Having a baby I have found leaves a person with very little time. Things kind of go like this: Wake up to baby crying, change baby, feed baby, try to get baby to fall asleep again, while baby is asleep try to get things done, these things may include: cleaning, eating, sleeping or trying to de-stress. Baby usually wakes up during this time and everything starts again. This is why I boggle at the advice that you get as a new mom.
Sleep while your child is sleeping is something I have often heard. Problem is sleep is not something you can always do when you have other things that need to be done. Things like feeding yourself, doing laundry, washing bottles, washing dishes, trying to get the house looking somewhat presentable, etc. The feeding yourself part seems to be my greatest hurdle. My baby seems to have a inborn sense of when Mommy is trying to feed herself, because almost every time I start putting anything together for consumption is when he begins to fuss or flat out bawl. This has led me to wonder if the baby has some strange desire to keep me from eating. Logically I know this is not the case, but there is a part of me that wonders.
This leads me to my next topic, hysteria. When I was in high school I took a class where we covered Latin roots, prefixes and suffixes. And hyster was one that we discussed. The word hyster has to do with women, which is why hysterectomy refers to the removal of the uterus. It is also part of the word hysteria. This is because hysteria was generally attributed to women, or rather only women were the crazy ones, which is why they were not allowed to vote in ancient Greece and Rome. When I was younger I really wondered about this, women were just fine, there was nothing insane about them. Then I had a child.
Truthfully I was lucky, I went through In Vetro Fertilization (IVF) to get pregnant and during the fertility treatments I did great! No crazed hormonally imbalanced woman going crazy all over everyone. Then I got pregnant and nothing really changed. I was good, even keel, absolutely fine. Then the baby came and suddenly the hormone change happened. I had mood swings, a stress level that was insane, I snapped at my husband, it was terrible. Then I got medicated and things began to calm down. But I began to see why women would be considered insane.
Thankfully in my medicated state I have two sides to me, an emotional side and a rational side. The rational side keeps me chugging along like a normal well adjusted person and the emotional side leaves me in a squirmy pile of goo over my cute baby. But thank goodness for that rational side, otherwise I would probably start to believe certain things that come to my mind. Things like: The baby doesn't want me to eat, or the baby doesn't want me to sleep, or the baby is out to get me, or the baby hates me because he cries half the times he looks at me, etc. My rational side grabs onto those thoughts and says, "Really? That makes no sense at all. The baby has no idea about you eating, the baby just needs something and is communicating the only way he knows how to at this point, by crying." But I can see how someone could easily go off the deep end if they started to believe the crazy thoughts that come into your head when you have just had a baby. And it makes me wonder about what comes next.
Showing posts with label Baby blues. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Baby blues. Show all posts
Wednesday, April 13, 2011
Wednesday, April 6, 2011
Meds, PPD and Memory
For those of you who know me really well, or who have followed my regular blog for years you will know that I have a huge sense of denial about depression. Maybe denial is not the word exactly, but I have refused the idea that I could need depression meds for years. The reason? My entire family has at some point or another been on depression medication. Growing up my mom has had a long battle with depression starting with Post Pardum Depression after my brother was born. I remember her telling me that she thought she was going crazy. Eventually she went to her doctor and was put on depression medication. Over the following years we discussed as a family the fact that depression was often hereditary and we wondered which of us children would have it at some point. We all got married and moved out and then my Dad was put on depression meds as well. Then my brother was and then my sister. My mom would talk to me and say that I should probably be on them as well since the rest of the family was. But I never felt like I needed to be.
