Poor Arthur (and 7 months old!)

Urgh. Diaryland has just been total crap for 24 hours. I had to post this entry (that I wrote last night) into my pregnancy journal (still have Gold there) just to get it posted! But now I can update here I am moving the entry. So here it is:

Phew. A moment to write! Sorry I have been a few days. I will fill you in shortly, but first….

Oh my goodness, you guys are so nice to me! I know I do not suck :) And thank you for your supportive words and messages. I am so rubbish at replying to messages – still have several notes left for me that I STILL mean to reply to, I’m so sorry if this is you! Thank you for the advice in my guestbook (and notes) about sleep issues. Eiluned, thanks for taking the time to outline a routine for me, that was so helpful. Heather thanks for telling me about the magazine with the freebie in it. I will try to remember to buy it before it disappears off the shelves! Polly thank you for the wise words and for signing my guestbook after all this time (!!) – congrats on your little boy! And yes, I did watch “Why Don’t You?” when I was young – thanks for the good advice in a useful context, hehe! Heather, thanks for your wise wise words. My, there are so many wiiiiise mothers out there! I’m so glad they think to share their wisdom with me! Thanks Laura for the notes about slings and night diapers – very helpful sites! And thank you Michelle for the kind offer of sending me a Baby Safe Feeder from the US – thankfully Polly just pointed out that I can buy them in the UK at www.thebabycatalogue.com so I will order one there! I know we must email. We are going through toooo much of the same thing to sit here NOT emailing! ;) Also thank you to Julie and Nicola for the lovely lovely emails. You see?! You guys are just the nicest people. I am so blessed to have such friends here online :) I hope I did not miss anybody out! I don’t normally make such specific references to people for their notes or messages, but this time I really wanted to. I was so blessed by you all.

Ohhhhh-kay.

Well I have various things to write about, but it’s late (surprise, surprise) and I’m tired (well well!) so we’ll see how much I get done. If I have to stop this short and post it tonight just so I get this much out there for now, then I will. But I hope I can write about everything first. Wait, I need a glass of water. Then I will be back for the long haul (I hope!)!!!

Waaater. Sooo thirsty tonight!

Well Arthur is seven months old!!! My big boy!! His Uncle Ian (Neil’s older brother) came to see him on Monday evening (he was 7 months on Thursday), and guess what he got for his 7 month birthday?! His first cold :( Poor, poor Boo. On Wednesday I had an osteopath appt in the morning which went well (though I still need a lot more treatment for a while) and I learnt some new exercises which should help my back get stronger in the right places. I had a bad headache all day that day. Arthur was going to have a walk with Daddy while I had my appt but he was so tired that morning and his naps did not work well around my appt time, so he ended up falling into a deeeep sleep in his car seat just as we arrived to meet Neil for the “handover” (!!). So Neil got in the driver’s seat and drove him to the park and looked at the ducks on the lake while Arthur slept for about 45 minutes! Then they came back to meet me, and Arthur woke as I arrived :) So he napped, which was good. In the afternoon, Arthur was a bit cranky and not that well settled for sleep, and he wasn’t happy for long with any activity. It was a nice sunny day with a cool breeze so we went out for a walk round the local small park, which is actually quite nice, though I don’t feel that safe there as it’s not the nicest area. Ugh. Anyway, I was careful to use his sunshade and walk in the shade with him, or if I was in the sun then I walked with the sun behind us.

I did notice around this time that he was sneezing more than usual and coughing a little more than his usual occasional splutters! I started to worry that he was developing hayfever because it seemed to have coincided with our walk. How awful that would be, to have allergies like hayfever at such a young age! But he did not have red or watery eyes, and he wasn’t clawing at his nose or anything so I figured probably not. I couldn’t believe he might be getting sick, because I don’t know… he has never been unwell before. He DID get exposed to the nasty flu that we had over Christmas, and he got a fever but it never seemed to develop. I am thinking that was to do with my milk, since I had the flu badly and would have been churning out some serious anti-viral agents around then! But mostly I praise God that I asked him to protect Arthur and somehow Arthur never got really sick. I am so grateful.

So he has never been unwell. Also it is June. He has been fine this whoooole long winter with bugs left, right, and centre!! Why now, in JUNE?!! But by Wednesday evening he had a runny nose and was sneezing even more, and he was restless in the evening, coughing in his sleep and waking himself up, and then sneezing a lot when he woke. It did seem mild at the time, and I thought well at least he has my milk to help him fight it.

But my poor baby, Thursday was a little worse, he was snotty and exceptionally sneezy – he sneezed and sneezed all day, like sometimes 20 times in ten minutes!! He had so much mucus and goo going down to his tummy that he was sick after his feed in bed mid-morning. I am proud that this didn’t send me into a huge panic attack, but then I knew it was to do with his poor cold, and not a tummy bug. Also some weird “mother button” clicked in, a very similar feeling to the “nurse button” I used to have when I was doing my midwifery and nursing training, and looking after Cameron in hospital. I love those buttons. They enable me to be cool as a cucumber over things that would normally freak/gross me out if I didn’t have that button pressed. I am lucky also, in that I don’t usually have to think about pressing the button. It seems to be automatic. So I am delighted to discover that I have a “mother button”!! It made the difference between panicking, and sitting calmly with Arthur on my lap, catching big slaps of sick in a towel (well, missing most of it!) and reassuring him with soothing words and kisses on his soft fuzzy head all the while. Poor Arthur. He did not seem distressed at all, which probably helped me enormously. He seemed so happy after he was sick, like his tummy must have been feeling yucky till it emptied. The cot-bed came into marvellous use as I laid him in there with a toy while he watched me take my sicky clothes off and change, take the sicky sheets off the bed and put fresh ones on, and finally take his sicky sleepsuit off and clean him up and dress him. It took me a while to figure out what order to do the cleaning in! I figured it should be me first so that I didn’t re-sickify everything I touched. Then the bed so I would have somewhere clean to lay Arthur when he was changed. Then the pukey boy himself! He seemed quite contented to watch me, much better for less goo in his tummy. I put everything straight in the machine and it was clean and dry again before the end of the afternoon!

But Arthur has been so poorly since then. Last night was his first bad bad bad sick night. He couldn’t sleep for longer than 10 minutes all night, until around 4am when he suddenly fell into a rattly-breathing exhausted sleep and I collapsed on the spare bed to lose consciousness till he woke again at 5.50. I had not been able to doze between his wakings, and he was so distressed whenever he was awake, crying and sobbing inconsolably, and unable to breathe or swallow past the goo in his throat. He rubbed and rubbed his nose and eyes so hard, they must have been so irritating. To make matters worse, he is suddenly teething really badly, and seems to have teething pain like never before. His cheeks are red and puffy again and he is clawing at his ears and moaning like he does when his teething gets super-bad. We have given him teething powder but it never does work so well when he’s particularly bad. He has had quite a few doses of Calpol these last few days. It’s hard getting it into him because he cries and doesn’t want to swallow it, and there seems SO much of the darn stuff for him to have to ingest! It’s just so sickly and syrupy, and I don’t blame him for not wanting all that in his tummy when it’s already full of goop and feeling yucky. I try to keep him calm when he has just had Calpol so that he won’t throw up from coughing or sobbing, and then hopefully it will stay down. He sometimes acts like he needs to be sick after he has Calpol, when he already has goop in his tummy. Poor boy.

So today has been worse. He is still sneezing aplenty, and his cough has become quite bad and rattly. Today he had a fit of coughing on his side in bed just after nursing almost to sleep, and that made him be sick a bit too. Then he was awake and crying because he couldn’t breathe or get comfy. My heart HURTS for him to see him this unhappy and uncomfortable. I wish with all my being that I could make him feel better or take away the things that are nasty. I wish I could do more than soothe him. I know my presence and soothing actions make a world of difference for him, but it just never feels like enough when he is suffering, you know? When he breathes, the sound of gunk ratching and scrunching back and forth in his nose and throat makes ME want to gag. It’s so loud and horrible. I can’t remove it for him. How I wish he could blow into a hanky! I have one of those nose-clear suction thingies for sucking mucus out of a baby’s nose, and I have been using it a lot today when I see goo visible in his nose. He HATES it when I use it, though I am as gentle as I can possibly be, and it must feel better to him when I get stuff out. But he just hates it and fights me doing it and cries. I rubbed Vick on his chest today, just a little, because the instructions said from 6 months onwards. He did seem a little clearer for it, and he napped better in the afternoon than in the morning. This morning (all day really) he has been so exhausted. I guess his night was so awful and he is sick so extra tired. He could not sleep this morning for more than 10 minutes, more often it was just 2 or 3 minutes before he turned restlessly and woke from coughing or choking on goo, then he would cry and cry so he wouldn’t be able to get back to sleep after that. This afternoon after some Calpol and mucho back-breaking rocking and Vick on his chest, he did nap for an hour, and then after 40 very upset minutes of more rocking and nursing and nose-suctioning, he crashed out with tears still on his poor red cheeks for almost 2 hours.

He has cried soooo much these last couple of days. I just know he feels soooo unwell. My poor darling love. It has been a different perspective for me. Since he got sick, I don’t give a monkeys about how long he is sleeping or whether I get mine. All I care about is being absolutely THERE for him 24 hours a day the moment he needs me, and making sure I do everything I can to ease his suffering to the best of my ability. My back injury (this might not have been wise) could take a running jump for all I care. I will just have to get extra treatment on it and put up with extra pain in the meantime. My little love needed to be HELD all day today. He cried like his heart was breaking if I put him down, although I did have to anyway a couple of times to get food for me to eat or to go to the loo. He was okay after the initial few moments once he found a toy next to him to play with. I can see he is trying to be in his normal happy mood, but he just feels too bad. If I do things that normally make him laugh and giggle, he doesn’t giggle, which is so sad! But he does smile, a funny weak sort of smile that almost tells me he is smiling because he knows I am trying to cheer him up and he appreciates it. Bless his heart. Today I held him clasped to my front with both arms, and danced him to a CD of Christian music for an hour. An HOUR!! My back hurt so much I can’t tell you. But Arthur could breathe better that way, and the rocking and motion lulled him, and I sang along quietly with the music which also soothed him, and his eyelids got heavier and heavier, and eventually he went to sleep against me. It was his first easy sleep all day so I wanted to keep going as long as I could. I danced him in front of the big mirror so that I could see him clearly, and he kept opening his eyes to look into mine in the mirror, like he was checking I was still there or something, and then they would droop shut again and he’d be off. Eventually the CD ended and my arms hurt more than my back even, so I slowwwly sat down, but he woke when I sat, and cried :(

He had a bath with Daddy tonight, and I made the bath with baby breathe-easy bubble bath. He seemed happier after his bath. He had so much snot in his hair! Poor thing. I felt like a “real” mother today! My t-shirt is covered in snot, tears, milk, sick and drool. Covered. I am still wearing it. Gross, you might think? I know I need to take it off and put something clean on, but it’s dry and not as stinky as it sounds, and somehow when I look down at my chest and see dry snot (!!) I feel my heart go tender because it makes me think of my poor baby boy who needs to be close to me so much at the moment. His various bits of goo are on my t-shirt because of how close he needed to be to me at his sickest moments today, and actually this makes me feel like the most blessed, privileged person alive right now. I Am Mummy! I belong to the most precious little boy, and he belongs to me. I am Mummy. I am his. He is mine.

D’you know what else I remembered today, on that line of thought? I am God’s. He is mine. My struggles and falls and mistakes and so on are similar to the various stains on my t-shirt, as God holds me through my ups and downs. He holds me as I have held Arthur today, because he loves me like I love Arthur – MORE so even! My brain boggles at such a concept. How could ANYONE love anyone more than I love my precious boy? But God does love me more. Thank you Julie for reminding me of this today with the various things you said to me and just your own heart for God.

