Tuesday, March 4, 2014

Overly engorged boobs and packaged mahi-mahi

LO has been right on schedule last night. I waited for her to wake up at 2am for her feed but i dozed off. Sure enough she woke me up at 230am. So i feed her, burp, change nappy, rock her a bit, and she was back to sleep at 0300. What i call 'a good night'.

I've been having problems with my mammary glands and LO's poops. One day I freaked out because i saw that LO's poop was green instead of the nice yellow color we've been getting.  At the same time I started having overactive milk boobs...yes the kind that can extinguish a city on fire. They engorge so hard that I soak everything during letdown, especially LO when she doesnt latch properly right off the bat during feeding. It's a crazy, sticky mess!!!

Hubby thinks the green poops are from too much iron, but I dunno.  At first I was thinking maybe it is my increased fresh milk consumption.  My MIL sent home with us like a gallon and a half of fresh milk with a 'best by' date of the 1st week of March.  Well it's the first week of March already and i would hate to see all that milk spoil, so I've been drinking loads of milk. Plus I missed drinking fresh milk during the time I had gestational diabetes (don't worry almond milk i still love you most!) Can drinking too much milk give you too much iron? I dunno.

But I've been pumping.  I was pumping to relieve myself of the engorgement, and so that LO will have bottles ready to drink during the morning when I'm more dead asleep than the zombies in The Walking Dead.  Dead exhausted to the point where I can't hear LO crying.  My hubby Says what kind of mother I am for not waking up to my baby's cries.  Many times I want to talk back and say 'I am a dead exhausted kind of mother, and stop being such an asshole.' but I dont have that energy. So i just tell him to give LO a bottle from the fridge.

Well the problem, I guess, is when you pump, you can start having an oversupply, which causes having an imbalance of foremilk/hindmilk intake on the baby when you feed, which causes baby to drink more foremilk and get fussy and gassy and have green explosive poops. I've pumped so much last week just to relieve my boobs, i used all my storage containers and within a week the fridge stash looks like it hasnt been used. So I froze some of them.  I want to start building my freezer stash of breastmilk for when i go back to work, and this would be like a great time to do that, but then LO started having green poops.  And she started choking on my milk during letdown, she gets more fussy, and gassy,  spits out more, farts like a grown man.  And I read having too much foremilk makes babies gain more weight rapidly.

So i stopped pumping today. I pumped yesterday just because i couldnt take it anymore. My boobs felt like rocks. How to go ahead with the pumping and freezer stash, I guess I'll figure out after LO stops getting the green poops.

random......
Sinigang na mahi-mahi

Tuesday, February 4, 2014

Love letter to my daughter #9

Love letter to my daughter #9

2/4/14

Dear Adara,

By now, we're all realizing that life has not given you any downtime, life has given you the task of survival.  When it gets tough, always remember that it is okay to cry. You were born a human being, not a rock. It is okay to cry out of frustration, but never give up.  Remember, when it gets tough, get tough with it.  And always I will be here by your side whether you need me or not.

Love,
Mommy She

Sunday, January 12, 2014

American poverty and reality

It's just bugging me...

Today I decided to go bike riding. I have like 10 thousand creative ideas on designing sweaters that I know is just another impulse that's driving me crazy. I can't bear not being outdoors on such nice weather either.  Two days ago I found out that the flat tire on my bike was just from someone deliberately taking the air out rather than a hole, so I put air on the tires and checked..no leaks! 

Yes it may be crazy for pregnant women to ride their bike, but biking is a way of life for me and as long as i can tolerate it and avoid falling we should be good.

So I made sweaters and decaf coffee a reason to go out and take a ride...and the other reason being...

There was a woman selling her baby sling and it was significantly cheaper than the one I bought.  So I told her I would buy it from her in the morning.  I could not meet her cuz I woke up late, so she said her husband will be home all day. So I went over at the address given, and found myself in an unexpected environment.  The only thing that gave me a false assurance of safety was a couple of toys that sat on their window sill.  I peaked to see if there was someone at the back of the house, but there was nobody.  There was only trash burning on the ground.  All the other windows were closed and there were beer cans on the other window sill.  I knocked on the door and then noticed the toy shotgun leaning beside me. I began to wonder what I have gotten myself into. 

I knocked. Someone inside knocked. So i knocked again. And a gruff man opened the door, and at his foot was a baby half-naked, held back by a makeshift baby gate made from a recycled pallet. The inside of the house was dark, untidy and smelled of smoke. I was just shocked at the condition of the baby's environment.  The man told me to wait outside and closed the door.  When he came back he gave me the baby sling.  I didn't even look at its condition, I just handed the money and thanked him, and then I left.

Riding my bike, i was zoning out again...thinking about the baby, and the dark, scary house...there's just this really dark cloud hovering above me, making me uneasy. 

I hope the money i gave them for the baby sling goes to the baby and not to like cigarrettes or beer or drugs...

Thursday, January 2, 2014

New Year exhausted

2014 bucket list: get back to writing some some....a daily entry to be exact...

Jan 1- all i did was clean the house, from 6am to 6pm. Because hubby's family decided to come visit on such short notice.

At least I've been forewarned.

Jan 2 - postcleaning hangover, woke up late...damn i'm tired. Still have to go to work later on...

Ugh. Life. 

Shhh. Baby is kicking.