and sticking to good intervals between feedings, but had completely forgotten the most fundamental concept, which is to establish circadian rhythms by starting each day with a feeding at the same time. Now that we've started doing that consistently, he's stopped feeding every two hours at night and has gone to 3 and sometimes four hour stretches. I am starting to feel we're back to two steps forward, one step back, instead of the other way around.

I am feeling even more motivated to get him sleeping through the night after the horrible night we had Saturday. After a long but basically good day keeping up with both Henry and Dean while Matthew had a wedding (it rained all day so Henry and I played Simon Says, read books, and built a fort in the dining room out of sheets and pillows and chairs), I had a massive migraine. Advil did nothing, so an hour later I tried the Imitrex my neuologist recently prescribed. By the time Matthew came to bed at 12:30 am, the pain had woken me up and was so bad I was nauseous. So I took a Vicodin -- anhour later the pain had gone from a 10 to a 9, so I took another. I was worried about nursing the baby with all those drugs in my system, so I had to pump-and-dump twice while Matthew gave Dean his first bottle (with stored breastmilk) since he was four days old. It was an all nighter for me and Matthew. At seven a.m., I called my mom and like an angel she appeared at our door and helped with the boys throughout the day so we could nap here and there.

I'm convinced that weeks of interrupted sleep is the culprit (tho my breastfeeding-guru OB did inform me today that I don't need to pump just b/c I take a Vicodin, and the pediatrician agreed, so that's one less thing). I know from experience with Henry the difference a regular schedule of feedings and routine can make in terms of sleeping through the night, so I am continuing to push with the schedule even though it has made things a little complicated with my sister Rachael in town. Luckily, she understands and has been really helpful, even coming over early this morning to take over watching Dean and Henry after the 7 a.m. feeding. Then she and Philip and Jane took Henry to the Insectarium. Matthew's little sister, Maddie, also came over today to meet Dean for the first time (she's been at college in NYC), so it was a busy day for our little social butterfly.

I am trying to maintain my perspective, though it erodes a little more with each delirious night. My early feelings of indecision and self-doubt have largely gone away as I've gotten more familiar with Dean's habits and patterns, likes and dislikes. It helps that I have the confidence gained from dealing with Henry's reflux and sleeplessness. I do still get frustrated, of course, but I know that Dean is healthy and getting happier each day, and I remember how so much of the early behaviors resolved themselves by the time he was three months and that "fourth trimester" was finally behind us. Right now I am just trying to keep my eyes -- my bleary, bloodshot, aching eyes -- on the prize.