Well, my baby Boo stirs, so I may have to stop in a moment. He took a long time to go to sleep tonight and cried till he started gagging. He coughed such a lot too. Every time he would start to settle his little head into the bed and close his eyes for sleep, his nose would stifle his breathing, and his mouth would pop open to gasp, and then after a breath or two, would close again, and I’d hear his breathing stifle in his nose again till his mouth popped open again. After a few times of this he would toss and turn to try and find a way out of it, and then finally open his eyes and cry his poor little heart out, sobbing and coughing and “Oh-yo-yo-yohh”ing. It just about broke my heart. In the end, Neil went out to by some stuff called Karvol, which is a capsule of stinky head-clearing stuff that you break onto a tissue near a little-one’s head so they can breathe more clearly during sleep. While he was gone, I held Arthur, who retched hugely but wasn’t sick, rocked and sang to him, and finally he went to sleep upright on my front. My bac hurt so much, so I eased myself down on the bed and sat against the pillows with some sort of superhuman strength in my left arm taking Arthur’s full unconscious weight! I sang Enigma Variations to him tonight, well, hummed and laahed them! I just love that music. I find it so beautiful and soothing, and I didn’t have a CD player to hand or a spare arm to fetch one, so I hummed it, hoping Arthur would find it soothing too. He did seem to, and I kept on singing it after he fell asleep, till Neil got home about 10 minutes later. Arthur was so unconscious by this point that he didn’t even stir as I got up and turned him around in my arms, and laid him down on the bed. Once he was down on his back, his breathing sounded so clattery and awful that I turned him onto his side so he wouldn’t have so much going down his throat. He didn’t even stir. Neil put the stinky stuff near him (but out of reach) and we retreated. He has coughed and stirred and even started to cry several times this evening since, but each time we get to him and he’s already asleep again. I think he is just so exhausted, the poor thing. It’s now 11.23pm and he has been asleep since about 7.40.

Here are a couple of photos of my poor boy, the first one taken yesterday and the second one this morning. He is so much worse this evening, and I guess tomorrow could be a pretty gunky day too, but after that I hope he will at least start to FEEL better, even if his gunk levels stay high for a while yet. Colds are so horrid. Arthur is so precious. It just feels so awful to see him unwell. Here is my poorly boy:

I think that is basically all that has happened since I last wrote. Everything has been dominated by Arthur being unwell, and having no sleep and how I feel about my little one. Neil has been home this afternoon as we were going to go up to Yorkshire to see his parents over the weekend (spur of the moment) because it is his mum’s 60th birthday on Sunday. But we can’t go with Arthur ill, so he worked half the day and came home the other half to help with Arthur. He is wonderful. There is noooo way that either of us has escaped being exposed to this cold. I see now why it’s almost impossible for parents to miss bugs and colds when they have tiny ones who are sick with them! If they are sick, it goes everywhere. If they have colds, every five minutes you are bathed in a fine mist spray of viral particles! I have felt under the weather yesterday and part of today, just yucky with an odd throat, and like I am coming down with something. But I have prayed about it, and taken extra vitamin C, and just kept going really. This morning my yucky feelings started to fade out, and I haven’t felt unwell since, so hopefully I have fought it off.

One thing I feel blessed about through this is my milk. For Arthur, these last couple of days, my milk has been nourishment, extra fluids, comfort, throat soother, gunk diluter, and most importantly, anti-viral medicine specific to Arthur’s cold. I love this about breastfeeding. I hope that it means Arthur has suffered less than if I had not been nursing him, although he has suffered quite badly anyway, and I hope that he will recover quickly now. Either way he has been getting “medicine milk”, and I am especially glad that I have been fighting the virus myself because I’ll be making a good bug-buster to go in his snacks and meals! When I wish I could do more than just soothe him, this comes the closest to that, but it still doesn’t feel like enough. Still, I am so grateful for breastfeeding. Once or twice I found it difficult that my milk came down so fast and free, because he had such a full tummy and only wanted to suck for comfort, but down came lots of milk and he had to take it into his poor tummy if he wanted to stay sucking for comfort, which I was kind of irked about. I get a second heavy let-down after each 5 or 10 minutes that he is nursing so when he wants to suck for say 30 minutes just for comfort till he is asleep, it means he has 3 occasions or so where he is forced to gulp down milk that he doesn’t want or need. I thought about taking him off the breast to let that milk go in a towel or something, but he was unhappy to come off the breast so I let him stay. I guess in hindsight, because it did stay down, he probably did better for the extra milk, with it being fluids and immune boosters, etc. But other than that one quirk, all the milk is a wonderful blessing that I am thankful for!

Arthur is still asleep, though he has been coughing a few minutes ago, and I think I will finish this up and join him. I have been sleeping next to him. He likes to be physically in contact with me the moment he needs to be, so if I’m right there, he can choose to roll away and sleep as normal, or roll into my body and have his mummy-contact that he needs right now. I cherish it. It takes the edge off the awful feelings that I can’t do much for him like I wish I could, while he’s ill. But I don’t get much sleep!

Okay, I’ll write again soon, I hope! Thank you for wishing Arthur a happy 7-month birthday! And I am not an auntie yet, Jemma - it is driving me crazy with anticipation!! I know it must be soon. Rosemary’s due date is today! I will let you know as soon as I find out, of course! :) Thanks again everyone, for the lovely support you gave me! xxx

Aaaaaaaaargh, darn stupid Diaryland is busy all the time and won’t let me update!!!! But I have to go to bed. What will I do? I really want to post this tonight. I think I will leave the computer on till Arthur’s nappy change in the middle of the night, and see if I can just click a button and copy/paste it in to post it then. I don’t really want to wait till tomorrow. Tsk. And I have gold membership still at alicesbaby! How frustrating! I could update there if it was the right diary. Stoopid darn Diaryland!! Hope you are reading this shortly after I write it, and not the next day!

Well, obviously this IS the next day! Just wanted to add that Arthur slept SIX HOURS from 7.40pm to 1.40am last night!! He stirred and coughed a lot in his sleep but never actually woke properly or needed our help to resettle. I don’t know if this is just because he’s ill though, and thus zonked. Around 2am we changed his nappy, and I fed him. He was super-hungry. My breasts were like rocks too! The milk came down so fast and he drank so much that he seemed uncomfortable after that. We put new Karvol on his tissue thingy but he was so thick and snotty in his nose that he couldn’t breathe or swallow or sleep. Poor love, he tried and tried to sleep, putting his little body in all his favourite sleepy positions. He seemed more and more uncomfortable until finally he threw up hugely, real vomiting. He was face down on the bed when it started, and I picked him up quick (I was sitting there right next to him with my hand on him) and sat him up on my lap. Neil was there with a big towel and managed to catch the rest of the puke in it. He really did puke. I never saw so much come out of him before! I felt so bad for him, because he must have been feeling sick before that happened. He was happier and clearer in his nose afterwards though. I think he had a tummy half-full of goo and then overstuffed with milk. I’m glad he got rid of the mucusy yuck though. It took us a while to clean up and change the bed again. He went back to sleep around 4am and then woke at 5.50am, when I fed him again and he coughed till he threw up on the bed once more. Not a lot this time though, but enough to need to change everything again. His cough is quite bad now.

This morning he looks poorly with puffy eyes and like he’s been unwell for a few days. He has a snotty nose but it’s better than during the night. He is much more smiley this morning than he has been for a few days, so I’m presuming he feels a little better today. I was hoping he would start feeling less ill soon, so that’s good! He is napping at the moment, his second morning nap so far. He seems to need extra sleep while he’s sick. My poor baby. I just hope he is better soon.

Urrrrrgh, sleep AGAIN! And stuff.

Urgh, too much to say again in one entry! Thank you for the guestbook messages and notes, etc! Michelle, I can’t get the Baby Safe Feeder in the UK :( I looked at their website but I can only order it if I live in the States. Poo. But thanks for mentioning it! And you have noooo need to be jealous of our sleep. That’s news item #1 for this entry:

Sleep issues. I hate always talking about them. But here we go again. We seem to have taken 2 steps forward, and what feels like about 946,034 steps back. Right now everything feels worse than ever with Arthur’s sleep, and I don’t understand why. Anyway, the outcome of this evening is that when I sat in front of the computer to write my diary, at first all I felt like writing was:

I suck.

Also, I suck.

And in conclusion, I suck.

But that wouldn’t explain much to anyone, so I’ll elaborate a bit.

Arthur is still sleeping okay at night, and last night was pretty good – about 3 or 4 hours between each feed. And he fell asleep again well after feeds, and even after the nappy change in the middle of the night. But the previous two nights he was really quite restless and woke a lot. So that felt like we were back to square one a bit. His naps in the day over the weekend have been difficult. And yesterday it was like an all-day battle to get him enough nap-time sleep. That sucked, because it was just tiring and no fun, for either of us probably. Today he has napped much better though. Half an hour this morning, then 30 minutes at lunch time, which I managed to settle him back to sleep after (nursing), and then he slept 90 minutes straight. Then he was tired late afternoon (he usually has 3 naps a day, two short and one long) but when I took him to bed he took an hour of rolling about, screeching (which is starting to drive me crazy, all his piercing, ear-numbing screeching that he seems to be practising constantly these days!) and basically not sleeping – even though he was rubbing his eyes and obviously tired and getting cranky. He did fall asleep eventually though. During that time I lay with him and tried to be patient. It is increasingly difficult to be patient, and I hate that.

But the main thing is that just in these last few nights, Arthur has been extremely difficult to get to sleep at bedtime. I guess maybe we could improve the structure and consistency of our bedtime routine with him, and that might help. But he is sooooo tired at bedtime, he is cranky and sleepy and irritable and rubbing his eyes, etc, etc, basically displaying every possible sign of a tired baby who is ready for bed. I nurse him. He is so so fidgety and distractable on the breast, and he flings his arms everywhere constantly, so I get whacked in the face, breast, arm, glasses, etc. I tried holding him closer or in a way that makes it more difficult for him to wriggle so much, but that just makes him come off the breast all the time to get annoyed, etc. He keeps on popping off the breast to turn away from me and look at the curtains. Then he’ll chat and screech at them, which wakes him up further and wears my nerves down even closer to the wick. I sing, and he listens, but still that doesn’t seem to leave him sleepy enough to prevent the constant wiggling and screeching. When he won’t take the breast anymore, it’s usually because he’s full of air, so Neil burps him. He always has a good few BIG burps! Then back he comes for the other breast. Ditto the above behaviour. Eventually (these days anyway), he is full to the brim of milk but not sleepy enough to fall asleep. He always used to be dropping off to sleep from nursing, but he just seems so ultra-hyper these days, at all times. It’s not just wakefulness, it’s the sheer speed and franticness of his movements and vocalising, it’s odd. I wonder why? Even when he’s tired and annoyed that he isn’t asleep.

Urgh. Anyway, so after he’s full of milk we rapidly run out of tools to help him sleep. Lots of things have worked in the past, including patting and shh-ing, Neil rocking him, etc. The last two nights when this happened, I just kept nursing him, and then giving him to Neil to burp him, and then nursing him, and giving him to Neil to rock him, and then nursing him, etc, etc. Over and over. Last night it took till 8pm (he goes to bed around 6.30) doing this till he finally fell asleep, completely exhausted. He was so tired the whole time, and we were doing the things that most help him to sleep. I don’t understand it. He did then sleep four hours straight though. Tonight I started thinking that maybe it wasn’t helping him to let him fall asleep on the breast or rock him to sleep. I mean, recently Neil has been rocking him to sleep a little more than normal – especially over the weekend. I wondered if maybe that had made things worse? I don’t know. So tonight I said we should try other things, and not rock him. And I wouldn’t nurse him right to sleep, but then I don’t generally do that anyway. He normally nurses till nearly asleep and then either pops off by himself and turns over to go to sleep, or I take him off the breast and he then turns over and sleeps.

Soooo that’s what we tried this evening. Except it went wrong. Really wrong. I nursed him. He fidgeted (and nursed) and rolled, and screeched at the curtains every few moments. Neil burped him. He burped and grabbed at the curtains and screeched and wriggled and twisted in Neil’s arms to see me so he could smile at me, and then he nursed, and so on. Eventually he was full and still totally awake. I guess I felt so…. I don’t know what the word is. Snappy? Worn down? Frustrated? Irritable? I don’t know. All of those. Snarndowfrustitable. Heh. I like making new words :) But anyway. I felt so whatever that I just had to leave the room and take a break. The same happened yesterday evening. Yesterday I took 5 minutes while Neil was in there with Arthur, rocking him or whatnot, and just pottered around downstairs folding laundry or starting dinner, and it did only take 5 minutes for me to feel okay again and go back up to the bedroom when I heard Arthur sounding cross and sleepy.

