It has been a few days now since the last entry, mainly due to my lack of sleep. I’m still expressing, and as Conrad wakes up for a feed every 3 hours, that only gives me 1-2 hours worth of sleep in-between feeds. As Conrad also spends 3-4 hours per night being restless, crying and wanting to feed and Jessica is an early riser, I’ve only managed 3-4 hours of broken sleep per night for the last two weeks, which has started to take it’s toll a bit.
Tuesday Ian and I brought Conrad to Bourne Hall Health Centre in Ewell village, about half an hour’s drive away, to have the suspected tongue tie checked out by an expert. It turned out that tongue tie was indeed the case, so we decided to have the small incision under Conrad’s tongue done straight away. Conrad was swaddled, as he’s a wriggly little thing, and I was dreading watching him being cut, but it was very swift and he seemed to be more upset about the gauze being pressed against the cut to soak up he little bit of bleeding afterwards than about the cut itself. I tried breastfeeding him immediately afterwards, as per recommendation, but he wasn’t keen, so we gave him a bottle of expressed milk instead, of which he only had about half his normal amount. Then he slept all the way home again.
Yesterday, Wednesday (25 June), our health visitor came over for the first time to meet Conrad and myself and see how things were going. She asked his name and when told her reaction was: “that’s a nice, strong name!”. Conrad was weighed again: 4.64 kilos (10oz 3lb) this time. He was also supposed to have a hearing test but the machine was broken so we decided that the health visitor would come back next week to do that instead. Conrad got his little red book, with his head circumference (36 cm) logged in it too. I explained about the tongue tie, why he wasn’t breastfeeding yet, and the health visitor said that Conrad seemed to be troubled by mucus still, and also have a habit of pulling his little chin back, and she also confirmed something that had been mentioned at the Health Clinic the previous day, that in addition Conrad also has a ‘floppy larynx’. All of which Conrad will grow out of soon, but which will not have helped him find breastfeeding easy. To get rid of the mucus, the health visitor showed my simple facial massage using strokes over his sinuses that I can easily do myself (and have done a few times now already).
I want to stick it out with the expressing until I feel I have had a proper go at breastfeeding Conrad, but there has been another little set back, as the NCT breastfeeding advisor called me today to say that she had to cancel her appointment with us tomorrow as she’s ill. Conrad and I will just have to keep trying over the weekend, and then I’ll see if we can speak to the advisor at the Baby Café on Monday. They will have moved to a new venue not too far from us, so I’ll bring Jessica along and see how it goes.
Today, in the afternoon, a few friends came over: Cara and Daisy, who Jessica and I see on a regular basis, and Julia and her two boys Cian, 4 1/2 years old, and Daniel, only a month older than Conrad. The latter three were meeting Conrad for the first time. Once again it was commented on how big Conrad is for his age. Daniel has only now almost reached Conrad’s birth weight and isn’t as tall. It’s nice that the two little boys are so close in age – hopefully they’ll become friends as they grow up.
Monday (23 June), by the way, was Conrad’s first outing in the baby carrier, as we decided to go over to Priory Park in Reigate for a couple of hours in the afternoon. Jessica ran around the playground with Daddy, trying out swings and slides, while Conrad and I sat in the shade having a bottle of milk. It was a really hot and sunny day and Conrad grumbled a couple of times. I had a muslin over his head and arms as he was resting against my chest, hoping it would keep the sun off him well enough, and it seemed to do the trick. Just before we were going to pop over to the café for an ice cream, we bumped into Paula and Michelle from the little group of post-natal mums I meet up with from Jessica’s early days, with their boys Kai and Luke respectively, and Conrad got admired again.
And, because I couldn’t resist, a piccie showing Conrad (on Daddy’s lap) just as I’m writing this:
Gabriella