I have always been a rather happy person, and never felt like I needed medication to regulate my emotions. Was it denial? I don't think so. I think I was really fine the way I was. Then I got pregnant and instead of going through a sea of emotions like many women do I sailed through pregnancy without a hitch. I was even keel when it came to my emotions. Then I gave birth and suddenly the dam broke and a flood of emotions ensued. I became a basket-case, I cried at everything, was angry at everything else and was so stressed and frustrated that I felt like I was falling apart. As my mother had said to me previously in my life, I felt like I was going crazy. My doctor had asked me if I needed depression meds, but I was in denial and told myself that I would just tough my way through it all, like I did with everything else in my life. It all came to a head one night, the baby had been crying for three hours straight, I had been struggling with breastfeeding, he was resisting the breast, my breasts hurt terribly, and I was at my wits end. Kevin came home and I gave him the baby and started to get ready to go to bed. He got a bottle ready and began to feed the baby and handed me the baby to see if feeding a happy baby would help me. But the baby was not happy, he was still upset and began crying like he had been all night long. I couldn't handle it anymore and in frustration, stress and probably some insanity I screamed back at the baby. The baby stopped crying, looked at me with this horrified look on his face and began crying harder. I knew then that something was seriously wrong with me. I told the baby I was sorry, put the baby down, and went to bed after promising my husband that I would call my doctor in the morning.
The next day I called my doctor and after talking to her for a bit she prescribed me some depression meds. I started taking them on the 11th of March I think. The next week my in laws came to visit which I thought would increase my stress but actually helped to reduce it. Though having visitors can be stressful, having them out to help with the baby helped reduce my stress quite a bit. And it gave the meds time to kick in. So now here I am feeling much better, less stressed, less frustrated and more clear headed, more able to enjoy my little baby. Now if only I could remember things.
It must be something about becoming a mother, my mom says it is from giving birth, but either way since having David I have been incredibly forgetful. To the point where I forget things I say, forget what I did the day before. Everything seems to just run together. Maybe it is due to lack of sleep. Maybe it is due to stress. Whatever is causing it though I must admit that I miss my memory.
I have always been a rather happy person, and never felt like I needed medication to regulate my emotions. Was it denial? I don't think so. I think I was really fine the way I was. Then I got pregnant and instead of going through a sea of emotions like many women do I sailed through pregnancy without a hitch. I was even keel when it came to my emotions. Then I gave birth and suddenly the dam broke and a flood of emotions ensued. I became a basket-case, I cried at everything, was angry at everything else and was so stressed and frustrated that I felt like I was falling apart. As my mother had said to me previously in my life, I felt like I was going crazy. My doctor had asked me if I needed depression meds, but I was in denial and told myself that I would just tough my way through it all, like I did with everything else in my life. It all came to a head one night, the baby had been crying for three hours straight, I had been struggling with breastfeeding, he was resisting the breast, my breasts hurt terribly, and I was at my wits end. Kevin came home and I gave him the baby and started to get ready to go to bed. He got a bottle ready and began to feed the baby and handed me the baby to see if feeding a happy baby would help me. But the baby was not happy, he was still upset and began crying like he had been all night long. I couldn't handle it anymore and in frustration, stress and probably some insanity I screamed back at the baby. The baby stopped crying, looked at me with this horrified look on his face and began crying harder. I knew then that something was seriously wrong with me. I told the baby I was sorry, put the baby down, and went to bed after promising my husband that I would call my doctor in the morning.
The next day I called my doctor and after talking to her for a bit she prescribed me some depression meds. I started taking them on the 11th of March I think. The next week my in laws came to visit which I thought would increase my stress but actually helped to reduce it. Though having visitors can be stressful, having them out to help with the baby helped reduce my stress quite a bit. And it gave the meds time to kick in. So now here I am feeling much better, less stressed, less frustrated and more clear headed, more able to enjoy my little baby. Now if only I could remember things.
It must be something about becoming a mother, my mom says it is from giving birth, but either way since having David I have been incredibly forgetful. To the point where I forget things I say, forget what I did the day before. Everything seems to just run together. Maybe it is due to lack of sleep. Maybe it is due to stress. Whatever is causing it though I must admit that I miss my memory.