But tonight Neil wasn’t rocking him, we tried the patting/shh-ing thing instead. Which totally did NOT go down well this evening. And when I took a break, I didn’t feel all nice again in 5 minutes. I just felt more and more resentful. Arthur got more and more tired and more and more angry, and eventually no matter what we tried, he was crying real tears and sounding so sad and angry, how he NEVER sounds. I hate that he cried and felt so upset. He absolutely could not go to sleep, and I think that is what was bugging him the most. That and the fact that he didn’t understand why we weren’t fixing it for him to get to sleep like always. We left him on his own twice for about 5 minutes each time, but both of those times he was happy enough when we left him, just wide awake and rolling and chatting to the curtains, etc. The first time he got cross and I went back. The second time he suddenly had enough and started crying and screaming, so I went back and nursed him. When he was doing that a lot, despite things we were trying, Neil worried that he had teething pain, because that’s the only time he’s really ever cried like this, so we gave him Calpol. He is teething, but then he always is. That’s frustrating me too. Probably not as much as it is Arthur, but there we go.

Anyway. Eventually it was 9pm, I had nursed him almost asleep three more times since the original bedtime feed, and each time he seemed asleep on his side when I got up, but the second I was off the bed he woke and was most upset straight away. Not that I was leaving, but that he was awake. The last time I didn’t even make if off the bed before he woke like that. I tried shh-ing and patting at that point, but he just cried and cried. Eventually, our dinner in the oven attempting to keep warm, Neil lay next to Arthur to shh him, and Arthur cried like his heart was breaking, which half-broke mine, and I escaped to the kitchen to cry, and feel horribly guilty and resentful and annoyed all at once.

I hate that we are starting to spend the whole evening, or the best part of it, fighting to get Arthur to sleep. I hate that he is tired enough for bed from when we put him there and still doesn’t sleep. I hate that he cried tonight. I hate that I am starting to feel resentful towards him over this. I have often resented the situation with his sleep issues, but I don’t really remember feeling resentment towards HIM personally. That is so unfair to Arthur. It is not his fault. But I find myself wanting to just chuck him on the bed and yell at him to “GO TO SLEEP ALREADY!!!” and bang the door shut on my way out. When he cries angrily at me and my patience is worn thin, I want to snap, “Fine! Stay up all evening then. See if I care!” and leave him crying till he tires himself out and sleeps. Sometimes the urge is so strong, because I am so fed up with it all. But as strong as that pull is, there is a stronger pull from the opposite pole, which is that I can’t bear to even think unkindly towards my little one. I feel protective and fierce about someone even thinking the things I just wrote, which obviously clashed horribly, since I’m the one both thinking them and hating myself for thinking them. I can’t bear him to cry and be upset. I want to always be there to “rescue” him from things that are upsetting him, not to be the source of the problem.

In some way or another I feel I am letting Arthur down over the sleep thing. Either by my choice of method, I am depriving him of learning to sleep better, because I won’t use a method that means he cries (what was tonight then?!), or by tightening the reins on things, I am causing him to be upset and therefore letting him down.

Neil came down about 10 minutes after I left them upstairs, by which time I had mopped up a bit and sat sniffling over a plate of tepid pasta and fish fingers. He said Arthur went to sleep at last, with Neil on all-fours over him, saying “shh-SHH…shh-SHH” over and over. Arthur seemed to want to feel enclosed, because when he stirred, he only settled again when he could put his hands on Neil’s arms either side of him. My poor baby :( He just needs physical contact, and comfort, when he is upset and trying to sleep. My irritability is making me deprive him of that when he needs it most. Ugh.

I feel like, for all that hassle and upset this evening, was it even worth it? Have we even gotten anywhere for doing it? If we had rocked him and held him and nursed him until he slept, would he not have slept sooner, or at least not had to cry and be upset? But I lose patience. I get so that I feel like when Arthur is in bed asleep, I finally get to de-stress and have some space and “me” time, otherwise I go crazy. I love spending all my time with Arthur, but I do look forward to his bedtime some days, by the early evening. I am ready for some relaxation and space to think and be me again for a few hours. But lately most of that time is taken up being hugely stressed and trying to get Arthur to bed. So then there’s a teeny tiny chunk of time for me to de-stress, with MUCH more de-stressing needed than normal, and no energy left to enjoy it. Tonight we basically had time to eat our no-longer-hot meal and then go to bed after several hours of putting Arthur to bed. Which really irks me. I am tired out. I should be in bed like Neil. But I neeeeed some time to myself. So I take the time that I need to stop my brain from imploding, and therefore guarantee myself an exhausted tomorrowness, since I will lose out on the extra sleep I am about 50 months behind on.

I can’t help but think crazy things, that everyone will surely tell me to stop dwelling on, but I’m not, they are just in my head and I can’t make them not be. Things like, if Arthur dies tonight, will I be glad that I was working on “training” him to sleep better, or will I wish that I had nursed him and comforted him and given him all the time I could, until he fell asleep peacefully at the breast or in Neil’s arms? There’s obviously no question. Things like that do make me wonder about any sort of sleep training. No matter how you reason it, or benefit from it, or try to make it gentle, somehow it just doesn’t seem natural to me. I would never ever ever ever ever ever ever (ad infinitum) forgive myself if I had spent Arthur’s last night resenting his wakefulness or listening to him cry for the “good” of his sleeping habits, or withholding a type of comfort that he is longing for, to help him sleep, like nursing to sleep or being rocked. Sometimes tonight when I took him off the breast in a sleepy state, his whole body reacted and reached desperately for me, even clawing at my t-shirt once I’d pulled it down, to try and stay nursing so that he could finish falling asleep. At the time I thought it was for the best that I helped him learn to do without. Why though? Not for him. For me. I was the one feeling impatient. Ugh. I am going round in circles.

Basically – trying to mould my baby into any sort of expected sleep habit doesn’t feel right or natural. But letting the current trend continue is doing my head in. I’m getting resentful about it. And tired. And irritable. And none of that is helping Arthur, or me, or Neil. So fix it. But a) it doesn’t feel right, and b) it’s not working. So use a method that works. But a) I will not let him cry. Nope. Not even for four nights (the predicted success time with many methods). Also b) I will not let him cry. Which many methods seem to include, no matter how gently it is managed, it’s still crying. And while he’s crying, my baby is upset, sweating, hyperventilating, and miserable. And c) I will not let him cry.

So where does that leave us?

Urrrrgh. This evening, it leaves me feeling horrible for having been snappy with my little one, and leaving him to cry with Neil while I sulked off downstairs. Now that he’s finally in an exhausted sleep and silent, I wish I could wake him to cuddle him and hold him close in my arms and love him. I wish I could whisper to him as I stroke his soft new hair that I am sorry I was impatient and irritable, and I’m so sorry that he had to cry and feel unhappy and frustrated and angry tonight. And I’m here, and I love him, and I’m not going anywhere. But he’s asleep. So I will save all that up for when he next wakes. Which of course I will do ultra-quietly while I nurse him, so as not to make him all wakeful again. I can’t wait till he wakes again so I can breastfeed him and be a tangible source of comfort for him. I feel like I want to “make up” for something that I took away from him earlier. Whatever that is. I feel bad. Basically, I feel like a truly crappy mother tonight. Crappy. But more so, because it’s not like I was a crappy mother, then I realised it, and now I won’t ever be a crappy mother like that ever again. Nope. I will probably be a crappy mother in the same way tomorrow, when Arthur’s sleep battles recommence and I lose the small sliver of patience that I have left. And I hate that this is likely to happen. I hate even thinking about it. Blah.

Something else. Talk about something else. I want to pull my own hair and slap my own cheek. Or something.

Oh my back! I went to an emergency appt with an osteopath on Sunday. I’m so glad I did! This osteopath is called Lexy and she is sooooo good! Yay! Neil and Arthur came too but they waited downstairs. I felt bad because we were an hour upstairs and I could hear Arthur being bored and cranky sometimes. I feel bad about things a lot lately, related to Arthur. I want him to always be happy (though I know that’s not realistic), and if he’s not then it’s usually something I haven’t fixed for him, so when he’s angry or unhappy it’s personal, and I feel bad. You’re going to tell me I’m wrong. But that won’t change how I feel about it.

Anyway. So I gave the osteopath my history which took a while (birth, pregnancy, rest of my life, etc!) and she looked at my back. She says my right leg is a tad shorter than the left, but probably because my pelvis isn’t fully aligned (which was what gave me the SPD trouble during pregnancy). And most of my height is in my torso (which I know), so the small of my back has an enormous stress-load as the pivotal point for any weight-bearing, etc. Much more so than anyone who is better proportioned than me (about 99.9999% of the human race!). So if my back is going to go wrong then it will be in the lower back area. Which is the bit that hurts. Also she said my joints are really loose. I said, “Oh that’s good!” She looked at me and shook her head. Oh dear. Very loose is bad, apparently. She said all my joints are really loose, and that makes it likely that the bones in my spine are too, which = easy misalignment and more work for the supporting muscles. She said I am sooo lucky I haven’t had a lifetime of back trouble so far! Yikes. Anyway she said we need to tighten and strengthen the muscles in my lower back, to support the oddness of my build (!!), and loosen the muscles at the top because they are tight as a drum. She said that was because of the strain of carrying Arthur during pregnancy, and from the birth, and from carrying him since. I didn’t realise how tight those muscles were till she started trying to loosen them. Oh. My. Ouchness.

Also she did a full treatment on my back, which meant a lot of being pulled about and that hurt sometimes, and that awful “clunk-click” treatment (as they call it), which involves her saying, “Take a deep breath in” and then leaning over me and saying, “…. And out again” and as I start to breathe out, she throws her full body weigh onto my ribcage, with some added force from her arms, and all my breath shoots out in a big gust, and once there is nowt left in there at all, that’s when all the bones in my whole body (well, the ribs and spine anyway) make the most sickening crackles and crunches! Like 10 of them, all at once. It makes ME feel sick, just hearing it! Then she does it again till there’s no more crackling. Yeurgh. Equally horrid is the bit where she’s manipulating my head and neck till it’s kind of hurting from twisting further to the side than I thought it was able to, and then suddenly with my head in her hands, she whips it back to face ahead, and then gives it a split-second twist to the side (further than before), whereupon it cracks most horribly! The weirdest thing is, the point where it cracks makes me yell, “Ow!!” but actually it’s a physical relief to my neck. Odd.

I have homework. I need to ice my back with a gel-pack when it hurts, 15 minutes up to four times a day (none at all so far, but that’s me not getting round to it rather than being pain-free, tsk). And I have to stop sleeping on my tummy – nooooo!! I told her that is the only way I can get to sleep, even when I’m exhausted. I have restless leg syndrome and I can’t bear to be on my back or sides when it’s bad. I’d rather pull my own ears off. Seriously. It’s a horrible sensation. On my tummy, it’s much more bearable, and I fall asleep much quicker that way. She said if I MUST sleep on my front, I should sleep with a pillow under my tummy to support my lower spine. She said sleeping on your stomach is really really bad for the back. In my case even more so, because of my joints being so loose. She said basically my lower spine will be collapsing in on itself overnight as it drops towards my tummy. So far I have managed to sleep on my sides or back once, but the other time I have slept on my tummy with a pillow under me. That wasn’t comfy, but it was miles better than restless legs on my back or sides. And she also gave me homework for my Jaw Joint Malfunction. I have to bite on a pencil across my mouth at the molars, equally on both sides! And try to always chew my food equally on both sides. So I’m trying. It’s weird though.

And probably other stuff. But my head is aching now and I’m getting tired, so I forget what I meant to say. Oh but I have another appt with her tomorrow at 11.20. It’s down the road from where Neil works, so I am taking Arthur to the office and Neil is taking a (very) early lunch to take Arthur for a walk while I have my appt. Lexy said I could bring Arthur with me, but I just thought, it’s up a narrow staircase so I couldn’t take the pushchair. There is very little room for him in the tiny treatment room, and even if there was, he can’t just be put down on the floor. He can’t sit or lie in there properly, and anyway, the session lasts about 40 minutes. He would be bored and cranky after about, ooh, three?! So that wouldn’t work. It’s good that Neil works so nearby. I am going to ask about getting lunchtime appts next time.

Urgh I am getting too tired to write any more. But I didn’t even get to the part where I write lovely happy stuff about being Arthur’s mummy, and about how he’s doing. That’s what I feel like writing about now that I’ve let off steam.

