The Formula For Density

If you are in the process of switching to formula from Breast milk, I urge you with all sincerity, not to Google the word Infant Formula. Unless that is, you are looking to read stories about how many babies end up dead or in the hospital every year because of the careless parents who feed it to them.  I was simply trying to find best practices and tips for serving and dispensing formula to my daughter. It’s like Mr. Bloomberg is overriding google searches to advance his cause.

Anyway. I am following the conservative preparation advice published by the WHO. Whereby I boil the sin out of filtered tap water before mixing it with the formula. Then I prepare enough for one day, and store them in my Glass baby bottles. Which can be quickly warmed up in the radiation fueled microwave and transferred to a sippy, requiring minimal effort. In addition, Leah is on the Sensitive formula, which gets notoriously foamy when shaken. So I mix it with a fork, and it stays pretty flat. I also strain the first two bottles that I pour because I tend to find little chunks of the formula that either get stuck in the nipple or end up between Leah's only two teeth.

Also, in the three-ish weeks that Leah has been on formula, she has gained 1 pound, 3 ounces. Impressive for a baby whom falls into the long and lean category. She's gained weight steadily her whole life, but always been on the skinny side. I mentioned in my last post that she just went through a big growth spurt, which feels like more than a coincidence with the timing of when she started full time of formula. But I guess we'll never really know. 

So I still have a small stash of my frozen milk. I spent a little time contemplating whether or not I should donate it to a hospital, because opening it was just a reminder that it's the last of my milk that she'll ever have. And I didn't want to reintroduce it, now that she is fully transitioned over to full time formula. But then the idea of adding it to her food came to mind, and decided that would be the easiest (on my heart) way. So I make her oatmeal with it. I do half water and half breast milk into organic steel cut oats. It smells a little peculiar, but it tastes sweet. And she eats it right up! 

Only about 30 more ounces to go...Then it's really over. 

Ten Months!

Dearest Leah,

The last few weeks have been CAH-RA-ZY. You are an entirely different baby from last month, 
I hardly know where to begin! My baby girl is TEN months now!

Still can't get you to sit for this photo...

Allow me to begin with your most accomplished new act; Pulling yourself up! The first time I saw it was on your monitor when you pulled yourself up in your crib! Needless to say we lowered the mattress that very day. And every day since then you try your best to pull yourself up using the couch, the ottoman, a chair, my leg, and even daddy’s chest hair! That one is secretly my favorite. Maybe not so secret anymore… In our living room we don’t have a coffee table, but a padded leather ottoman. You spend the bulk of your day in between that and the couch. As though flapping your arms, slapping the ottoman with your palms and banging the remotes together was your job. 
And you take it very seriously!

Doing business with a friend

You’ve started babbling with consonants, making a Fuh, and Kuh sound. Though, not together. 

You’re not exactly like your momma.

Please ignore my sideburns, it's regrowth from my post-partum hair loss

Mimic! You've started to mimic your dad and I when we stick our tongue out at you. You push your tongue out of your mouth and then immediately feel for it, seeming surprised when it slips back in your mouth. Ahhhdorable.

I'm Your Huckleberry

(Doc Holiday?)

(No?)

(mmmkay)

This is your first fall . And as everyone around me knows, I LOVE FALL. (I'm so unique!) We haven’t been able to go to as many Fall functions as I would have liked this year, but we‘ll have many more years to make up for it. Which will be great because you’ll then, of course, have some idea as to what we are doing anyway. You hit a pretty big growth spurt and were napping more than four hours per day for close to two weeks! And since you also sleep 12-13 hours at night, it wasn't leaving us much time during the day. And yes, I continue to be profoundly grateful to the universe that you are such an awesome sleeper. At least we managed to make it out to Half Moon Bay for pumpkins! 

Pumpkin Perfection. 

I constantly have to remind myself that you will only be this tiny once, because it's so hard not to day dream about all the super fun stuff we'll be able to do with you when you are a bit older.  I constantly wonder how your voice will sound once you are speaking in complete sentences, and how you will inevitably humiliate me in public by regurgitating something your dad or I have said in front of you unintentionally. Mortified and shame-filled I'll do my best to demonstrate how to slink out of a public space unnoticed.  Oh the places we'll go. And leave, disgracefully. 

