Bodmacity

Jake is one month old today. In some respects it seems to have flown by and in others it seems much longer. It is known as a paradox. Amy had another bad night as Jake just refused to settle himself for bed. This morning when I woke she was in no mood to speak so I skulked around quietly getting my things together.

In the night there was a little projectile poo action which resulted in us running out of clean dry nappies. One really needs to keep on top of the whole nappy cleaning thing. I put a load in this morning. Maybe that is the best solution. To put in whatever is in the bucket before I go to work. The nappies are not getting cleaned properly with the Surcare detergent. We have tried soaking them with lemon juice in the bucket and applying stain removing spray locally before the wash but to no avail. I have found that using a stronger detergent such as Fairy does the job but I am not sure if it is okay for baby’s soft skin.

I am still getting into work an hour early so I can leave earlier. The trains are still quite busy and at Clapham Junction it is a struggle to get a seat because at that hour the train has only four carriages. Cheers for that South West Trains.

Yesterday after 10 days of no poo, Jake decided to let rip. What a relief it was for both parents and for the bairn! Within seconds his little face looked relaxed and contented. It was so good to see it after all the days of red faced straining and pained expressions :-(.

Jake ironically had quite a restless night last night or at least he seemed to have. Amy took over 100% doing the feeding and nappy changes in preparation of my return to work tomorrow. This morning it was no surprise that she looked absolutely shattered. So that she could get some sleep for at least a couple of hours(what bliss) I took Jake on a shopping trip to Tescos in Lewisham. I decided to take the sling which actually worked very well. I was worried that I wouldn’t be able to pick things up and put them in the trolley but it was fine. The little angel slept the whole time and had admiring glances from the lady at the checkout.

When I got home Jake was due a feed so Amy duly complied. Afterwards a nappy change was the order of the day. By this time Jake was a little fractious. He weed on his new nappy and then weed across the floor of his room. Now he was really starting to cry. We checked his rash and applied some Sudocrem and my home-made lotion(for recipe see end of entry).

After dressing the little man he calmed down and has been sleeping soundly ever since. He is now languishing in the moses basket in the lounge.

Nappy lotion(lasts 2-3 days)

• 1 freshly brewed and cooled pot of camomile tea
• 1 tablespoon of Olive oil
• 1 teaspoon of honey
• 2-3 drops of Lavender oil

Our postcards arrived today from Photobox. I expected them to be just prints made with special paper with the space for a stamp and address on the back. They are actually properly printed just like pictures in a magazine or paper. I’m sure that there is a technical name for this type of printing but I don’t know what it is. Anyway I am very impressed! I normally use winkflash because they are incredibly cheap but in recent months I have not been impressed with the quality of service for uploading images. I cannot fault photobox though. The Java upload application is very well written and performed perfectly.

Our health visitor came by today and said that little Jake was suffering from constipation. This accounts for his restlessness and bouts of crying. I was beginning to get a little anxious because he has not pooed for several days. We made an appointment with the doctor in Hilly Fields and she diagnosed the same condition. Because he is so young she hasn’t prescribed any medicine. Just 2 fluid ounces with his feed to get things moving.

He has just had his water and is having a sleep. I never thought I’d say it but I am wishing for the pooiest nappy ever when he is next changed! The poor little mite. We have some visitors coming in half an hour or so so I am just going to pop down to Costcutter to get some juice and cakes.

I thought we had turned a corner. On Friday Jake was sleeping around 4 hours in the night. This meant that we had just two feeds to give him. However, on Sunday night he started to feed every 2 hours again. This is probably a growth spurt but it coincided with an increase in crying and restlessness. We have tried everything to calm him down. Changing his nappy, giving him a feed, giving him a cuddle. Usually the dummy will work for a short while before he creases his body and starts crying again.

The crying usually subsides when he is picked up. He seems to prefer the upright position as opposed to lying horizontal. I have read that this is something all babies go through but it is very frustrating and upsetting for us to see him in this distressed state :-(. We thought that maybe he has colic but have read that this generally appears after the first month. Other than the restlessness he is healthy and passing lot’s of urine.

Yesterday I lay him on my chest on the Slider Glider and he fell into a contented sleep. I didn’t want to move in case he woke. I think he stayed that way for over two hours. Later on we may take Jake for a walk. I think it’s important to not let him sleep the day away and give him some stimulation. As I write this he is moaning in his moses basket although I think these are pre-sleep grunts. He is such an angel!

Jake is now two weeks old today. It has been and still is incredibly exhausting, especially for Amy. Jake seems to breast feed for hours, but is still hungry an hour later. We have realised that he tends to feed for a short while then falls asleep on the boob. When asleep he continues to comfort suck. So now we have to make sure he is feeding by tickling his toes or stroking his wattle. It is quite stressful for both of us as we don’t want him to go hungry.