Okay, well he is doing well, other than sleep! He is gorgeous. I love him so much. He laughs and smiles all the time. Earlier today when he was struggling to go to sleep for his nap, I let him roll away from me for the fifty millionth time, hoping he was turning over to go to sleep, and there was a pause and suddenly his head popped up and he started talking to the curtains cheerfully! I felt so exasperated, but this was like the 9th time or something, and suddenly the exasperation flipped into seeing the funny side, and I started to chuckle – but that whispered type of chuckle, where it bearly sounds like you’re making more than a few hushed puffs of air. Amazingly, Arthur seemed to recognise it as a hushed giggle all the same, because he immediately stopped chatting to the curtains, and turned towards me, starting to giggle himself!! I love how this little boy giggles simply because I am laughing! Just to see or hear me laugh makes him happy and giggly, and that’s so lovely. He uses giggling as a way of getting attention, I think. He has developed such a silly cute false laugh!! He uses it a lot, like when Neil and I are talking to each other, all of a sudden there will be a funny chokey laughing sound, and we look at Arthur and there he is, fixing us with a very direct look, coughing out an odd sounding chuckle! He knows we respond with great delight when he laughs and giggles, so I guess he is using it as a method of grabbing our attention when he wants it! I think it’s very sweet, mainly because it’s soooo obviously a fake laugh, but he must think he’s doing a convincing job, hehe! :)

Today for the first time he has been up on his hands and knees – well, not quite knees. More like thighs! He hasn’t quite made it up onto his knees, but they get pulled up near enough, so that he’s resting on his thighs. He rocks and rocks like this. This afternoon he rocked so hard in this position that he shoved himself a few inches forwards in one lunge. It wasn’t crawling as he didn’t move any of his limbs, but he moved forwards in a crawl position. So I guess it will be soon! He was pleased to move forward those few inches, as it brought him within reach of a favourite toy, which he immediately grasped and settled down to play with! I hope that will encourage him to try it again and get crawling. He is getting so frustrated that he can’t move about like he wants to now. He rolls everywhere and at angles, but it isn’t nearly efficient enough for him! He has to roll back and forth many times over to get himself where he’s aiming – say at a toy a few feet away diagonally from him. If he could just propel himself forwards he could get there fast and in a straight line of sight too.

What else? Ohhh I shared another apple with him today. This time I put him in his highchair while I cleaned a bit in the kitchen, and I started eating an apple. I cut him two sticks of apple out of it and he gummed on them a bit and then dropped them on the floor. Then I decided I might as well be steaming some apple for pureeing and freezing while we had some nice organic apples. So I got that going while I continued cleaning. When the sticks of peeled apple that I’d steamed were cool enough, I gave one to Arthur to see what he would do with it. He loved the texture (squashy), but didn’t seem to consider putting it in his mouth! He squished it in his fist until it fell into three sad little squishy pieces on his highchair tray, and then he picked one of those up between finger and thumb and squished it further! After that they were boring and lay discarded on the tray.

Then I pureed the remaining steamed apple, and I was all set to spoon it into ice-cube trays, when I suddenly thought I might try Arthur with some. He hasn’t tried pureed apple yet, and it was warm and fragrant and perfect. Thicker than his other purees, but just like apple sauce really, not too slushy or coarse. I gave him some. He took several spoonfuls, but basically did not seem impressed that I’d shovelled them in his mouth! Hehe. He preferred (as always) to use the spoon himself, so I let him. Here are the photos of Arthur being less than impressed with yet another food!...

Hehehe! He made a lot of soured faces, like that middle photo. I guess apple is much more sour than breastmilk, even though it was a nice sweet eating apple. Anyway, he did swallow it well. He looked kind of gaggy a couple of times, but moved it to the back of his mouth and swallowed very quickly and efficiently each time. We’ll see how we go.

He is 7 months old the day after tomorrow!!! Crazy. Also my SIL is due that day too!! Yay! So excited.

I re-evaluated the signing. I decided that “more” and “eat” are definitely not that relevant for now, so I stopped teaching him “more”. There just weren’t any opportunities to use it in any case. The only thing he really has more of is milk, and we already have a sign for that. I thought about his normal day and what he might like to communicate most if he knew how. I think other than “milk”, he might like to ask to be picked up or put down, but not that often, since I hold him a lot and he likes it. But the main thing I thought he would like to communicate would be something to do with pain (eg. teething) or getting medicine for that. He has teething pain ALL the time, and gets medicine for it in some form every single day. Poor baby. So there is plenty of opportunity for us to teach him a sign about that, and for him to learn and use a sign too. I figured he could learn “pain”, but that’s not so easy to teach with a frame of reference. I might try it anyway. But I thought the most important thing (and easiest) for him to learn would be “medicine”. Easy because it’s like “milk”. He is fussing and rubbing his ears. I say, “Do you need some medicine?” and sign “medicine”. I get the teething powder or Calpol or gel or whatever, and when he sees me holding it, I sign medicine again. I ask him again if he wants medicine and sign one more time with it. Then I give it to him. Right after that I sign “medicine”. That’s a really easy one, and I think he’d learn it fast and be able to use it to ASK us for medicine when he needs it. That would be so great! We’d also be able to tell if he really needed it by his reaction to the sign once he has understood it. The only thing is, I can’t seem to find a sign for medicine anywhere! I’ve looked in the books and websites – nada. Sooo I made one up! :) I just picked a one-handed sign that is easy to make and unique from his normal hand mannerisms. After fiddling with my hands for a while (!), I decided on a sign where I point with my forefinger across my body, and raise and lower the whole hand at the wrist, sort of like shaking my hand at the wrist but with only my finger pointing. I don’t know why I settled on that one. It just seemed easy.

So today we have given Arthur medicine for his teeth twice (powder). I have stopped calling it “powder” when I give it to him, and started calling it medicine. It was easy to teach him this sign today! He watched my hand attentively, took the powder (very pleased!) and watched me sign it again whilst saying “medicine” clearly. The next time we gave him powder was when Neil had just got home from work. I explained the plan to Neil and showed him the sign. Neil signed it to Arthur and gave him the powder. When he signed it to him again after giving him the powder, Arthur made his hand into a fist with his forefinger pointing across his body (but not moving) as he watched Neil sign it!!! Clever boy :) So I think he will learn this one fast. It’s probably one he will be eager to use, to communicate with us about his poor teeth.

Hmmm, what else? It’s after midnight now (soooooo silly) so I should go to bed. Arthur has been asleep since he finally went out at around 9.10pm, so three hours so far, which is great. I hope we have a good night. Arthur needs it really, he will be extra tired from such a late bedtime.

Here is a photo of my little man enjoying a bubbly bath with his daddy! He loves the bubbles, and we take care to froth them up as much as possible while we’re running the bath. He also loves a nice deep bath! He likes it when he can sit on the bottom and the water comes up to nearly his chin! Although when he dips his head forward (as he likes to do to see the bubbles!), he often comes up again with a bubble-moustache and beard, hehe! Sometimes I wonder what he would make of a bath sitting on his own. He has never had one. I don’t think he’d be crazy about the couple of inches of water he’d be sitting in (safely) if he was on his own in the bath. Anyway, here he is in his nice deep bubbly bath!...

We are testing out Tots Bots nappies again. They are such lovely nappies, but he outgrew the size 2s a while ago. I heard that they make a size 3 for preschoolers (haha!), so I decided to buy him two – one white and one unbleached. Both with aplix, which is annoying since I prefer poppers or snappi fastenings, but they only come in aplix for size 3s. Arthur can undo aplix, I have now discovered! And enjoys it too! ;) Anyway, I also bought a really nice PUL wrap in size 3 from Tots Bots, but it’s not on their website. It’s a new PUL print, really nice! So he is wearing them and they fit him! They are also the first nappies he has worn in ages that have some extra room for him to grow!!! I love them. I cut out the fabric for making another towelling/microfleece stuffable nappy today, during Arthur’s lunchtime nap. I need to sew it now. They are all he uses at night now, as they can be stuffed with anything absorbent and get covered with a wrap so they don’t leak. They fit him generously and work wonderfully with a toddler size Stacinator So-Simple Wrap. My huge boy! The toddler wrap is actually getting a little tight on the legs!! He is so chunky. I know he’ll slim down in the thigh once he’s crawling though. We have had to put all our lovely size large Fuzzis aside!!! I can’t BELIEVE he has outgrown these – it’s crazy. He still fits the waist on the smallest or second smallest snap setting, but they are a bit tight on the thigh and he keeps getting a builder’s bum at the back! So I presume he has outgrown them in the rise. I am tentatively on the look-out for XL Fuzzi Bunz, but we’re having a minor money crisis so I’m not actively hunting right now. We need a couple more Grobags though. He does great in his Grobags at night, but it’s getting too hot for his summer ones. He needs a couple of high summer ones I think. But we’ll see.

I’ll leave you with this last photo of Arthur, taken yesterday. He was lying on the bed, and I was taking photos of him, and I popped up behind the camera and said, “BOO!” (which he always loves!) and he laughed and giggled at me! Here is the photo I took of him doing that! :)

He’s so lovely. I do love him sooooo much. I wish I could fix his sleep for him better. And not be so grumpy. And love him even better than I do. But I do love him so. I sing him love songs. Really! I sing songs that I know the tunes to (like chart songs or church music) and change the words, making them up as I go along, to be all about Arthur and how much Mummy loves him :) Because I do. And I want him to always know it. My little love.

Arthur and the apple... and lots of other waffly stuff

Thank you for the recommendations for Chris's diary recently. I started reading there a while back after Jemma gave me the link to her entry about freezing homemade baby food, so don't worry I am already reading her! We have a lot in common, it seems, and I left her a message about it recently. But thanks for recommending her all the same :)

Dum-de-dum.... Neil is taking Arthur for a walk in the pushchair at the moment. Arthur is increasingly frustrated and cranky these days. I think it has partly to do with teething, as he seems to FOREVER be in pain with his gums, poor boy. But also I think he is getting very frustrated with not being able to move himself easily to things he sees that he's interested in. It helps that I am always with him and notice what he's looking at, and bring it to him (mostly, if it's safe!), but he still seems annoyed that he can't get there himself. If you add tiredness to the mix, he can sometimes almost seem tantrumy at the moment. He arches his back and screeches with the most angry look on his little face, and shouts angry words (very punctuated "DAY! LAY! RRROE!"). He also thumps the floor when he's cross, and once or twice when something is REALLY bugging him he has thwacked me pretty good too. Not that he means to, he is just flailing his arms about because he's feeling frustrated. I wish I could somehow help him to crawl, so that he could learn it faster than he is. It seems to be driving him crazy that he can't - I'm absolutely sure that's what is annoying him. He rocks and pushes with his arms, but it just makes him slide backwards till his arms go out from under him, and then he makes angry screeches and hits the floor! Poor Boo. Soon, though. I'm sure he'll manage it soon, if he's this desperate to do it.

Poor poor baby with his teeth. It seems so unfair that he has had really quite painful teething symptoms almost constantly since 11 weeks of age, and no teeth to show for it. Some babies get teeth with no trouble! Alex is one of these - well done on your two new teeth, Alex! But poor Arthur. One time a lady I spoke to said how her baby was "such a star" because he made no fuss with teething at all and all of a sudden he had a tooth! She implied that babies who cry and struggle and fuss with teething are "difficult". That really bugs me. I wanted to say to her how Arthur had to be the BIGGEST "star" of all, since he obviously had more to cope with than babies who don't complain. They don't complain because they don't have any pain to complain about, and what's courageous about that?!! Grr. You'd complain if your gums ached and throbbed hot pain into your ears day and night, now wouldn't you?! It's like saying, "Oh my son is such a trooper! He never cries after he ingests dairy produce!" when HELLO?! He is not lactose intolerant so he doesn't have any discomfort or pain to complain about!!! Some babies have ZERO teething pain, therefore they are not "troopers", they are just lucky. Some have horrible teething pain. It really annoys me when people say stuff like that. But I guess I am just feeling protective of my poor boy.