Can't wait to see what the next month brings.

Love,

Momma

. 

Loud and Clear

I think my body is getting the message. I've been able to make it at least 48 hours in between pumping. Only getting between two and four ounces. I'm going to wean my body instead of stopping cold turkey and resorting to making coleslaw in my bra.

The rest of my body is catching on as well. I've noticed some...differences...in my nether regions. Either my lady parts are aiming to catch up for 8 1/2 months of missed periods (I haven't had any bleeding since postpartum), I'm going to ovulate a Grade A Cage Free Brown Egg, orrrrr - the Whore-Bag is back.  I've had all sorts of pinchy heaviness going on down there for several days. It's starting to get pretty uncomfortable.  I may even go see my Gyno or Acupuncturist. On top of that, I've had an outbreak of eczema, a reoccurrence of hemorrhoids, and a bout of insomnia.

I have an IRL friend who has Ovulatory PCOS as well and after her son was born; ended up with classic PCOS - irregular periods accompanied with regular cysts. Sounds terrific. She ended up having to go on Birth Control to temper the cysts. NOT what I want at all.

The next obstacle is MY ASS. It's umm...Well, it's huge right now.  I have only lost about 15 of the 35ish that I gained during my pregnancy. That 15 came off within a week of coming home, and after that nothing. Breastfeeding didn't do SHIT for weight loss up in here. 

But I also haven't been exercising or even remotely conservative with my diet. Not that I'm eating Junk Food - Leah didn't react well to fried foods, and by policy I try to stay away from a lot of processed stuff and products that contain MSG. I know how to lose weight. I've done it before. Just need to get back on it. Can you feel the motivation behind my words? 

Me neither. 

A Moveable Feast

I think it's over.

She went the entire day today on just formula.

And did great.

Per a friends recommendation I switched her from the Soy Based formula over to a Dairy Based Sensitive formula. Truthfully the soy based was HORRIBLE. Over two weeks I had worked my way up from cutting it with a 1/2 teaspoon of formula to cutting it 50/50 with my pumped milk, and the few times I tried to give her straight formula she flat out refused it.  So I started the new stuff at 50/50,  and within four days was able to give it to her straight. I tried this one too and it's a vast improvement over the soy. Like a thin room temperature milkshake, really. At first I worried about the sugar content, but in all honesty it's probably not much different in sweetness to the way my milk tastes. Well, tasted.

I have gradually reduced the amount that I am pumping. Down from four times a day, to two. And at some point this week it will be one...

And then none.

While I feel at peace with my decision to switch; there was really no way I could continue with trying to nurse her, or be shackled to a pump four times a day. I can't help but mourn the loss of my physical connection to Leah. From egg, to embryo, to fetus, then a baby in my arms, and milk in my breasts. I've been lucky to have this amazing connection with her, but in a way it now it feels like it's being severed. It was a sacred bond that we had, just me and her. And selfishly, I loved that it was something else no one else could do.

And I know I'm trading this one little thing for a much different kind of bond. It's pretty fricken cool to see her want me. She actually knows how to express that she wants ME to hold her. But I just wasn't prepared to let it go so soon. So I'm dealing with it the way I know best, by eating my feelings. My glorious dairy filled feelings. 

Oh, how I missed you, cheese. Brie will always be there for me...

I Still Don't Get It...

We battled for almost five years before we received the greatest gift we could ever hope for. Our daughter.

I know the depths of the IF battlefield so well that it still knocks the wind out of me when I think about my darkest days. 

It haunts me. 

I am afraid of who I was. 

Terrified that it will find me again. 

The anguish. The sorrow. Consumed on a daily basis by the fear of the unknown. It's crippling. Still.

When I see my dear friends, in the blogosphere and in real life suffering; consumed, paralyzed by loss. By failure. It crushes me.

Especially now that I know the joy, the unbelievable gift of a child. It kills me that much more to think of my friends who have been denied the experience. Who have suffered losses. 

I want it so very much for them. 

Why can't children come from wishes?