Saturday, February 12, 2011
Breastfeeding
Davy breastfed twice during the last two feedings. He fed for probably about 30 minutes last night during his 3/4 am feeding time and then he did the same thing this morning at his 8/9 am feeding. I let him feed until he unlatched and then finished him off with the bottle. Considering that he hasn't breastfed regularly yet this is a big success for us. Not that it really makes things any easier. I still need to pump after he feeds, and I still need to make plans for when I have to go back to work. Which is at the beginning of March. I know I still have three weeks left (mostly) but it seems like my maternity leave is going by so quickly.
I don't really want to go back to work, even though it will be working from home still. I still don't feel like I have enough time in the day with everything the baby throws at me. Something that would seem like a quick little process turns into a big production. Take last night. My mom comes over so I can take Kevin's laptop to him at work since he forgot it at home. Baby wakes up while I am gone, so my mom feeds him and then he falls asleep. She leaves and like always after my parents leave, Davy wakes up. I change him, and then feed him again because he is acting hungry. He seems to finish eating so I go to put the bottle away, as I am in the kitchen he gets the "I am going to throw up" look on his face and then proceeds to throw up what looks like everything he ate while I fed him and while my mom fed him. (a huge waste of milk, ugh!) I go to clean him off and end up changing his diaper while I am at it, while doing that he proceeds to pee all over himself, so I end up having to give him a bath. By the time he is cleaned, changed, in new clothes and calmed down a huge amount of time has passed. All my plans for the night (cleaning the rest of the kitchen, making bread, making a dinner for myself other than a frozen meal) has gone out the window.
And currently the little guy is crying, but I am still hooked up to the pump. So finish pumping and then see if I can get him to go back to sleep.
I don't really want to go back to work, even though it will be working from home still. I still don't feel like I have enough time in the day with everything the baby throws at me. Something that would seem like a quick little process turns into a big production. Take last night. My mom comes over so I can take Kevin's laptop to him at work since he forgot it at home. Baby wakes up while I am gone, so my mom feeds him and then he falls asleep. She leaves and like always after my parents leave, Davy wakes up. I change him, and then feed him again because he is acting hungry. He seems to finish eating so I go to put the bottle away, as I am in the kitchen he gets the "I am going to throw up" look on his face and then proceeds to throw up what looks like everything he ate while I fed him and while my mom fed him. (a huge waste of milk, ugh!) I go to clean him off and end up changing his diaper while I am at it, while doing that he proceeds to pee all over himself, so I end up having to give him a bath. By the time he is cleaned, changed, in new clothes and calmed down a huge amount of time has passed. All my plans for the night (cleaning the rest of the kitchen, making bread, making a dinner for myself other than a frozen meal) has gone out the window.
And currently the little guy is crying, but I am still hooked up to the pump. So finish pumping and then see if I can get him to go back to sleep.
Wednesday, January 26, 2011
Nursing strike, baby blues, and peace at last
Since the second day we had him Davy has been fussier than he was on the first day. At first we thought that it had to do with his circumcision, but when we took him in to his first doctor's appointment on Monday we discovered it was because he was hungry. My milk hadn't come in yet, and he wasn't getting as much nourishment as he needed. The doctor advised us to supplement with formula until my milk supply came in. So we went home and gave him his first bottle. And then my milk came in so I pumped and we gave him some of the pumped breast milk in a bottle, and then later Kevin gave him another bottle of formula, in total he had four bottles of formula/breast milk. Fast forward to 3 am on Tuesday morning, I am sitting in the living room with Davy, trying to get him to take my breast. And he wants nothing of it. One day, one day with bottles ruined it all. I ended up feeding him breast milk in a bottle and then taking all my stress out on Kevin. Poor Kevin. We didn't get back to sleep until about 7 am or so.
Tuesday I spent the day from 9 am to about 5 pm trying to get Davy to take the breast again. But he was having none of it. He screamed, and cried and screamed some more. Scrunched, angry baby face was the Davy face I was coming to know. Finally at 5 pm I had enough, I had done everything. I had called his doctor for help (advice, keep trying), I had looked online (advice, keep trying), I had tried every hold that La Leche League shows, I tried different latch techniques, I tried nursing skin to skin, I tried pumping first to get my milk flowing and then tried to get Davy to nurse, I tried putting milk on my nipple to entice him, I tried every single thing that I could find for advice to get my baby to nurse. And Davy just screamed harder and harder. I knew he was getting really hungry and nothing was working and he was starving.