He had about 2 days between the end of the last bout of painful teething and the start of the one he's currently on. Right now he's biting on stuff a lot, and drooling heavily, so those are good signs that he's teething, whether or not he's in any pain from it. But a lot of the time he is moaning and rubbing at his ears till they are red :( He juts his bottom jaw out and wails, "Oh-yoh-yoh-yoh!" between sobs, so I know it hurts him a lot. Poor baby. I wish I could take it away for him or get his teeth to darn well HURRY UP!!! We ran out of teething powder so I have been using Bonjela and stuff like that on him, which has not seemed to make much difference. Yesterday we finally bought some teething powder and he was so eager to open his mouth and put his tongue out for it when I opened the first packet! I hope that first tooth comes soon. Like today would be nice. His gum doesn't look particularly prominent over any one tooth. Poo.

In other news, my back has finally had it. I think I mentioned a week or so ago that I had hurt my back. I don't know how, but the likelihood is that it was done carrying or lifting Arthur. He most definitely weighs over 21lbs now, but I'm not sure how much exactly. Neil said this morning that he thinks it's possible (HOW?!) that Arthur may have had yet another growth spurt! He suddenly FILLS his pushchair seat. And two days ago I noticed that he suddenly does not fit into any of his 6-9 month tops or vests, even with the vest extenders. He also suddenly stopped fitting most of his 9-12 month dungarees. Two weeks ago I tried him in two pairs of new dungarees in a very generous size 9-12 months, both of which were hugely spacious at the shoulder straps, and therefore too big. Yesterday he fit them with no room to spare! Yikes. We don't have enough vests in size 9-12 months so I need to buy some. He is now in size 9-12 month clothing in all his clothes, except that some of the tops and jumpers from Next are too roomy, but their sizing is very generous. In some brands he has completely grown out of size 9-12 months! It's a crazy thought that I need to buy him some outfits and things in size 12-18 months!! I haven't got anything ready in that size because it seemed soooo far in the future! Who would have thought that I'd be needing to buy those clothes when he was nearly 7 months old?!!

Sooo big boy. Very very sore back. Ow. One mother said to me ohhh yes her back was under a lot of strain too when her baby weighed 21lbs. Well I would just like to point out that most babies at 21lbs are WALKING, if not crawling! They are usually a lot older when they weigh that much. It is a whole 'nother ball game to lug around a 21lb baby who is only 6+ months old and does not mobilise at all yet by himself! He needs a lot more physical support in my arms than an older baby, and he needs holding and carrying like fifty million times more in a day than a mobile baby. So my back is out. For the count. Yesterday I did take him for a walk like I said I might after my diary entry. I pushed him in the pushchair. We were gone maybe 45 minutes - I will write about that in a mo! But when we got home my back hurt soooo much low down, from hip to hip across my back. I just thought I would rest a bit and it would ease off. It was sharp like a bad muscle spasm. Ow.

Anyway it has not gone away. I can't roll over in bed with out catching my breath with pain. Walking hurts like diddly, and for the first time yesterday evening I was reminded evvvver so slightly of back labour, it was that painful. I took painkillers but it only took the edge off it. Today I can't even pick Arthur up, and that feels awful :( If I hold him (transferred to my arms from Neil's) and lean his weight towards my body as I take him, it's like someone sticking me with a red hot poker in my lower back and holding it there till I hand him back to Neil. Every time I make scissor movements with my legs (eg. walking or using the stairs) the pain makes me want to cry. I am hobbling around like a little old lady, because it's most bearable if I'm hunched over. It sucks :( Today we phoned an osteopathic clinic in the area and they couldn't fit me in today at all, but they will open up especially for me tomorrow morning - phew! So no church tomorrow, because I will be getting my back seen to at 10am instead. Ohhhh I can't wait. I hope they can fix me up tomorrow so that I can leave without pain. I'm scared that they will tell me I can't hold Arthur for a while. I can't imagine such a thing. I feel scared at the very thought, of having enforced "separation" from him in that way. Obviously we can snuggle if I can get comfy, and I can sit as close to him as I can, but neither of us are used to time where I don't hold him to my body in my arms for most of the day. There HAS to be a way around this, for the future. There has to be a way that I can continue to hold and carry Arthur as much as I want to without injuring my back. Doesn't there?? Please? I hope there is. I can't bear the idea of having reached an age where I can't do it anymore :( I am so slight of frame and Arthur is so huge and like nobody can believe he came out of me!! Heh. But anyway. All I can say is thank GOODNESS this happened on a weekend so that Neil is here to hold Arthur and pick him up for stuff while I am not able. They HAVE to fix me tomorrow. Neil goes back to work the next day and I need to be able to somehow carry on as normal from then.

I'll let you know how it goes.

Oh our walk yesterday was great! When we got outside, the sky was pretty threatening, but it had stopped raining and hailing. I put Arthur's raincover over the 3-wheeler and took my umbrella, and off we went! We had only walked for about 3 minutes when I started to get this feeling that we were in for a heavy downpour. I kept going but the sky was making me more and more nervous! I love walking in the rain, but the sky looked more menacing than just rain so I actually felt nervous about it, which is odd for me! I decided we would go over the bridge and round the park once, and then back home. On the bridge I stopped and said, "Oh my bob" because it was high enough to get a clear view right to the horizon across the trees, and we were a good 10 minutes walk from home, and everything looked a bit weird! The trees were grey and the sky was green, like they had swapped colours with each other. The sky was soooo dark, and I could see dark green streaks from the clouds to the ground near the horizon. The wind
was nearly knocking me over up on the bridge, and it was making the clouds race across the sky, directly from the green streaks on the horizon to where I was. Hmmm! RUN HOME!!! But noooo, I am so stubborn, I was determined to walk round that park before coming home! We made it to the park before the big drops started pattering down, and I covered Arthur up with the raincover all securely so that he didn't even feel a drop. I put my umbrella up and legged it round the park (sooo stubborn, tsk!). I was nicely sandwiched between some very tall trees and a METAL fence when a big rumble of thunder sounded! Uhm, duh?!! Move AWAY from the lightning conductors!!!! I got kind of scared and prayed a lot while I huffed and puffed down the path, Arthur's pushchair swaying this way and that as I ran! We left the park near a parade of shops, and by the time we got to the shops, the heavens had well and truly opened. Sheets of water slapped into the back of my legs, and hail rattled on my umbrella, which by the way was flipping inside and out as the wind whipped it around, and not protecting me at ALL! We dived into the nearest shop, which happened to be a chemist, where we discovered a local stash of the teething powders that Arthur prefers - hooray!! We waited the worst of the storm out in there, but after a while I wanted to head home because it was getting near to the time when Neil would get home and Arthur would need to go to bed! Also the shops would close if I stayed much longer.

Outside, the roads were completely flooded. In 15 minutes! People were stepping off the kerb to get to their cars and their whole shoe would disappear underwater (amidst much swearing, hehe - I am so bad finding these things funny! ;) ). It was still raining heavily but not like before. I held my umbrella up with one hand and used some sort of super-human strength in my other arm to steer the pushchair up the hill and round corners. On top of the bridge the rain got torrential again and I kept gasping as the wind flung my umbrella off my face to slap a sheet of cold water over me! The weird thing is, somewhere around the bridge, I realised how much FUN I was having!! I felt like, "Ooh this is a fun challenge!!" I like a challenge. I guess I am just a control freak. I like to battle out the control between me and the weather, and arrive home dripping wet but triumphant! It's such a buzz, and I love it. So I felt GREAT for the walk, but my jeans were soaked to the knees and I was tiiiired. Plus after that my back started hurting soooo much. But it was so nice :) Arthur enjoyed himself! He slept well too, yesterday evening, but woke a bit more than usual during the night.

He now stays asleep every single time he rolls in any direction, onto his side, back or tummy in his sleep!! Yay Arthur!!! He rolled onto his tummy in his sleep yesterday and stayed there, and when he lifted his head he had the most awful red imprint of his own hand on his face, hehehe! He had rolled onto his hand by his cheek and not even noticed until he woke! His little hand was all red too, but he didn't seem bothered by it.

I went to the doctor's on Thursday - I forgot to mention that yesterday. I asked her about my back pain (BEFORE it got this bad!) and she seemed clueless about back pain - tsk. She said, "Oh dear." and "He's a heavy boy, isn't he? That's probably how it happened." (um, DUH?!!) and, "Just join a gym and do some exercise - that will probably help it." So I smiled and nodded and made a mental note to disregard anything she said about structural problems! But also I asked her about two moles that I have which are looking a bit dodgy. One of them she said was nothing to worry about. The other one we are going to keep an eye on, which is slightly worrying. She is less worried than she might be, because it went that way when I was pregnant, and it's normal for moles to change during pregnancy. So we'll see.

Also I have a lump on my back, loooow down. The doctor I saw a few months ago said it was a knotted muscle. I thought, "My bum it's a knotted muscle" but I said, "Oh, okay then." and left. This doctor says it's a cyst. Which is what I thought. I hope it stays un-bothersome like it is now. What else did I ask the doctor about? I had such a list!! Oh yes, I think I have a nose infection - how nice. Nothing gross, but it is sore and keeps having little bleeds. She looked and said yeah it looks like there might be one in there. She seemed surprised that I would waltz in and ask her to tell me if I had a nasal infection, but then she doesn't know the huge hassle I had with these things in pregnancy. So I know! I get to put yucky cream up my nose, which she "guessed" was safe for breastfeeding mamas. Tsk. She couldn't find any contraindications in her medicine book. I think I will see a different doctor next time! But she was very nice.

I need a smear. Oh joy. I have been overdue one for.... years I think! I hate them because they always hurt me such a lot. I should have parsnips more often and then it probably wouldn't hurt me to have a smear. If you used to read me when I was sheepdip, you'll know all about my use of the word "parsnips" in place of s*ex. I hate gross googlers. So I replace words where necessary! Parsnips is the official word for s*ex, for future reference, okay? If nothing else, my sentences can be highly amusing when I do this! ;)

Well my back hurts sitting here and I probably need to go because Arthur and Neil will be home soon, and then Arthur needs to nurse and nap.

Okay short break there - they arrived home at that exact moment and then we changed Arthur's nappy, and I read my nose cream leaflet which made me have to phone a pharmacist to ask exactly how safe it is with breastfeeding. And the pharmacist said to AVOID it!!! Tsk! Good thing I didn't have to pay for that prescription, with my maternity exemption card! Which runs out on November 4th... hmmm, must get pregnant again before then, haha! Or else just not need any prescriptions between then and when I get my next maternity exemption card! ;)

Anyway so no nose cream for me. Pfthth. I need to look up what my other nose cream was that Top Nose Guy prescribed me when I was pregnant. That must be a safe one.

My back is beginning to ease up just a little! I don't know why. I have just been sitting around and resting. I'm still very glad to have an appt for tomorrow though, as I'm sure it's something that needs fixing. And I will finally get to see someone about fixing whatever was wrong with my back in time for another pregnancy, and thus HOPEFULLY avoid the SPD with accompanying excruciating pubic bone pain. I reeeally hope. The other osteopath I saw during my pregnancy said that if I got my back sorted out between the birth and the next pregnancy, I could avoid the same problems next time around. Otherwise be prepared for the same thing or worse - yikes.

Anyway, so while I was on the phone to the pharmacist, Neil picked Arthur up as he was starting to fuss on the fleece blanket, and as he was swung up onto Neil's lap, Arthur's eyes caught mine and he gave me a sudden desperate look and pumped the milk sign with his left hand! I notice that he always uses his left hand to sign. Always. But I know it's still way too early to know if he's left or right handed. Neil is hoping for a lefty, because he is one too. Anyway I was stuck on the phone so I couldn't respond to Arthur's plea right away, but as soon as I was off the phone, Neil carried him upstairs for me and I nursed him. He seemed to almost want sleep more than to nurse. I wonder sometimes if he is using the milk sign interchangably for sleep and milk? Nursing is usually followed by sleep for Arthur, so if he WANTS to sleep because he's tired out, it makes sense that he might let me know by signing milk.

He nursed to sleep in about 3 minutes flat! He napped 30 minutes and then woke, but Neil rocked him back to sleep and now both of them are having a nice peaceful snooze in there :) And I am here to finish my entry and relax my back for the first time today, as the pain has eased enough for me to let my spine curve into a more relaxed position - yay!

I can't wait to be breastfeeding a toddler!! There's a buddy group online that I'm lurking in excitedly, one for mothers of breastfeeding toddlers, all about things to do with nursing older babies and toddlers. There are some mothers in there with babies aged 8 months old, but everyone else has older babies than that. Some have two year olds. I can't wait to join in!!! Just one month and one week to go! :) I guess they would accept me now, but I want to wait till Arthur is as old as some of the other babies in there. There are some little quirks that are specific to nursing toddlers that I can't wait to observe and experience with Arthur. I love some of the things these mothers are saying. Like the 18 month old who shares his "nigh-nighs" with his teddy - awww! I love that! And the acrobatic nursers - I know that will be Arthur soon enough because he is making more and more attempts to latch on and feed whilst playing on his TUMMY next to me, etc! He also likes to take a quick snack sitting up on my lap if there is a breast available. If there isn't, he usually lets me know he is keen by latching onto my T-shirt in the right location!

Oh ohhh, that reminds me - I saw a home movie online that I just LOVE, and I wanted to post the link. It really made me smile, but not like the audience in the background - they were cracking up - because I just think it's cute-funny, not hilarious or outrageous. I will never be able to do that position (!!) but I hope Arthur will do crazy things like that when he's older. I don't know why, I just do! It's cute :) He does nurse like that baby does quite often now - ducking his head about to get the right position if he's sitting up, and he holds my breast like a sippy cup - the ones with two handles! He literally takes a scrunch of skin in each hand on either side (owch) and pulls it towards him! I am working on showing him not to scrunch me and telling him to be gentle with Mummy, or that it hurts Mummy when he scrunches her! He also fiddles with the nipple. He likes to pick it up with his finger-and-thumb pincer grasp, hehe!! He is very gentle though, and I let him explore, but I do get nervous that suddenly he's going to go scccrrrruuuunch with his little razor sharp finger nails! Ohhhh, that would hurt! But he's a gentle boy and just seems to like looking at what he's about to eat!

Neil and I had a good chat about "us" the other evening. We were sitting down to eat dinner, which lately we have been doing in front of the TV, and this particular evening there was nothing on TV to watch at all. Suddenly the prospect of eating together without a distraction seemed awkward, and that was the alarm bell I needed. So we talked about things. I have been worried that our closeness has been slipping lately. We are well clued up on this stuff since we've been there before and completely and utterly lost all of our intimacy, and had no parsnips for like 2 years or something. Maybe longer, but most of that time I was housebound (sometimes bedbound) with an exhausting illness, so that wasn't so unusual. Anyway, last time (as veteran readers will know), we ended up having psycho-parsnip counselling (hahaha, this paragraph is making me giggle - oooh, the dangers of a psychotic parsnip to a marriage, hehehe!!) and that lasted a whole YEAR before things were getting back to normal in that dept. But things had got pretty bad. We definitely don't want to get to that state again, and we will if we don't encourage some intimacy in our relationship. Lack of intimacy breeds lack of intimacy, just as the opposite is true. We learnt this the hard way and now we know the signs and how to fix it. But it was a difficult path, doing that last time.

Soooo we decided we are too knackered for parsnips anyway, and besides parsnips seem to be just the most unappealing um, vegetable (!!) ever since Arthur was born. (by the way, I absolutely ADORE real parsnips! Just wanted to point that out!)

So we chatted. We are going to try to have some time in the evenings when Arthur is asleep, to talk about things other than Arthur and parenting and Neil's obsession of must-provide-for-family-with-large-house-that-we'll-never-afford! This obsession is turning him into a nervous wreck about our family's future, which is crazy, since we DO NOT NEED a huge house to be a happy and satisfied family. Of coures it would be nice, and I know it's quite normal for men (breadwinner-type-men, that is) to have this as their main concern after becoming fathers, but he seems to have gone into overdrive with it, and is burning himself out worrying about finances (that aren't in any trouble at the moment) and houses and schools, etc. I love that he's so thoughful and anxious to provide well for me and for his children, but I do wish he could let go just for a few hours a day so that he doesn't go crazy with it. And also realise that he doesn't NEED to go to such extremes to provide all that his family need.

Anyway. We ended up reminiscing (sp?!) about how we started dating - awww that was so nice to talk about! I haven't thought about those days for a while, and it's been even longer since I spent time chatting to Neil about it. It worked because we both felt much more close and mushy by the end of the evening :) We are going to set time aside to do more good-times reminiscing soon! I read once that if you are finding yourself always irritated or making note of negative things about your spouse, you should focus on positive things about them and remember the reasons that you fell in love with them. I need to do that, because I do get so that I find fault with Neil a lot, and it's not fair of me to do that. So I thought the reminiscing thing would work in the same way, for both of us, and I'm glad it did :)

When I told my mum I have my smear on Monday, she (knowing the issues behind it) told me I just needed a weekend of hot parsnips. *shudder* I love being close to my mum, but there's something soooo ewww-y about having her say stuff like that to me! And it's not going to happen. Hot parsnips, that is. Hot WATER BOTTLES, maybe! I hope my back gets better soon...

Okay one last thing (Arthur has been asleep another hour now!), I am still not planning to give Arthur any solids till 7 months, but during the week I was eating an (organic!) apple and he was sitting on my lap. He started reaching for it, and then I realised how wonderful it was, because it was the first time I was eating food for ME, and it was safe for me to share with him in its "adult" form!! Woohoo! So when he acted interested, I just handed it to him! Yay! I made sure there were no loose bits for him to choke on, and it was a firm, crisp apple so he couldn't bite bits out of it with his no-teeth. He seemed THRILLED that I gave him some of my food! He sucked and sucked on that apple, where I had taken a bite and it was juicy. It was lovely knowing the juice was perfectly safe and fine for him too :) Now and then I bent down and took a bite from the other side while he sucked on "his" side! It was lovely. After I was done, he didn't want to let go of the apple, so I sat him on the floor with cushions behind him incase he launched himself backwards, and gave him the apple to hold and suck on. He dropped it in his lap once, but went straight to work picking it up again, and it went right back in his mouth.

Here are a couple of photos of Arthur enjoying his first real grown-up food!... (not that he actually ate any, but I'm sure he got some good juice!)...

See his hair? It's still so fine but it is much thicker than before. It's much easier for us to see his cow-lick at the front now, as the hair grows in more. But the top won't lie flat for anything. In the bath it just goes curly if it's wet, rather than lie flat. But the sides and back lie flat very nicely. Except that he still has a huge bald patch at the back! When will that EVER grow out?!

Okay that is all for now. I will write again soon. Must get Mr. Arthur weighed again soon to keep track of his enormous growth spurt! :)

Longings and improvements!

Right now I have the most ENORMOUS craving. I am absolutely longing to slip between clean cool sheets on a comfy spacious bed, in a relaxing-coloured room with gentle light bathing me through the drawn curtains at the window. The room would be the perfect temperature with good ventilation, and I would need to have an especially soft and fresh-smelling pillow too. The craving requires that I have absolute freedom of movement in my bed, and noooo pressure whatsoever on time. In fact, I wouldn’t even need to think about what the time is. I would just breathe in and out, one delicious relaxing breath after another, and drift off into blissful sleep. And not wake till my body naturally felt like waking. Seriously, the longing is so strong that it’s like a physical ache. And it’s all I wanted to write here today. But now that I’m here, I’ll write about other stuff while Arthur is napping. I could be spending my time trying to fulfil my craving, but the time element would be non-existent, since Arthur tends to need resettling, or even finish a nap at the half-hour point, so I wouldn’t even be able to get fully relaxed in that time I think. I am a wound-up person I think. It takes me ages to relax and fall asleep. How I long for that sleep. I think about that fantasy a lot, but sometimes I feel guilty for it, like because I am wishing for it, that must mean I’m wishing Arthur was not around to prevent me. Which I would never contemplate wishing. But anyway.

Actually, just in the time it has taken me since leaving him peacefully asleep, to go to the loo, think about sleep, and switch the computer on to write this down, Arthur is pretty much at the half-hour point of his nap, so I may have to stop any moment now. He has napped well today. It’s 4pm, and he has now had 3 hours sleep in 3 naps, including a 1.5 hour nap this morning (no half-hour stirring or anything!). He usually only takes 3 hours even if he has the opportunity for more, so I would expect that he’ll wake after half an hour (now) and not need or want to go back to sleep till bedtime. If that happens maybe I’ll save this in Word for later, and post it with my other waffle this evening.

I’m tired. But Arthur is sleeping better. He has four hour gaps between every night waking now – and they are getting predictable too. His wake times are usually (approx.) 10.30pm, after a 6.30 or 7pm sleep time, 2am, and 6am. The 2am waking involves a nappy change though, and he wakes up completely then. This means with the nappy and the feed and his wakefulness, he (and I) are usually awake for an hour before he’s asleep again and I can drop back off to sleep. The good news about this wake-time is that for the last two nights I have just fed him and left him to it, rolling about and babbling on the bed next to me, and he has gradually quietened down and gone to sleep by himself! Last night I was so excited about it that I even stayed awake to watch how he did it! Not that I could see, because lately we have started turning off every light in the house for bed. Until recently we have had the landing light on low, or the lamp on downstairs, just to throw a little bit of light up to the bedroom, so we could make out Arthur’s face for things like feeds and resettling, etc. And nappy changing.

It’s weird dealing with him in the night in pitch darkness. But I like it. It’s sort of…. instinctive. It makes me feel so accomplished! I hear him but it’s so dark that I can’t even make out his shape in the bed next to me. When I hear him making little whimpery noises and sounding like he’s waking, I undo a bra-flap and roll towards his sound, and feel for his body with one hand. When I find him I pull his body so that he’s on his side facing me. Usually by the time I have him on his side, his mouth has found me and latched on. Then all I can sense is the feel and sound of him drinking my milk, and the smell of it on his breath if I cradle him close to me and bend my head to his. I feel his silky little hands exploring my arms and patting and stroking me sleepily. I feel his soft hair against my cheek as I bow my head over his. It is the most perfect intimacy ever invented. It is more intimate than I ever found sex to be. For me, it is the most intimate human experience I ever had. I love it. I like that the darkness is making me more aware of this precious experience, and even more intimate in my bonding experience with my son. I like how it sharpens my other senses so that I notice things about night nursing that didn’t seem that apparent before.

Last night I was so excited that Arthur was actually falling asleep (from fully awake) by himself next to me in bed, that I kept flashing the clock light on to see him in the dim glow, just to get the thrill of seeing him curled on his side, and his little peaceful face with closed eyes and fists tucked up for sleep under his chin. I had nothing to do with it!! He did it all by himself, and whoop-de-do, the nasty jail-bed sat empty at the foot of our bed, whilst my cutie and I lay side by side in the big bed, just as I had always wanted it to be! Yay! I hope his sleep keeps improving and that his gaps get longer, but right now it is much improved. If only I was organised enough to go to bed earlier in the evening, maybe I wouldn’t feel so tired anymore. Arthur is actually only waking twice in my night now, so that is manageable. Although last night he woke at 4.30 as well, not sure why. I think he was a little chilly. When I told my mum how excited I was that he was sleeping better and told her his wake times, she was aghast that he was still doing “all that waking”!! I was a bit deflated at that, because it really is so much better, and I have read time and time again that it’s very common for breastfed babies (esp. co-sleeping babies) to wake once or twice a night for a feed still at one year of age. So I’m not worried about two night wakings. He now sleeps very easily when he finishes feeding (except when we wake him right up to change his nappy, tsk!), and usually only nurses for about 10 minutes on one side. He doesn’t really seem to have fully woken in the first place.

He is still asleep! That makes it a 45 minute nap so far. I am not too bothered about him sleeping any longer since I know he took all the sleep he usually needs today already. When he wakes, if it’s still this early we might go out for a walk in the park. But that means driving to the park, which is kind of a hassle. Or maybe we should go out and pick out a meal for dinner from the supermarket? Either way, an activity out of the house like that should take us nicely up to when Neil gets home from work and Arthur’s bedtime right after that. I like it when days go like this!

