Journey to and Through Motherhood: Lily's Twelfth Week (5/18/09

I got to have a bonus day home with Lily because Kirsten called early Monday morning to say that her son, Nate, came down with croup Sunday night. The poor guy was up all night coughing and wheezing. I didn't want Lily exposed to him because croup is contagious as long as he had a fever, so I kept her home with me. Paul has a lot more time off saved up than I do but I wanted to be the one home with her. Plus her breastmilk for the day was at Kirsten's house so Paul would've had to go there to pick it up. We had a nice day home alone together.

Unfortunately, I believe that due to the fact that I was home three days with Lily who didn't eat a ton during that time, my milk supply was super low on Tuesday. I could hardly pump anything out while I was at work and when I got home with her that evening and she wanted to do her usual binging, I had basically nothing in me to give her. She kept screaming so we had to give her a bottle of formula. I felt horrible and inadequate which meant that both her and I were crying over the incident. I knew she wasn't getting anything from me because she was sucking vigorously but not swallowing. She gulped down 4 ounces of formula so clearly she was really hungry. I spent the rest of the evening all stressed out over the possibility that I was drying up. Over the rest of the week I tried to drink a lot more to keep myself from being dehydrated and pumped more frequently. Gladly, by Friday, my supply was back up to normal. With the three day weekend ahead, I plan to try to pump between feedings to keep my supply up. I think the problem is that when she is with me on the weekend, she eats less milk more frequently because she can. During the week she doesn't eat a lot with Kirsten but eats a ton when we are back together in the evening. I have to have a big supply to keep up with her on those evenings which means that I produce more than she needs during the weekday. This is fine, I just freeze the excess that I pump. But I guess I will have to be careful that her less frequent eatings on the weekends don't cause my supply to decrease.

On Wednesday, we got some annuals and Paul planted them. I took Lily out to watch in her Baby Bjorn. This is the first time she used it facing outward because I think her head control is finally adequate enough to do so. She enjoyed it but then I got my first mosquito bite of the year so we went inside before they attacked her as well. On Thursday, we took Rachel to a basketball class. She isn't sporty and isn't a joiner so we were very proud that she wanted to go. She had a lot of fun. Lily got her first bug bite right between the eyes at Kirsten's house. Kirsten felt bad but it was bound to happen eventually!

The work week seemed to take forever and I was very glad to start the three day weekend. On Saturday, I cleaned the upstairs then we went to the Brighton Farmers' Market. It was Flower Day which they block off Main Street for. It was a beautiful day and there were a ton of people there. We got a few more annuals and a couple new perennials. Then I dragged Paul in to get a haircut and we had lunch at IHOP. When we came home, we tried desperately to catch Lily rolling over on video. We caught it once but missed her going from her back to her side. We have many other recorded attempts where she rolled up onto her side then staying there while we cheered for 10 minutes then gave up. She has been rolling over all week but mostly just at night. It keeps freaking me out that she is sleeping on her stomach so I end up getting up nearly every hour to flip her over. Paul did some yardwork then we had movie night and watched Remember the Titans. It rained early Sunday morning then turned into a beautiful day. Paul mowed the lawn while I finished cleaning the house. I wanted us to get out and do something fun but that never happened. Finally, at 9pm, we went to Dairy Queen and got ice cream as our one fun outing of the day. This is the first dairy I have consumed in a long time since I gave it up in an attempt to cure Lily's digestive issues. We'll see how it goes.

I got a scary phone call from my mom Sunday night that my Grandmother had been in a car accident on Sunday morning on her way to church. She was hit by a van which flipped over her Cadillac and landed upside down next to her. Miraculously, both drivers walked away unharmed. They took my Grandmother by ambulance to the hospital for tests just to make sure she was okay. Being 88 years old, having osteoporosis, and being in a big crash, you would expect some broken ribs but everything checked out fine. We thank God that she is okay!

Here are some pictures from this week.

My adorable baby girl: