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2009-07-21 - 9:52 p.m.��previous entry��next entry
12 days old!
Time is passing so quickly! I'm sure Arthur never got to 12 days old so incredibly fast!!! The more babies you have, the faster the time seems to fly! At least, that's my experience anyway.
Benjamin is doing great. The midwife who delivered him came on Sunday and discharged us - she was very pleased with him and didn't even feel the need to weigh him again prior to discharging him! She said he hadn't lost much of his birthweight and she could see he has grown already since she weighed him at 5 days old, so she was happy. She also knew the Health Visitor was coming to do her first visit the next day, and he would get weighed then. I found it a bit sad (as I always do!) to be discharged by the midwife, because that's the end of seeing them and and thus the end of the lovely lovely pregnancy/birth/new baby bit which I love so very much! They always say something along the lines of "see you next time!" as they cheerfully wave goodbye! It always feels bittersweet for me, but I love the fact that they are so very accepting of the fact that I hope to be seeing them again sometime in the next year or so every time, hehe! ;)
So on Monday (yesterday) the Health Visitor came round. She's a student HV, and I haven't met her before - she was very nice. She weighed and measured Benjamin, and he now weighs 9lbs 1oz, which puts him at the 75th percentile, as did his birth weight. She gave me his new red healthcare book - I have a drawer full of red books with blue dots on the cover (blue dot for boy), hehe! I'm always excited about getting the red books because I love seeing their measurements on the charts and look forward to filling in the details on the pages where you can write when they first smile and crawl and lift their arms to be picked up, etc. And their teeth - the order they come in and when. I love that stuff! :) I'm still adding to the other boys' red books as their development continues, though Arthur obviously has all his teeth (and Matthew too), and has finished all the developmental stuff in the book.
Benjamin was never measured at birth, length nor head circumference, and I like to know these things, so I was glad she measured him! I know he'll have grown since birth, even in just 12 days, but still it gives an idea of what he might have measured at birth. His length was 54cm (22 inches I think), which also puts him at the 75th percentile (nice and well-balanced!), and I think he must have been my longest newborn yet, as well as my heaviest! The little boys were both 48/49cm at birth (even though Nathan was born 6 weeks earlier than Matthew was!), and Arthur was 51cm at birth. I think Benjamin must have been 52cm long, or maybe a bit more, so 21 inches. His head circumference measured 38cm yesterday, and the HV measured it again just to be sure she had it right (which she did). His head circumference is on the 91st percentile! Nothing like little Matthew, who has the teeniest head of all the brothers! Matthew's head didn't measure 38cm till 7 weeks old, hehe! ;) Arthur has always had the bigger head shape, but even his head was 36.2cm at this age! Benjamin doesn't strike me as having a huge head, but then he's bigger in general than the others, both length and weight, so maybe it's just that he's more in proportion for a larger head?! Anyway, he's a healthy weight and size, and growing nicely :)
His eyes are starting to lighten up, but staying grey. They are a sort of mid-grey now, not light grey yet. I don't know what to think about what his eye colour will settle on in the end! I will just have to watch and see - how fun! :)
Little man is feeding very well indeed! He doesn't go more than a couple of hours between feeds, and often lately he is not going an HOUR between feeds even. He wakes frequently at night, sleeping in blocks of maybe 1-2 hours between waking to feed. It has been a few days in a row that he's been waking so frequently around the clock, so I'm thinking growth spurt. Typically, babies do have a growth spurt at around 10 days old. He started feeding a bit more frequently (he was already going at it before then!) at 7 or 8 days old, which I assumed was the start of his growth spurt because my other babies have had their "10-day" growth spurts at 7/8 days old too. But, he's 12 days old now, and still it continues! He's one hungry boy!
I have a ton of milk, as always. I feel very blessed to have that happen so easily for me, and I know he's getting perlenty. He is weeing and pooing loads, and has only had one blow-out (at night, of course! ;) ). He pees on me/the bed/himself regularly when I'm trying to wipe him during a nappy change, hehe! I think my milk supply has increased these last two days because he's bringing up a lot of milk after each breast today and yesterday. I just have a bunch of terry towels on hand at night - we sleep on them even! I leak like crazy and he brings milk up a lot, and between us we go through half a dozen towels every night, and then a whole load more during burpy times in the day!
He's waking now (he's in the Amby hammock)d so I will pause this for a bit and go and snuggle my tiny love and give him some more milky :)
Okay, sweet lil man is at my breast and I am propped up in bed all comfy with my laptop next to me, and have one arm free! :) So I will continue till he's finished. He does feed quickly, because my milk flows fast. Oh, that reminds me of something I've been meaning to note here - Benjamin is the first of all my babies to be a bit clever with the flow of milk! From 2 days old (when my milk came in), I have had a strong let-down like I have done with my other babies. All three of the older boys have automatically tried to keep up with the flow when it kicks in, and they gasp and swallow as fast as they can while their little eyes get wider and wider, until finally they choke and need consoling! Benjamin hasn't done that at all. I noticed the first time I had a strong let-down (it hurts quite badly for me, when my milk lets down), that he immediately stopped sucking, but didn't take himself off the breast. He waited, really still, with his eyes looking this way and that, all focused. I knew the milk would be filling his mouth up, and when it was full, that's the point at which he swallowed it and then resumed sucking! I was really amazed at that, probably mainly because all my other babies have just frantically tried to keep up until they choked on the milk before it had chance to slow down. It's just that it seemed instinctive with Benjamin somehow, to stop and wait the fast flow out without de-latching. I don't know how he knew to do that! I was really impressed with my tiny boy! :) He does it every single time, just waits out the fast flow, and as it dies down, swallows what milk has filled his mouth and resumes. He has not choked on my fast let-down of milk once! By 12 days old, all the others had done a lot of choking! ;) Eventually they got bigger and seemed more able to cope with the fast flow - maybe Benjamin is coping better with it because he's bigger?? I don't think that's it though - he's not THAT much bigger, and he's actually doing something different to the others which is helping him deal with it really well.
Okay it's much later now - the boys are all in bed and Benjamin is asleep too in the Amby hammock. He seems fine in there. I put him in it once he's well asleep, at the moment, and he stays for the duration of his short-ish blocks of sleep until he wants another feed. He sometimes fusses a little in his sleep, as though he might wake any moment, but then stays asleep after all. I don't know if that's the Amby helping him though, or just how he is during his sleep. At night he sleeps next to me in bed.
Benjamin has had what seems to me like some low wind pain tonight. He has been doing such a sad hurty cry and arching his back and bunching his legs up :( I hate seeing him hurting, and his cry makes ME want to cry! His poor little face goes so pitiful and sad looking as he cries. I have bicycled his legs and rubbed his tummy and held him and cuddled him and jiggled him and breastfed him. He's asleep for now, but I don't think he'll stay asleep for long if he has some wind that he hasn't passed yet. Or maybe it's a big poo that's bothering him? His little bottom is a bit sore too at the moment. I had started using sensitive wipes when changing his nappy, but I'm back on the water and cloth wipes in case it's the non-cloth wipes that are bothering his bum.
He had his first bath today!! Yes, I know he's 12 days old! ;) We don't have a baby bath - well, we do, it's in the loft, but it's HUGE and cumbersome and just a pain to use, so we are not using it this time around. We barely used it at all after Arthur, actually. I think I bathed Matthew in the bathroom sink when he was tiny! And Nathan I used one of the clear plastic tubs that we store toys in! Much easier :) But, we only have one of those boxes left now (the others broke), and it's full of toys in the cupboard, so... I ordered a Tummy Tub for Benjamin and hopefully it will arrive soon. Today I bathed him in the (clean!) bathroom sink. I have washed his hair much earlier on, but just washed him rather than bathed him. His cord stump is totally healed now, having fallen off at 4 days old, and the last little scab came off during his bath. It now looks like a proper tummy button - all healed up and normal skin colour! I can't believe how fast it healed! It's SUCH a cute little inny! I just want to kiss it! :) Arthur is pleased with his brother's new tummy button. He found the cord part a bit ewwy! :)
Benjamin rather surprised me with his bath! He's my very first baby not to cry or scream at ALL during his first bath! What a nice surprise! He just sat there with my arm supporting him while I washed him, looking around and making these fast little breathing sounds and "eh eh eh" noises as though he was somewhat concerned at this new environment, but not outright panicking enough to get upset! He was less "eh eh eh"-y if I talked to him constantly and told him what a GOOD BOY he was being in his first bath! :) What a sweetie pea pie. *sigh* I love him sooooo! After I bathed him I wrapped him up and washed his hair over the sink, and he was very calm for that too. All my other babies have screamed the place down from the first instant they touched the water - no, before that - when they were undressed! They didn't stop screaming till they were dressed again on the other side of the traumatic experience! Benjamin is so different with his baths and that's lovely :)