Oh I know what I meant to mention last entry! Inspired by Jemma and Jaya’s swimming experience, I decided a few weeks ago to look into baby swimming classes for Arthur. I did some research and decided that a good one to go with would be Aquatots (is this who you went with, Jemma?). Check out their website to see what Arthur will be doing and for photos of babies underwater in their classes! Today I phoned them to find out availability for the nearest few pools to us for the term beginning in July. I want to start with Arthur as soon as possible, and preferably not wait till the October term. My nearest pools don’t have a July term, but the lady says they have a new pool in Wimbledon (easy drive) with availability for beginners in July! The only thing is, it’s Sunday mornings only, and that clashes with church, so I’m not sure what to do. I want him to start in July. We seem to have missed church for the last month or two. But I always plan on going, so I don’t want to arrange something that will prevent that. Decisions, decisions. Anyway I will keep you posted, but Arthur will definitely be starting those classes sooner or later! Yay! I can’t wait!! Jaya’s underwater photo was so lovely, I can’t wait to post one of Arthur underwater! I think he’ll love it. He seems to love water, and doesn’t cry if he puts his face under by accident. He is used to wafting around in deep baths, so I think he’ll love it.

Oh I think he is waking now. I heard little mumblings coming from the bedroom, hehe! Oh bums, it’s raining outside. Not so good for a walk. Hmmm. Maybe we’ll go to the supermarket. Yikes, the rain just turned to torrential hail! Definitely strike that walk! I think I’ll post this now, since I managed to get so much typed, and make another entry soon to post the photos I took yesterday and talk about other stuff :)

Sleep and solids and hair and stuff

Thank you for all the nice messages about Arthur’s chubs! Hehe! He is scrummy :) Eiluned, thank you for telling me what cariad means! And thank you for calling me it! :)

Well I am so slack at emails and guestbooks once AGAIN. I get so many nice messages and then don’t return the favour, but honestly it’s not personal! I mostly get the chance to read my favourite diaries, and if I don’t then I catch up at the first opportunity. Once or twice I have opened a guestbook to leave a message and then Arthur has woken up, so I never really write them. Sorry to my friends who support me so well and who could also do with my support back – I have plenty of “time” to pray while I nurse Arthur or lie awake trying to get to sleep, so that is my time to lend some support by praying for you. Maybe when Arthur sleeps long and predictable naps I will get more messages written? Although I guess I will probably find something to do with the time, like housework. Ugh, this house needs soooo much work!!

Anyway.

Arthur is signing milk all OVER the place, now that he’s done it once!! The next day he signed it four times over the course of the day, and three times the day after. Today he has signed it countless times. I don’t know if he really wants milk every time that he’s signed it today, but I always offer him some. He seems soooo excited about making the sign – he does it over and over and makes the cutest face, sort of like a michievious grin with his shoulders hunched up and his little fist pumping the milk sign, hehehe! He’s such a cutie :)

We went to see my SIL (Neil’s sister) and her hubby on Sunday – they are expecting their first baby on June 9th – soooo close now!!! I am so excited. I think she is having a girl, but I am just guessing really. She isn’t quite as big as I was at 38 weeks, but her hubby is a reeeally big man. Tall and stocky and heavy. So I figure if they were having a boy, he would be likely heavier than Arthur was, and looking at her, I’m not sure her baby currently weighs what Arthur does. But yeah, guesswork, plus I don’t really know what I’m talking about. So. We’ll see soon!!! It was so nice to visit them! They loved seeing Arthur, and he was terribly sociable as always :) He got to sit on his cousin’s bottom, haha! He sat on SIL’s bump whilst standing on her lap, and of course with the baby being head down, that meant he was sitting on his cousins butt. We had a chuckle about that. And got it on camcorder for when they are cringing and blushing at a large family gathering in their teens. Heh. I am so excited. Arthur’s first cousin. MY first niece or nephew!! Woohoo :)

We saw all round their new house and the decorating they are doing. All their new baby stuff sits around the place in boxes and Mothercare bags. Ahhh it brings it all back! Such an exciting time! They are sooooo excited, and they seemed almost like little children showing us everything, they were that thrilled and eager about it all! It was cute. I feel so old now, even though that was me 7 months ago. I feel like, “Aw, aren’t they cute. They have nooo idea, do they?!” It’s wonderful, but man oh man, nothing can prepare you for parenthood. Even if you get told. Or research it. Or happen to be an easy-going, take-life-as-it-comes person. Or anything. You think you know, but you don’t. But it’s wonderful. I wish I could press rewind and live it again, because I can’t ever be pregnant for the first time and give birth for the first time and be a brand new mummy again. There’s something so extra-special about the firstness of it. But I can’t WAIT to do it all again – I know it will be just as special, just in different ways.

Anyway. It did make me broody as I thought it would, but not as much as I’d expected. In some ways it made me remember how much we’ve been through in the past 7 months (good and bad) and just thinking about it makes me tired, though happy! So thinking of doing it again like, tomorrow, is…. tiring. To say the least!

BIL was holding Arthur on his lap, and we were all sitting round talking about stuff, when we got on to the subject of baby signing. We told them how Arthur just signed milk for the first time yesterday, and all of a sudden Arthur leaned forward on BIL’s lap and stuck his arm out and SIGNED IT!! Clever boy! I don’t know if it’s possible or not for him to understand the word enough to make the sign, just randomly like that, so I guess he coincidentally happened to be hungry. He had not nursed for 3 or 4 hours though, so I’m pleased that he told me about it! We all did the gasp-in-amazement thing and told him he was a clever boy, and I signed milk back to him and whipped my top up and nursed him. They didn’t seem to mind, which is good. I don’t intend to creep off to other rooms to nurse him in family gatherings, so I’m glad nobody in the family seems to bat an eyelid when I whip a breast out! He was too interested in the conversation to nurse properly so he didn’t get much of a feed.

Later we headed home (a 50 minute drive) and it was almost Arthur’s bedtime at that point. It was 2 hours after he had that so-so feed, so he must have been really hungry by then, given that he had a huge gap before it. Poor boy. The saddest thing happened, which I hadn’t really prepared for. On the motorway on the way home, miles from anywhere to stop, Arthur signed milk, clear as day. I couldn’t do squat about it :( Poor Arthur! I didn’t know whether to sign back or not, as I didn’t want to confuse him with signing it and not offering him the breast. In the end I did sign back but said I would nurse him soon. Which sucks, because he can’t understand that. He kept signing it, and eventually cried and cried :( We were about to get to a place where we could stop when he fell asleep. He was so tired. So we kept going. He napped till we got home, and when we got there we changed him for bed and I made the milk sign (he didn’t bother asking this time, poor love), and nursed him in bed. After he finished it was so cute – Neil was standing in the doorway, and Arthur finally popped off the breast after a huge feed, rolled onto his back, saw Neil in the doorway, and gave him the happiest of his huge range of smiles, and made the milk sign over and over at him! He has started doing this after most of his nursing sessions now, especially if he has enjoyed having some milk – he likes to roll away, look me in the eye, smile contentedly and tell me that he’s had milk :) If Neil comes in over the next few minutes he will do it all over again to tell Daddy about his milk too! I take that as a huge compliment, because it’s like he’s telling me how much he enjoyed having his milk and how pleased he was to nurse. It’s almost like a thank-you. It’s so precious. HE’S so precious. Seriously. He did it tonight too before he went to sleep. It’s really special because I have never signed milk AFTER a feed, only before. I like that he wants to communicate to me that he’s had milk and enjoyed it, after he’s done :)

I have signed “more” with him quite a few times now, but I’m discovering that it’s not a particularly easy one to find the appropriate moment for. The only thing I might ask him if he wants more of, is milk. And I’m making the milk sign for that. I don’t want to confuse him and make him think this is a new different sign for milk! Once we used it with a game we were playing, to ask if he wanted more of the game. But really, it’s not very consistent. Neil signed “bubbles” with him as he opened the bubbles to blow some, so I did that today too. But the two-handed signs are difficult, because usually we’re holding something at the same time as wanting to sign about it, or we’re holding Arthur and needing to sign with the free hand, which can’t be done with a two-hand sign. I have signed “daddy” to him a few times, for example when Neil is getting home from work. “Milk” is so easy.

Arthur’s sleep has been weird today. I don’t know why. He has seemed more tired than normal, so maybe he’s feeling a bit off colour? I have been crazy-tired today, so much so that I have not been able to do anything with Arthur most of the day. Which sucks. I get so that I don’t have the strength to hold him for long, or the brain to play actively with him long either. We have spent a lot of today on the bed. Which also sucks. I feel bad, but I am so so so so so tired. Arthur woke around 6am today, and I was just feeling ill with tiredness, so Neil got up with him after they lay in bed for about 45 minutes, and I went to the spare room for more sleep. Neil woke me at 7.45 because he needed to get ready for work. But I just couldn’t stand up for tiredness, so I went back into our bed with Arthur. He seemed sleepy and fussy so I nursed him, and he was asleep by 8.15. Weird time for him to nap. But anyway. I went to sleep nursing him, and he woke at 9am. I couldn’t get my eyes to focus at ALL, I just can’t get over how tired I have been today. Arthur rolled about all over the bed and fussed and that, but I couldn’t stay conscious, and only came round if he squawked or yelled or something. He was fully awake and probably wanting to get up, and I felt bad for that. BUT. When I woke up it was 10.30, and the last time I had looked at the clock it was 9.30. When I looked to my side, there was Arthur, fast asleep! So that’s GREAT because he went to sleep by himself from being awake and active after a nap! And not so good because hmmm, why did he do that? Is he okay? Hmmm. I got up and Arthur stayed asleep till 11.15am! I have no idea when he fell asleep, it could have been 5 minutes before I woke, or an hour. So I can’t really tell how much sleep he has had today.

After that nap, we didn’t do too much. I wanted to take him out but I didn’t have anywhere to take him, and I didn’t have any energy at all. It was raining all day today, and strong winds as well, so that would have sucked for walking. Not that I had the energy for a walk. And there was nothing that needed doing out of the house. So we stayed in. I feel bad (again) because Arthur basically revolved around me today, and I always want it to be ME revolving around HIM, not the other way around. He sat on my lap at the computer for a short while, and I checked my emails and read some diaries. How dull for Arthur. Although he did like patting the keyboard! But the novelty of that activity is starting to wear off these days. And I put the TV on for a while. Which I nevvver wanted to do. But I have. Just so tired. I don’t want to put him down, because then there’s nothing to do but also he’s not in my arms. He has toys, but they can’t keep him happy for long, and I feel like he should be in my arms unless he gets fussy and wants to be put down. Which is never. He loves to be in my arms. But he’s soooo heavy, that I find it hard when I’m tired, to hold him for long.

But by 1.30 he was tired AGAIN, and signing milk, so we went to bed and he fell asleep for 30 minutes. After that he was kind of cranky and although I could make him smile and giggle easily as always, he was not quite as cheery as usual. I blew bubbles for him on the bed, and cracked out a new toy – well, it’s actually the oldest toy he owns, because it was Neil’s when he was a little boy! It is a music box type of thing, where you twist the key at the back and it plays music and a little man with jointed legs dances and makes lots of clattery sounds with his feet. It was bought for Neil in Germany, when they lived there for a while because his dad was posted out there (Army). Neil’s mum kept it carefully all these years because it was Neil’s favourite. It’s still in great condition actually. Anyway when we were last in Yorkshire visiting his parents, she gave it to us to take for Arthur. It has been sitting in a bag since then, and I finally got it out today. Arthur LOVES it!!! But he wants to grab it with both hands and pull the see-through front casing off it and then ram it into his mouth. So it is like wrestling an octopus trying to sit with Arthur and just WATCH the dancing man from a safe distance! He doesn’t like to sit still and watch when he wants to get hold of something!

Anyway, at 3.30pm Arthur was acting increasingly tired and cranky, so I put him back down in bed and nursed him, and he went to sleep. He slept 3.45 to 4.15, and then I nursed him again, thinking he’d be sure to wake up properly after a feed, but he went back to sleep around 4.30, and didn’t wake again till 5.20. Lots of sleep today. I hope he is okay and that this is nothing to worry about.

He is definitely getting better at learning to sleep by himself though, and I am proud that it is a gentle and stress-free process for him with no tears. It’s slow, but I can already see the progress, so that is really encouraging! Last night he woke to feed at around 2am, and Neil changed his nappy before I nursed him. But then he fussed and rolled about and stuff, and I was so tired that I dozed off WHILE he was fussing (like this morning)! When I woke it was 6am, so he had put himself back to sleep even from fussing in the night! Yay Arthur!

