Friday, September 26, 2008

can't think of a good title...

Yikes, nothing like breastfeeding questions to bring out the commentors!!

Let me clear my poor LC's good name, she is not the one obsessed with time, etc, I am. In fact, she keeps telling me now that my milk supply is good, to just trust my body and trust the baby. Well, you all know that I have a VERY hard time trusting my body and I'm also a little nervous about trusting someone that poops her pants about 6 times a day. That doesn't inspire trust. And I'm obsessive by my very nature. I obsess over minutia for a living...seriously, I break complex behaviors down into their itty bitty components and collect data on those itty bitty things. And then I analyze and graph and do all sorts of fun stuff with it. So me collecting data right now on her time on breast, if she cues, and her pee and poop is nothing. There is so much more I'd like to measure (like duration of sucking but I don't have a free hand to work the timer, and I am SO not kidding)

But I am starting to relax about it all. When she's hungry the girl most certainly eats, and when she isn't, she doesn't. The fact that she is starting to visibly gain weight and has grown out of her first set of PJ's does make me feel a little bit better. So I'm working on the whole trust thing. But right now, there is no way I could stop with my data, no matter how many people tell me I'm being crazy, it makes me feel like I have some semblance of control and am doing something proactive to make sure she's eating and staying healthy.

In other news, my dad is coming to stay with us for the weekend. Cue family drama. You may remember he left my mom in June and moved 8 hours away...and no one really knows why he made the move. He's since lost his job so he's now completely alone with nothing to do. For a man with a history of depression as well as a history of self-medicating that depression, that is not a good thing. He says he's finally going to do something that makes him happy, instead of some corporate job. Only problem is, hiking and drinking wine seems to make him happiest. And he could open a hiking and wine store but that would be a pretty niche market...not sure how well it would do. So, he's flying down for the weekend to see the baby, my mom got all upset that she won't be able to see her this weekend (for the record, my mom lives under 10 minutes away and has come over on her lunch break to see Sweetness), my brother is pissed because my dad picked the only weekend all fall that he has to work...and Mr H and I don't really know what to do with him. The whole thing is going to be so incredibly awkward. Luckily, we have a bunch of things around the house that Mr H needs help with. So that will at least give him something to do. And...in a few weeks, he wants to come down and stay for the entire week to help me out. So this is really just a dress rehearsal. uggg...

Now I have to go vacuum for him, you see, the man is also very allergic to cats and never wants to take any allergy medicine when he comes over. uggg again...

hmmm...as I re-read this, writing about my neuroses and then my dad's makes my whole family seem kind of f-ed up...guess the apple doesn't fall to far from the tree...hopefully Sweetness will be spared

8 comments:

Jen said...

Ack...family drama! I hope the visit goes well this weekend, and you make it through unscathed. It sounds like the BF'ing is going well. Maybe it is just the kind of challenge you needed!

AwkwardMoments said...

good luck with the bf-ing. Not knowing how much was going in per feeding was driving me insane. But i am told if you have appropriate diapers of poo/pee which you seem to be having and weight gain all is dandy! You are doing a good job momma. keep it up.

I have loads of stories for f-ed up families, do n't you worry

Julia said...

not that I am looking to enable your obsessive data collection, but... if you are obsessing anyway, maybe you can get a home baby scale and weigh her before and after feedings. That way you can see exactly how much she takes in (and, maybe, you can even scatter plot it vs. time at breast. not that I am encouraging or anything...).

Me said...

I'm with you on not trusting your body. Could you try to trust the baby's body though? If she's pooping 6 times a day she's gotta be getting plenty of milk.

I'm not really the one who should be giving assvice though, BFing is HARD!

Rebecca said...

I'm with you baby! I'm having trouble with the bf-ing too and it's so frustrating! I don't think that "normal" people realize that we "infertiles" can't really trust ourselves at all!

I hope that all goes well with your Dad...I have a similar situation except that my Dad left 30 years ago...awkwardness still there sometimes! That's why we call Family the f-word in our house...too much!

Morrisa said...

Good luck with your Dad's visit. I say try to get as much work out of him as possible!

LIW (Lady In Waiting) said...

You and I have similar personalities, though you probably know that already. At this point, I am still obsessing over the minutia of every ache and cramp in the hopes that they are signs of impending labor. Since they clearly are not, this endeavor leaves me frustrated and annoyed. I can only look forward to what I will focus on once LL's here. :-)

The visit from your father sounds like it will be challenging. Family dynamics - and dramas - are always the most stressful because they are so close and tied up with lots of old and new feelings. Try to find as many opportunities as you can that don't involve chatting. Distractions - like fixing things - are a great plan!

XOXO

sara said...

I'm late writing this - but I hope the weekend went okay and was pretty trouble free. Ahh family - no one can quite drive us insane in quite the same way, huh? I hope the breastfeeding continues to go okay - I'll be coming to you for advice soon :-) I feel like I'm going to be clueless.