Amy is suffering from sore nipples. The Lansinoh cream helps to a certain extent in softening them but they are still painful. Today I bought a savoy cabbage. Placing a cool leaf on each breast is supposed to work wonders! Jake struggles to sleep at night even though he feeds like a beast! To calm him and ensure at least 3-4 hours sleep to keep our sanity intact we have complemented the breast feeding with a bottle of formula at night. Our midwife said that this is absolutely fine as long as baby is getting breast milk, which he does during the day. This gives baby Jake a good sleep and allows Amy and myself to rest a little more. A calm relaxed mother will give more milk and baby will pick up on this too and be calm himself :-).
Today was our first experience of projectile poo. We usually place a towel on his changing station but today it was in the wash. Jake was placed instead on the pristine towelling changing mat from Mamas and Papas. He decided to choose this moment to wee then poo and then poo three more times. As soon as we wiped away one lot another little snake of watery poo came out! We managed to stem the flood enough to put his nappy and cover on! What a beast!

It was a landmark day because we ventured out to Blackheath for a spot of lunch. Amy was worried that Jake would scream and be fractious but he couldn’t have been better. In fact we smugly sat there eating our pasta while all around other bairns were screaming away. We strolled round the village with Jake sleeping soundly in his pram. What an angel! Later I did a spot of shopping at Sainsburg’s in New Cross while Amy fed him in the car. He has been sleeping since we got back over two hours ago so I’m expecting some stirrings soon.

Baby Jake is now 1 week and 1 day old. He was born on 16th March 2006 at 8.58am precisely. He really is a joy to behold and we are really thankful that after a long labour and subsequent complications he is a beautiful healthy bairn.

The learning curve over the past week has been very steep and short. I have lost half a stone in weight because sometimes there just didn’t seem to be enough time to eat! There is also the sleep deprivation which actually I am coping with better than I thought. We are woken two to three times in the night for a feed, each feed taking up to an hour assuming he gets back to sleep without any problematic wind or discomfort.

We have been using reusable nappies which although save money and are green take a little bit longer to put on as you need to carefully position the liner to avoid leakage. Sometimes leakage is inevitable though :-). Jake was a little small when born; 7 pounds and 1 ounce and these nappies although ‘one size’ are a little big, making Jake look a little like an Emperor Penguin. Of course he will grow into these very soon.

Amy is persevering with breast feeding and it looks extremely painful. Every time Jake latches on I see Ames face and a ‘silent scream’ there. Once he has latched on both Jake and mother seem quite content. I have bought various creams and tried home-made remedies to help the soreness which all help to a certain degree :

• Cold camomile tea bags
• Lansinoh cream
• Vitamin E cream with calendula
• Olive oil and honey

So after a week I believe we are beginning to get there and a kind of routine is being established. Now we are more tuned into Jakes needs and can read his body language and cries a little better so that we kind of know what he wants. Although sometimes he will cry and no matter what we do nothing helps :-(. Thankfully this has only happened once! (a dummy is a life-saver for these situations).

As I write this it is 7.22am and Jake is feeding. I have got up after a wonderful 5 hours sleep and am psyching myself up for changing Jakes nappy after his feed. I heard some ominous sounds coming from his bottom earlier so it might be a pooey one!

I have been trying to do this successfully for a while but my endeavours have never looked quite right. Leafing through the March 2006 issue of Photography Monthly I found out that there is a filter in Photoshop that will do the job for you.

What is ‘the job’ you may ask? This is where you want to ‘cut out’ a portion of an image, say a person, so that the background is removed. Performing this task using the selection tool can be a little tricky and time-consuming especially when selecting hair, for example. The way to do it properly is as follows:

1. Select Filters->Extract… from the menu bar

2. Select the brush tool and optionally the brush size

3. When the whole outline is painted with the green highlighter, select the fill tool

4. Select the Preview button

5. Once you are happy with the result click the OK button.

Only six more days to the ‘official’ launch of the Swiss Family Bodlington. Both of us are extremely anxious now. Every time Ames gets a twinge or slight discomfort I am thinking ‘here we go’.

The chances are that he will be born after the 6th. I have formed this opinion through a quick survey at work from all the recent dads(of which there have been 5) and they have all been late. Ames is rather large as is expected and ‘he’ is struggling to find room to move. Yesterday his bony elbow was pushing out for a stretch which lasted at least a minute before relaxing again. What a beast!

I have this nagging feeling that I have forgotten to do some critical chore or bought some vital piece of equipment but maybe this is just my nervousness at the impending birth. It is hard to believe that in a week WE WILL HAVE A BABY IN OUR FLAT! A new life to nurture and love. It’s amazing really, and almost unreal in some way.

Further to my entry last year Amy has come down with a particularly vicious cold. I feel bad for her as not only is she struggling to sleep with all the pains and twinges due to the pregnanct but she also has a blocked nose and sore throat 🙁 This is made event worse by the fact that she is not taking any drugs to alleviate the symptoms(apart from a few paracetamol tablets). She has had it almost a week now so I hope it will soon be over.

The midwife gave us the all-clear yesterday. The bairns head is 3/5ths down and doing well. This is a very anxious time and every day I half expect a call from Ames to ask me to come home. I can see why people say that the last few weeks really drag by. It’s a little like when you watch the kettle boil it always seems to take longer.