Let's see, what else? Oh I had a blocked duct! I got a very sore bruised feeling on the underside of one of my breasts and it was really distracting after a while. I phoned Heather to ask her advice, because she's an almost-fully-trained breastfeeding counsellor. I had no redness or hot patches, and felt well, so it didn't seem like mastitis at all, but it was pretty sore to the touch. It also hurt like crazy when my milk let down, and felt "lumpy" although there was no actual isolated lump. Heather thought it was a blocked duct and gave me a ton of things to do. I also researched online about mastitis in case it turned into that, so I'd know about it in advance. I used hot and cold compresses, dunked it in warm water (!), and basically nursed Benjamin as often as I could from that side. I massaged it both when breastfeeding and when not, and I breastfed in as many different positions as I could think of, lol! I spent the whole first night breastfeeding over Benjamin on all fours, every time he woke to feed, haha! It was no better (but no worse) the next day, and during the following night, but when I woke the next morning I had no pain at all, hooray! I'm really glad it cleared up without turning nasty. I have since had some bruisey lumpiness in the other breast in a different place, which cleared up pretty quick, and today I've noticed a little of the same back in the same place. I'm wondering if it's to do with my milk supply increasing dramatically maybe? I do go up MANY cup sizes after my milk comes in, so maybe the breast tissue is just finding that irritating or something?! I don't know.
Well, I can't think of much else right now, but I DO have a few more photos! These were all taken at 5 days old, so they're a week out of date now - oops! I haven't taken photos every day or anything, but I've taken some more in the last few days that I haven't uploaded yet. Still no photos of the boys all together (except for the few I posted last entry). I'll get to that eventually! I'm trying to start thinking about getting some good photos for a birth announcement, but I'm not doing too well so far! Here are the few I took when Benjamin was 5 days old. These first two are sweet but a little odd to me, because he doesn't actually LOOK like that at all! It's so weird how I took these photos of him and they came out looking not much like him, even though they're of HIM! ;) Weird. Anyway, his little face doesn't actually look this way at all, but here he is all the same, hehe!
Another one of Benjamin, with my hand in it this time! I decided that he looked way too big in the photos, like it wasn't too clear that he's actually TEENY TINY, so I took a photo of me stroking his little face for a bit of perspective! See, he's tiny! :) He's making a face that turns my heart mushy - as he feels my hand on his face he scrunches up and starts to turn his face to root for the breast. This is the very start of him doing that. His little face is so soft and tiny. He makes my heart melt!
A bit later on, downstairs this time - I just took these to capture another of Benjamin's favourite expressions - the little 'O' mouth :) He often looks around with his mouth like a teeny little 'O' shape, with his eyes all big, as though the world is just an astounding place to be, hehe! The second photo is where he suddenly looked up at me with the camera. I like it because it's like he's saying, "What you doin'?!" :)
The obligatory "Mr. Bump" sleepsuit photo, hehe! All the boys have worn this little bright green Mr. Bump sleepsuit that I won at eBay before Arthur was born! I just love it. It's size newborn (up to 10lbs) so they outgrow it pretty fast. I will have to dig up photos of the other boys wearing it to compare!
And here is why Mama needs a kingsize bed to herself when she has a new baby, haha! ;)
The baby and I fill it right up, what with all the pillows and nappies and burp cloths and changes of clothes and wipes and rolled up blankets to wedge the boy when I'm breastfeeding him, and so on and so on! I have everything I need right there on the bed, for day time and night time, and it's the best way to do it, BUT there really is no room for Daddy! :) He's sleeping in the boys' room on the futon on the floor right now, to keep everyone settled if Benjamin's crying wakes them, and also to get better sleep without all of Benjamin's night wakings affecting him. By the time the sleep is more settled, we won't need all that stuff on the bed and there will be room for Daddy again :)
Okay that is all! Benjamin has stayed asleep better than I expected, although he has been stirring on and off for a while now. Oh but I just looked through my Photobucket albums and found pics of the other boys in the Mr. Bump sleepsuit! :) Here they are (and Neil and I were really amazed at how much Nathan looks like Benjamin in the one of him with Arthur! Neil thought it WAS Benjamin at first!) - the one of Matthew isn't a good one, but it's the only one with him wearing the sleepsuit. Arthur was zonked after a huge breastfeed in his photo, hehe!
Matthew
Arthur
I'll update again soon! Thanks for the comments! I love reading them! :)
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