Yesterday he had appalling naps – only two 30 minute naps in the whole day! Late in the afternoon I tried him one last time for a nap, but he wouldn’t sleep. I rigged the camcorder up on top of the wardrobe to film him (and me, next to him) in the darkened room, so that I could watch it back later and see if there was anything that became obvious from that different viewpoint that I could change to help him nap. I took 15 minutes of footage, which was so funny when played back with the fast forward button pressed! It was like a time-lapse film, and it was so funny to see Arthur’s movements and his activity at a glance. He rolled this way and that constantly, and never ever stopped moving his feet. They were like little vibrating blurs through the whole clip, hehe! He rolled right and left, from back to front, and front to back, each roll changing his angle and position on the bed, till he had roly-poled his way down his side of the bed to the very foot of it, where he lay on his back holding his feet for a while and rolling now and then, and then fiddled with the wood on the bed-end, and then roly-poled his way back up the bed towards me, where he inched closer and closer until he was latching onto my t-shirt. I nursed him, and that was interesting played back, because he nurses, then leans away, then nurses, then leans away, over and over and over – such a fidget bum! And then it’s really obvious when he’s finally done, because he rolls his whole body away to the other side of the bed, and then more rolling and feet-holding/tugging, etc. He was soooo active and not wanting to sleep! Maybe he is making up for that today? Maybe that’s all it is.

But then he had a great night, as far as these things go for us! I put him to bed a little after 6pm, as he was tired out. He was fast asleep by 6.30 – hooray!! I like 6.30 for a baby-bedtime. I used to feel it was too early, but then The No-Cry Sleep Solution said that babies actually NEED an early bedtime. They do best with a bedtime well before 8pm, apparently, and it says many are actually ready for a night’s sleep at 6 or 6.30. Arthur is definitely one of these. He is tired by 6pm no matter when he last nap ended (even if it ended after 5pm), and is fussing and crying if we are disorganised and get him into bed as late as 7pm. It makes no difference to his wake time, that he goes to bed early. He just needs to end the day at that kind of hour. Otherwise it’s just too long a day. I like to aim for 6.30 sleeping, but lately he gets in bed at that time and it takes him 20 or 30 minutes of nursing and stuff for him to be asleep. When we were trying to leave him to sleep by himself recently, he would still be awake, exhausted and upset around 8pm. Noooo good. He does need a big feed at bedtime so obviously he needs time enough to do that after getting in bed. Maybe I should put him to bed earlier? But then Neil wouldn’t see him after getting home from work. Both my boys like that part of the day, so that’s no good. 6.30, then. That’s the best time. As time goes by I know he will fall asleep quicker, and then he’ll sleep earlier.

But yesterday was good in that I nursed him around 5.30, so he had his big feed early, and only needed a little to help him feel sleepy at bedtime. I was amazed how fast he went to sleep! I took him off the breast before he was asleep, and he didn’t protest, just went off to sleep. He woke briefly at 7 and cried a bit so I nursed him for like 2 minutes and he was asleep again. Then he didn’t wake till 10.30. I am happy because in that time he rolled onto his tummy and stirred, but he just rearranged himself and stayed asleep!!! Yay! This is a breakthrough for Arthur, because all this rolling has been interfering with his sleep lately. Anyway, I nursed him at 10.30 – big hungry feed but only from one side. He went right back to sleep easily. Then he didn’t wake again till 2am! Yay again! And after that it was 6am. Much better.

I don’t know how tonight will go – it’s always a case of wait-and-see. He took ages to fall asleep tonight and I guess it was just after 7.30 when he finally went off. Neil rocked him to sleep and when he stirred right after that I nursed him, but took him off the breast before he was fully asleep. He woke just now at 10ish, and I nursed him. Ten minutes later he rolled onto his tummy and stayed fully asleep!!! Yay!! He rolled with his leg up against the side of the bed (can’t be comfy!) so I went in and lifted his bottom half and laid it straight with his top half, and he lifted his head sleepily, but just put it back down and continued sleeping! I am so thrilled. A few nights ago Neil and I were having a whispered discussion about what to do about Arthur rolling in his sleep, after what felt like the 50th time that he had rolled and woken crying and upset, and then was hard to settle. It just happened over and over. We were debating whether or not to wedge something against him on one side to prevent him rolling onto his tummy, or just to let him roll and wake until he got used to it. It seemed harder to do the latter option, but that’s what we decided to do. He rolled, woke and cried. We nursed or rocked him. He rolled, woke and cried. We nursed or rocked him. He rolled, woke and cried. Etc. We just waited it out. Now, just a few days later, he rolls, stirs, and settles himself back to sleep! Yay! I sometimes do try patting or rubbing his back and shh-ing but he often just cries when I do that, so I mostly nurse him. Sometimes he is in the mood to let me just rub his back and goes back to sleep. I go by his moods for things really.

Ooh I noticed something else about his sleep – well, related to it anyway. As part of his bedtime routine, once I have darkened the room, I always sing the same lullaby in a quiet voice (it happens to be “Speed Bonny Boat” because I find it relaxing) and just lately I have noticed Arthur go noticeably quiet and calm and sleepy while I am singing it. I am usually doing other things too, while I sing – maybe changing him for bed or giving him a back rub or something. But if he’s on his back watching me put his night boots on while I sing, he will watch me closely with the calmest expression, and then start rubbing his eyes. It’s so sweet! And exactly what I’d hoped for. In the night a couple of nights ago, when he rolled and woke all upset, sometimes I rubbed his back and sang Speed Bonny Boat softly, and even if he had been protesting at first, he just came over all sleepy and his head went heavy and dropped back onto the bed, and he went to sleep! So we are making lots of breakthroughs with the sleep. He is definitely learning, slowly but surely, to sleep by himself, and in various different ways, so I am thrilled! I hope it will start to lead to longer stretches at night, for Arthur and for us. I hope that happens soon. But I’m sure it will eventually. Once he has completely learned to resettle himself back to sleep when he wakes at night, I think things will get a lot easier.

Oh I have talked for a LONG time about sleep! And talking of sleep, it is getting late and I don’t want to be as tired tomorrow as I have been today. I had better go to bed and hope for a gooood night! Let me see, were there any other major things I wanted to write about first?

Hmmm…

Oh yes, I am fed up of fiddling about trying Arthur on solids when he is clearly not interested for now. I know he liked banana, but I’m not entirely convinced that his system felt nice the following day or two. I had been starting to feel like, “Oh it has been a few days since I tried Arthur on some solids! I had better get it together and try something else” Which was basically feeling more and more like pressure. And I know he was feeling something close to pressure too, even though I was trying to keep it low-key and fun. So it gives me great relief to have to decided to think no more about solids until he reaches 7 months old. Which is in only 8 days now (wow!), but anyway, I came to this conclusion before the weekend so that gave me 2 weeks of not having to even think about it. Which was nice! And then I will try him on things again. Eventually he will be interested, I figure. If he’s not, after I’ve tried him on things here and there for a week or two, I will leave it again until the next month-milestone. I have been lurking on various parenting boards and reading some very interesting discussions about weaning experiences, and it seems surprisingly common for mothers to just ignore all the pressure and advice, and WAIT till their child seems ready. Which in MANY cases is older than 7 or 8 months. One or two of them had exclusively breastfed babies at 12 months old. Two ladies had babies who only really started taking in amounts of solids worth counting at around 18 months. All their nourishment came from breastmilk. These mothers had their babies’ iron levels checked at 9 and 18 months, and they were perfect. So I feel better, and more able to relax about it. Man. There can be a lot of pressure out there. Intended or otherwise. I hope that if Arthur is not interested in solids till he’s like 12 months old, I don’t get flamed left, right and centre the whole while. I was surprised at how relieved I felt to think of waiting. Like a physical weight came off my shoulders. And mothers shouldn’t be made to feel like that about instinctive parenting. Tsk.

Anyway, no solids here! Not till 7 months. And then no pressure, because we’ll see how we go. He is growing enormously still, at the 90th percentile, and obviously needing absolutely nothing more than my milk. I agree that it’s good for babies to experience the textures of food and the social interaction of mealtimes. But Arthur hates the textures. I know babies accept them more as they get used to them when you persist with solids, but he obviously won’t hate them forever, so I should be happy to wait till he’s more interested in feeling new textures. I shouldn’t be all, “No, no! You’ll like that gravely slop against your soft pallet if I persist at putting it there long enough!” I mean, really. That’s what it boils down to, right? I wouldn’t like that. Arthur doesn’t like that. I won’t persist if he doesn’t like it. Eventually it is sure to be an interesting curiosity. He will want to follow it. I wouldn’t blame him if he never had any interest in slop of varying lumpiness, no matter how good it tasted. Even if I have to wait till he’s reached the stage where he gets to pick up food off our plates and eat it as it is – now that would be FAR more interesting and appealing wouldn’t it?! Also better for the social mealtime thing. Urgh. Annoying issue.

I can’t believe there’s only a week left till Arthur is 7 months old! He is almost crawling. He rocks and rocks on his tummy, but not with his knees under him yet. He is pushed up so high on his arms when he rocks, that the only part of him in contact with the floor/bed/wherever, is his nappy. His tummy is clear of the ground now! And his legs are up in the air behind him, as ever! He bounces and bounces like that, not a slow rocking, but fast wobbling bounces! I should get him on the camcorder doing that so I can show you.

Oh we have the cot-bed up at last. It FILLS our bedroom at the end of the bed. I put him in it yesterday as an introduction to the thing, and he smiled and smiled, and did his bounce thing on his tummy in there. But he smiles like that at anything new. He is such a smiley baby. He looked mildly panicked if Neil or I went out of sight, even for a moment. I hate bars on things. I hate how the sides of a cot are a barrier between a mother and her baby. It’s just not natural. So *I* hate the thing, but hey ho. I know it will come in handy at some point. Arthur turns himself around in there on his tummy until he is face-to-face with the side bars, and then tries to lift his hand up to grasp a bar, which makes his head drop suddenly, and WHAM! Big ole red bruise above the eye and sweet boy crying his little heart out :( Stoopid darn jail-bed. He has never had any restrictions around him like that so he is whacking his head on the sides a lot. I know if I leave him in there frequently he’ll get used to the area and how to avoid banging his head, but really. Does that seem remotely natural or right?!! I don’t want to put him in it. Ever. Again. But I know we’ll use it eventually, and maybe even soon. Like when he is crawling OFF the kingsize bed during nap time, heh.

What Neil and I both agree we need, is more space. We have been looking at houses in the property papers, but we can’t afford anything bigger than the house we’re in. Neil has got an offer of a job change in his company, which is GREAT, as it has good prospects further down the line. He is taking it. But there will be no pay rise. In August he does come up for pay review, so maybe he’ll get a little extra then, but the company isn’t doing so well at the moment so he thinks maybe not. Soooo the houses will have to stay in the paper. And we stay here. Which is fine. We have a sweet little house, all of our own. We are a little family. We don’t need anything more. But we choose to family-bed, not use the small bedroom as a nursery. So we need a big master bedroom, and we don’t have one. We need to somehow get rid of our wardrobes in our bedroom, because they take up soooo much room. And then put the bedframe (huge) into storage. We just need an empty room! We would ideally like to put our mattress on the floor and buy a single-bed mattress to lay next to it, and that would become our family bed. We like sleeping on the floor, and our little ones would not come to any harm if they rolled toward the edges. And we would have lots of space in bed! We could co-sleep with two if it came to that. But we need the wardrobe space for all the clothes and stuff that they house, and they won’t fit in any other room. And we can’t store the bedframe easily. And storage facilities cost too much money. So poo. But we’re still working on it. We are both very serious about career-type co-sleeping, hehe! We always planned to co-sleep long-term.

Okay I was meant to be going to bed. Tsk. I’m sure there were other things. But I need sleep now. Will try to update again soon. No photos today – I took a couple at SIL’s but they didn’t come out well. Arthur’s hair is suddenly growing in so fast and thick, so I’ll take some more soon! The hair on top WILL NOT lie flat! It sticks up straight! I figured it would lie down as it got longer, as the sides have done, but the whole of the top of his head is springy, and an inch long! I think he may have my wavy hair, or a tiny part of it, because his hair does go quite curly/wavy in the bath like mine does. Neil’s is dead straight, so it’s not Neil’s hair. Anyway, bed! And more soon :)