Happy One Month David!

my sweet boy

His Stats
Our guess is David weighs about 11.5 lbs and is about 23 inches long!

His Likes
He usually likes to lay on his activity mat and he loves looking up at his mobile.

one of his favorite spots is his changing table because we have a mobile hanging above it

some activity mat time with his big brother

He sometimes likes his bath.

he wasn’t so sure about his first not sponge bath

He sometimes like the Moby Wrap, but he heats up like a little oven and gets so hot he wakes himself up!

he sometimes likes going on walks

being swaddles with arms up only

His Dislikes
Being put down…pretty much ever.

Sleeping not on us

loves sleeping on daddy’s chest

newborn snuggles are really sweet

The carseat

One of my sweet friends gave me this awesome Mom’s One Line a Day Memory Book when I was expecting Caleb and it has been such a great way to keep track of things even in my sleep deprived state. Since I am writing this post a month and a half late, I went back to look at my entries. Most of them are something along the lines: “very hard. no sleep. David slept 1.5 hrs once and 20 min another time” day after day after day. There was one time he slept 3 hrs twice and one time he slept 4 hours (not being held) out of a whole entire month. I am not exaggerating. We thought we already went through the really hard doesn’t sleep baby thing with Caleb, but in the first month of his life, David took it to another level. Nothing we tried would work. I think the hardest thing when you first have a new baby is figuring out what he or she likes. Each is a unique individual from the very beginning. Things that worked with Caleb (moby wrap, swing, swaddle) did not always work with David. We mostly swaddled him with his arms up (he loved having his arms by his face) in an Aden an Anais blanket. He wasn’t a big fan of the new swaddlemes I bought. We also usually put him in the rock n play for the first month of his life, but ended up coping by taking turns holding him. He would wake up constantly. And would never nurse to sleep (which was really frustrating for me- as he would always be up for at least an hour ever time he woke up and then not even sleep an hour most of the time which meant I felt like I didn’t sleep at all), and had lots of gas and seemed to always be in tummy pain. We bought a new rock n play that rocked on its own but ended up taking it back and we bought some other contraption hoping it would help him sleep but ended up taking it back, too. The hardest thing with David was his inconsistency in what he liked. Sometimes he would like nursing, sometimes he would SCREAM. Sometimes he would like the Moby wrap, sometimes he would scream. Sometimes he would like one pacifier, sometimes another. Sometimes he would do okay in the swing, sometimes he would hate it.

We were not new to this whole we have a challenging baby thing, so we were super proactive. I looked for a tongue/lip tie (he has one but too slight to make a difference). We saw a Lactation Consultant to make sure breastfeeding was going well/he wasn’t taking in too much air. We put him on Gerber Soothe Probiotics, gas drops, gripe water, tried tummy massage, even bought a Windi in hopes to relieve his gas issues. We made a few trips to the pediatrician to make sure he was gaining weight (I did not want him to be hungry and with breastfeeding you never know) and tried some reflex meds and I cut out dairy beginning at 3 weeks. Thankfully for the first two weeks I had my mom and Bryan helping me, and the next two weeks were mostly about survival. It is really hard to function with such little sleep and the whole “sleep when the baby sleeps” doesn’t work when 1) you don’t have a baby that sleeps like hardly ever and 2) you have an older child to take care of…

But we made it, and we had a few sweet memories-
David’s First St. Patrick’s Day

David’s First Easter

Newborn Pictures with Frames of Grace

pictures in the Bluebonnets

poor baby cried the entire drive there and back, and most of the time taking pictures

this one shot made it worth it

 David also had several visitors and we had so many people bring us yummy meals!

Some other sweet moments:

shh David is sleeping

Things I am learning- I thought we had low expectations being that Caleb was so hard, but Bryan said our expectations should have been on the floor low, haha. It was a really rough start. David cried a lot. Caleb cried a lot. I cried. A LOT. But it is always good to be reminded how poor and needy we are. I read Psalm 86 today and it was such a good reminder of how poor and needy we are and how good and gracious God is. When we are in distress we can call on Him. He is faithful and He is good. I reread some of my thoughts from when caleb was one month, and I feel like God is making me take a retest and relearn some of those same things. Just because I am now an experienced mom doesn’t mean I don’t desperately need Him and need to find my identity in being His alone.

I’ve also learned that it is not nice to tell people who had a “hard” first baby that their second baby will be a breeze. People who say this are trying to be encouraging, but it sets up false hope, and we just can’t know for sure. I really wrestled with feeling like it wasn’t fair that we made such another hard baby, but thankfully things are going better now (that he is 2.5 months). Looking back I don’t really know how we survived not really sleeping at all other than continuing to remind ourselves that “this too will pass” and leaning on the help of others (especially my mom). If there is one thing I’ve learned about parenting it is that every stage your child goes through comes to an end eventually. And then there are new stages along with new worries. 

Psalm 86

A prayer of David.

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