How to Survive Being Sick with a Baby

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It is every new moms worst nightmare. You are sick, baby is sick, and you both are miserable. Claire and I just survived our first MAJOR colds together since she was born, and it was awful! To make it worse my husband was away in Florida for two weeks, and we were SO sick that we had to quarantine ourselves to not spread germs. We survived though! So I thought I would share some quick tips to you new momma's dealing with or dreading this inevitable thing.

1) Baby will get better before you do, that is just a fact. Their little immune systems are much better then ours. If baby is breastfed then they are getting all of your nutrients and anti-bodies....those lil suckers! So there will come a time when baby is better and wanting to play, and all you can do is lay on the couch and moan. This made me feel like a HORRIBLE mother but in reality that isn't the case. There are things you can do to entertain your crawling/walking/active child even while stuck on the couch

• given that baby is better and they need all the nutrition they can get make a fun snack for them! Use a muffin tin and fill each cup with a different healthy snack. Aim for lots of variety in colors, tastes, and textures. 
• BOOKS! Never underestimate the power of a good book! Reading is a calm activity that can entertain them and allow you to rest
• Climb Mountain Mommy! There were many times I just lay on the carpet and let Claire climb all over me and she LOVED it. I was her human gym. As she climbed over each part of my body I would teach her the name and point out where her "arm", "leg" etc was too.
• Borrow a playpen from someone....yes a baby cage. Now some people hate these, and that is just fine. Everyone is entitled to there opinion. But I LOVE MINE! I feel confident having a place I can put Claire that I know is safe and secure. When sick it is a life saver! I put new items for her to explore in there, things she hasn't seen before to interest her. Tupperware, measuring spoons, spatula's, wooden spoons (as you can see I raided my kitchen for idea)

2) If baby is suffering from congestion try using a cold air humidifier. Cold air humdifiers put moisture in to the air without making the room feel like a swamp! There is also a nifty thing called the Nose Frida! It is a nasal aspirator that you do with, uhm, your mouth. Yup. Your mouth. It sounds gross I know but nothing gets in your mouth!!!! It is a long tube with a filter on your end that allows you to control the suction and power as you clear babies nasal passages. A few drops of saline water before hand and this will clear out babies nose like a hot damn!

3) Vitamin D is not only good for babies bones! It is also a powerful anti-viral agent! I use a liquid d and put a couple drops into Claires food. I also give her Dr approved infant pro-biotics. Did you know that 90% of our immune system is in our GUT!? The building blocks of our immune system are found in our intestines, where the healthy flora should be thriving. Pro-biotics help ensure this.

Other then that drink lots of garlicy chicken soup and enjoy the extra snuggles you will get from baby. Hope you both feel better soon!


 

Mommy Tips From the Trenches: Get Some Mommy Friends

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One of the best pieces of advice I can give you, aside from sticking with breastfeeding because it is so worth it, would be to ditch the parenting books. You hear me, ditch em. OK maybe not all of them, but do you really need every book on babies and parenting ever written? One good solid reference book is enough, because lets face it there are some important things you should be able to look up when in need: fevers, allergic reactions, illness etc. But in general everything I learned about parenting has been from OTHER MOMS! Mom's who have either been there, or are in the exact same boat I am in. We trade notes, swap stories, and share tips. The plethora of baby books I had just started to confuse me as they all said different things about breastfeeding, introducing solids, sleep, and play time.

I joined a mommy group. We meet every Thursday and it is lead by an AMAZING knowledgeable lactation consultant and mother advocate. Each week we discuss important issues relating to parenting/babies in a round table way, with each mother sharing her stories and battle scars. I have learned more from that group and those moms than ANY BOOK! So take it from me, save yourself the $20 and don't buy that latest and greatest trendy baby book, get some mommy friends instead!

A Guide to Essential Online Mommy Resources

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We are very lucky to be parents in this digital era! Information for us worry wart mommies is at the tip of our fingers...but that can also be overwhelming too. I thought I would share a list of some very helpful online resources I have discovered in the past 6 months, both informational and fun blog reads:

Kelly Mom
Dr. Jack Newman
Babble
Biological Nurturing
Postpartum Progress
The Leaky Boob
Momzelle Breastfeeding Apparel
Human Milk For Human Babies
PhD in Parenting
Viva La Feminista
Dooce
Mothering

Mommy Tips From the Trenches: Feeding Baby Their Very First Foods

Now that Claire is 6 months old we have ventured into the exciting world of solid foods! Feeding baby for the first time is so much fun, each bite, each flavor, is a new and exciting experience. It can be daunting for some people though so I thought I would share some tips I have learned along the way

* Make your own puree's! Trust me it is easier then you would think and you save so much money! Simply get out your blender and chop up some fruits and our veggies! This way you know exactly what is going into your baby, pure, good, whole food! No fillers  or additives

* mix breast milk into your prepared baby food to reach the desired consistency. Unlike water it will add important nutrients and a familiar comforting flavor.