So I finally broke down and did what Kevin told me all day not to do. I gave him a bottle of pumped milk. I let him drink until he wasn't screaming anymore then took the bottle away and offered my breast, and he latched on and sucked for about 1 minute tops, but he still latched on for the first time since we gave him his first bottle. Yay!! This achievement made me feel happier than it really should have, but it relieved so much stress for me. So now I have been pumping and feeding him off my pumped milk, and at each feeding pulling out the breast and having him sniff it and play with the nipple and sometimes even latch on for a bit. I figure it will take time before he actually nurses from me again, but hopefully it will happen eventually.
In the meantime I had to buy new pumps. The lactation consultant that I called on Tuesday called me back and we talked this morning about Davy's nursing strike and what I can do about it. And she told me I did exactly what I should have done. And that I am doing what I need to do to get him back on the breast. Then we talked about pumps, and I mentioned that my pump was getting about 2 oz from each breast in about an hour's time sometimes two hours. She told me I needed to get a hospital grade pump and that there were a few places I could call to rent one. The pumps she was speaking of were Medela pumps. Which I had thought about buying but hadn't because I couldn't conscience buying a breast pump for that much money. But the rental costs would have added up to that amount in just a few month's time. So today we went to the store and bought an electric Medela pump and a hand held manual Medela pump. On the way home I pumped each breast for 15 min with the hand held manual pump, and I got about 3 1/2 oz total breast milk. So tonight I have put together the electric pump and in a 15 min pump session I got another 4 oz total (2 oz from each breast). What a relief, and how nice that it went so quickly instead of the 2 hours I am used to with my other pump.
So hopefully Davy will eventually get off the nursing strike and get back on my breast, but in the meantime it is nice to finally have a quality pump that does what I need it to and will give Davy the food he needs until he does begin nursing again.
With everything that has been happening, what with Davy crying all the time (which he does much less now that he is getting enough food), and the nursing strike and just the stress of being a new parent, oh and the hormones too, I have been having the baby blues. For the past few days I have been so sleep deprived, so emotionally compromised, and so frustrated that I have basically been on the verge of tears 24/7. It is kind of funny what I find myself crying over. The dance numbers on the show "Live to Dance", commercials, the other night my parents and I watched the movie "Secretariat" and every time the horse ran I cried. Much of my crying has happened while I held Davy and wished that I could do something for him, this resulted in he and I sitting there crying together. It has made Kevin a good bit jumpy as he doesn't know when I am going to have a meltdown next.
Speaking of Kevin, he has been awesome with everything. Yes he has had his tough spots as well, times where he got just as frustrated as I was, but overall he has been very supportive. He has happily helped by holding the baby, changing diapers, taking care of the baby, feeding the baby (with bottles), comforting me when I have a meltdown, listening to me when I get frustrated, called for help when I really needed it (aka. got my parents to come by), and in general staying mostly calm and mostly reasonable through all this. Not all new fathers are like him, I know this. There are some fathers who refuse to change diapers, period. He changed all the diapers for Davy when we were in the hospital. I helped with one, but he was really the one that did them all. He has changed many diapers since we got Davy home as well. It really makes me appreciative for how awesome Kevin is. He really is one of my heroes.
All of this crazy baby stuff seems to finally be calming down a little, enough that I don't feel like I am going crazy anymore. And the little bit of calm makes me feel really good. Much better than I have felt for a while now. I don't think I will be completely ok for awhile still, but for now I will take what I can get.