* make it fun let them play, learn, touch, feel and experience new textures. Baby will instinctively want to put his/her hands in their mouth with the food....let them! It is all part of the learning process

* Bumbo seats with tray attachments are very handy, take up less space then a high chair, and are easily portable

* The Baby Safe Feeder is an uniquely interactive way of letting baby safely experience new foods on their own. It is a mesh bag with a handle attached. Simply add a fruit or veggie to the mesh bag and let baby chomp away!

* frozen banana's make a yummy treat for sore teething gums, we put some in Claire's Baby Safe Feeder and let her NOM NOM NOM away

* if your baby is prone to constipation beware of foods in the BRAT diet (banana's, rice, apples, and toast) as these foods have a constipating affect and are often used to dry up diarrhea

* make your own rice cereal! Store bought rice cereal often contains additives such as wheat and milk proteins which are very common allergens. It is very easy to do: just grind up 1 cup of brown rice in a food processor until it is in powder form. Toss that powder into 1.5 cups of boiling water, give it a stir, cover and let it sit on low heat for 20 minutes. You now have a rice porridge base that you can freeze or keep in the fridge. Simply add warm breast milk to it when you are ready to use it

* babies love herbs! Try adding some mint to your peas, or basil to your avocado. It may seem weird but babies have a much bigger flavor palette then we think. They taste all we eat through our breast milk, so why would we think they would want to eat bland foods? Claire loves basil!

* most important tip of all....embrace the mess! Strip baby down to just a diaper and let them get messy. Then you have a fun bubble bath to look forward to when its done!

A Mommy Tip From the Trenches...

When you hear a loud fart sound...and you see this grin on your child's face:

Make sure you pick them up with caution. That is unless you want baby poo all up your arms like I just had.

Motherhood. It is FULL of surprises

Breasts, Boobies, Ta-Ta's, Knockers, Titties, Gazoonga's

Call em what you want, once you have a baby your entire relationship with your breasts will forever change. As will they. Breastfeeding is hard, it is a very natural thing, but it does not come easy. At least not for all of us. Most women I have spoken with feel the same, it is rare to meet a woman who says it was easy for them. IT IS WORK! I will be honest with you, this time last week I nearly gave up. I was exhausted, Claire never seemed satisfied and she was CONSTANTLY at my breast. It just seemed like no matter how much she ate she wasn't getting enough out of me. I had to top her up with bottles or have to deal with her screaming all the time. It broke my heart every time I gave her a bottle. Seriously. It was like a little piece of me died each time.

Why isn't she getting enough from me?

Why cant I satisfy her needs?

And then the "nipple confusion" started. There are people out there who will tell you there is no such thing, hell I doubted it at first. She seemed fine bouncing between breast and bottle as needed and then one day that all changed. She started madly wiggling her head back and forth, unable to latch onto me OR the bottle, crying, frustrated, clearly confused. It was HELL. No matter what I offered her now she was upset.

Oh my God I never should have brought in bottles

What have I done, will she ever breastfeed?

That is when I went to see a lactation consultant. Please take my advice, if you ever have ANY problems breastfeeding GET THEE TO A LACTATION CONSULTANT! They are amazing! They are specially trained in just that one thing, and will save your sanity! I learned so much I nearly cried with relief. I was given a prescription for a medication to bring in more milk as it was deemed that I was behind Claire due to my surgical recovery and that we were not able to establish breastfeeding for several days after her birth. I hate taking unnecessary medication, but taking it was THE BEST choice I could have made. Suddenly I had a different child.

She was calm, fed, happy

She slept better

SHE GREW!

I stopped looking at the clock, stopped timing the feeds and worry about how many times she ate in a day, stopped madly pumping. I relaxed. I learned, breathed, and focused on loving my baby. I fed her on demand and learned to recognize her patterns and cues.

Words cannot describe the joy and satisfaction I felt at finally being able to satisfy my baby.  I started breastfeeding her everywhere! Walking in the garden, while cleaning the house, in a sling, and my most recent favorite...in Kensington Market on a recent visit to Ontario.

For those of you that dont know it Kensington Market is the hippy, BoHo, alternative, artsy fartsy centre of Toronto. I LOVE IT! I spent all my spare time there while living in Toronto. Healthy food, vintage shops, awesome coffee and street festivals....it is my lil slice of heaven. Claire got fussy and hungry as I walked through the market and so I found a bench and sat down to nurse her in the sunshine....bliss. Pure and utter bliss. I watched the world pass me by, no one minded me nursing in public, and I felt empowered to be doing so. I even had one woman with her 2 year old son come up and ask if it was ok if she explain to him what I was doing. A beautiful moment.

Breastfeeding is HARD, really really hard. Do not fool yourself into thinking that something so natural, comes naturally to you. It won't. You and your baby will have to learn how to do this together. Your breasts will hurt, your nipples will burn, you will be frustrated, tired, overwhelmed. You will want to give up. But don't. Trust me when I say it does get better. It gets beyond better, it becomes BEAUTIFUL. My breastfeeding sessions with Claire are full of calm, joy, peace, love and bonding. I wouldn't trade them for the world and I already know that I will miss that special time once she is weened.

Motherhood Monday: Tips from the Trenches

Tomorrow my baby Claire will be 3 weeks old! WOWZA! 3 weeks and we still have only been out of the house a handful of times, I have a wee bit of cabin fever. That and new mom fever, I just want to go out and show off my baby! Every day gets better and better, my energy improves as does hers and my incision is healing slowly but surely. In the meantime I am learning bit by bit, and realizing how little I knew going in to this! You can read every book under the sun, but trust me, you will still feel absolutely clueless at times. I know I did and still do! So because of this I thought I would share some tips from the trenches for you all, things I learned along the way and things I wish I had known before hand!

• the crankiest nurse is often the one you wind up loving the most. Trust me on this one, you may want to squirt her in the eye with boob milk at first but you will learn a lot from her! In my experience the CRANKIEST nurse I had out of my entire hospital stay taught me the most. I wanted to take her home with me. She was overworked and overtired but she had seen a lot, learned a lot, and if I let my ego step aside for a moment and gave her an extra smile she would drop some knowledge gems in my lap...valuable ones!
• if you happen to have a c-section, or a lot of stitches after a vaginal birth trust me on this one: do not be a hero with the pain meds! TAKE THEM! You are useless to your baby if you are in too much pain to enjoy him/her. And when you get home, and your milk is in, pain will dry up your tits faster then you can imagine! 
• Your milk WILL come in. Do now worry, you will see milk squirting out in no time. At first it is just the nutrient rich colostrum, but in a few days you will see milk. I promise you. You will doubt this at times, but have no fear.
• Do not take that colostrum for granted! It is FULL of good stuff for baby and their tummy is so small that they don't need much. Hence the small quantity at first, it is enough to tide them over until your milk comes in. My poor Claire wasn't able to breast feed at first so I literally used a spoon and hand expressed colustrum from my nipples for her that the nurses would squirt into her mouth with a syringe...it is liquid GOLD!
• When your milk does finally arrive you can have a physical reaction to its arrival. For some it is a mild fever for me it was BONE CHILLING SHAKES! I thought I had a fever from my surgery and was taking my temperature. I was shaking so hard I thought I would chip my teeth! Ryan whipped off all his clothes as if I had hypothermia and wrapped himself around me with a duvet around us both to warm me up, and still I shook. It scared the BE-JESUS out of me but the next morning I woke up with swollen boobies and pumped a CRAZY amount of milk! 
• and on that note, trust me...your milk will come in. 
• sleep when baby sleeps! This one is so important, I cannot stress it enough. You need to try and get your regular 6-8 hours of sleep still, it will just be in divided chunks not in a row. This means naps with baby. Remember how I said above that pain will dry up your tits, well for me lack of sleep does too!
• and the last but best tip of all? LAUGH! Laugh at the blunders and bloopers that come with new parenthood.. .live, love and laugh. Even when it is too hard to smile, laugh and smile. If you can't laugh at the blunder then ask for help. Do not be ashamed at asking for help! Remember, it takes a village to raise a child!