Tuesday I spent the day from 9 am to about 5 pm trying to get Davy to take the breast again. But he was having none of it. He screamed, and cried and screamed some more. Scrunched, angry baby face was the Davy face I was coming to know. Finally at 5 pm I had enough, I had done everything. I had called his doctor for help (advice, keep trying), I had looked online (advice, keep trying), I had tried every hold that La Leche League shows, I tried different latch techniques, I tried nursing skin to skin, I tried pumping first to get my milk flowing and then tried to get Davy to nurse, I tried putting milk on my nipple to entice him, I tried every single thing that I could find for advice to get my baby to nurse. And Davy just screamed harder and harder. I knew he was getting really hungry and nothing was working and he was starving.
So I finally broke down and did what Kevin told me all day not to do. I gave him a bottle of pumped milk. I let him drink until he wasn't screaming anymore then took the bottle away and offered my breast, and he latched on and sucked for about 1 minute tops, but he still latched on for the first time since we gave him his first bottle. Yay!! This achievement made me feel happier than it really should have, but it relieved so much stress for me. So now I have been pumping and feeding him off my pumped milk, and at each feeding pulling out the breast and having him sniff it and play with the nipple and sometimes even latch on for a bit. I figure it will take time before he actually nurses from me again, but hopefully it will happen eventually.
In the meantime I had to buy new pumps. The lactation consultant that I called on Tuesday called me back and we talked this morning about Davy's nursing strike and what I can do about it. And she told me I did exactly what I should have done. And that I am doing what I need to do to get him back on the breast. Then we talked about pumps, and I mentioned that my pump was getting about 2 oz from each breast in about an hour's time sometimes two hours. She told me I needed to get a hospital grade pump and that there were a few places I could call to rent one. The pumps she was speaking of were Medela pumps. Which I had thought about buying but hadn't because I couldn't conscience buying a breast pump for that much money. But the rental costs would have added up to that amount in just a few month's time. So today we went to the store and bought an electric Medela pump and a hand held manual Medela pump. On the way home I pumped each breast for 15 min with the hand held manual pump, and I got about 3 1/2 oz total breast milk. So tonight I have put together the electric pump and in a 15 min pump session I got another 4 oz total (2 oz from each breast). What a relief, and how nice that it went so quickly instead of the 2 hours I am used to with my other pump.
So hopefully Davy will eventually get off the nursing strike and get back on my breast, but in the meantime it is nice to finally have a quality pump that does what I need it to and will give Davy the food he needs until he does begin nursing again.
With everything that has been happening, what with Davy crying all the time (which he does much less now that he is getting enough food), and the nursing strike and just the stress of being a new parent, oh and the hormones too, I have been having the baby blues. For the past few days I have been so sleep deprived, so emotionally compromised, and so frustrated that I have basically been on the verge of tears 24/7. It is kind of funny what I find myself crying over. The dance numbers on the show "Live to Dance", commercials, the other night my parents and I watched the movie "Secretariat" and every time the horse ran I cried. Much of my crying has happened while I held Davy and wished that I could do something for him, this resulted in he and I sitting there crying together. It has made Kevin a good bit jumpy as he doesn't know when I am going to have a meltdown next.
Speaking of Kevin, he has been awesome with everything. Yes he has had his tough spots as well, times where he got just as frustrated as I was, but overall he has been very supportive. He has happily helped by holding the baby, changing diapers, taking care of the baby, feeding the baby (with bottles), comforting me when I have a meltdown, listening to me when I get frustrated, called for help when I really needed it (aka. got my parents to come by), and in general staying mostly calm and mostly reasonable through all this. Not all new fathers are like him, I know this. There are some fathers who refuse to change diapers, period. He changed all the diapers for Davy when we were in the hospital. I helped with one, but he was really the one that did them all. He has changed many diapers since we got Davy home as well. It really makes me appreciative for how awesome Kevin is. He really is one of my heroes.
All of this crazy baby stuff seems to finally be calming down a little, enough that I don't feel like I am going crazy anymore. And the little bit of calm makes me feel really good. Much better than I have felt for a while now. I don't think I will be completely ok for awhile still, but for now I will take what I can get.
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