Ruth_Baldock

Life is a cruel joke. I'm sure that all of you lovely Mums (and Dads!) are sick of me posting, but...tough titties (pun intended) Baby Baldock is losing weight. Rapidly. I have tried boosting my supply with all the usual tricks: Fenugreek, a 'nursing vacation', lots of skin to skin, getting him to latch on all the live-long day, but nothing doing. Then, last week, we were both ill and my supply dwindled to practically nothing. On the GP's advice, we started to supplement with Aptamil, but today he's had more formula feeds than breast and seems happier- because he's fuller. I'm pleased he is full and happy, but I am gutted that our nursing relationship is over so soon :( I am also in the position of knowing NOTHING about formula feeding; I know how to make the feeds up in our house, but what if we're out? I have to get a train to far, far away (Well...Epsom) soon, and I don't know how to feed him because I was under the impression you have to chuck feeds away after 2 hours and can't make pre-made ones to take out anyway. I know you can get cartons of pre-mixed formula, but how do you heat them up? Presumably I will have to invest in a bottle warmer. Woe. WOE IS ME. I am a sad person today and not just because Baby Baldock woke up every 30 minutes last night (yes you did read that correctly).

I agree, Helena. I like Mr Tumble, good old Justin. I read an interview with him....er....somewhere....once....(so articulate, I astound myself really) and his is a big advocate of Makaton and SEN and intergration and stuff, which is all gravy with me (Myself and my Ma and brother are all v involved with the National Autistic Society so thats right up our street). He'd be a very good male nurse, too, I think.

ryedalema Wrote: ------------------------------------------------------- > Oh boy -I have soooo many slummy mummy > confessions. I do the competitive 'worst day' > stuff, the 'gin addiction' stuff...but the Lazy > Town and Something Special guys? Eeewwwww no > thanks! > > Hasn't anyone mentioned the CBeebies presenters > yet? Esp. the black guy and the Vernon Kay > lookalike? > > Yummmmm. Don't know about them, but I used to teach Jacob Scipio who now presents Kerwhizz. He was a right little bastard. I say 'teach', he had small group lessons in the Learning Support dept. where I worked.

Helena, Hard to say. DH works stupid hours, by his own admission, and then will call me at 7pm to say 'Just leaving now...' only to roll in at 9pm, after saying 'Oh, as I was leaving so-and-so came by the office for a drink...'which leaves me REELING, so he knows I have it 'worse' and hasn't really tried to play the victim much in my son's 13 weeks of existence. However, he does sleep through Baby Baldock's night-time operas, and will accuse me of lying when I say 'He woke at 1.45, 3.15, 4 and 7' because he couldn't hear it!!! I think parenthood has divided us slightly but he's good at doing what I want anyway- he reguarly tells his overbearing family to go take a hike when they come over, smirk and then tell me what I should be doing (this happens about three times a week- best was yesterday 'If he slept in his own cot, he wouldn't have got that bug you got- this is why co-sleeping is DANGEROUS'.

Smiler Wrote: ------------------------------------------------------- > I just don't get the Sportacus attraction. No no > no. > > Have just let my two-year-old sleep for almost the > whole afternoon: she is still sleeping and it is > tea-time. Know it'll be chaos tonight and in the > night, but by then my husband will be home and I > will deny all knowledge of why she is so lively > and claim that I've had a "hard day" (catching up > on American Trash on Sky+ and surfing the net) and > make him take care of her / get up in the night > (he doesn't have work tomorrow after all) while I > scoff take-away / sleep! > > Hurrah. Smiler, this has made me laugh like a drain every time I read it. I've come back to re-read it about seven times! (It's been one of those afternoons where you just want to cry and put the baby on Ebay)

Oh god, swearing...it's such a norm here in the Baldock Crib (see what I did there?) that I didn't even THINK of it. Husband and I are always saying 'we MUST stop swearing...'. It's yet to happen. When I was in labor, I was shouting out all sorts of swear words (Well, obviously!) and the MW said 'Stop it! Do you want the first thing your baby hears when he enters the world is your foul language?'. Husband actually said to her 'Oooh, Matron!'. It was the highlight of a terrible, terrible labor!!! Apart from that, errr when we run out of biccies, I'll normally break into Baby Baldock's stash of rusks- keenly bought for weaning a bit too early. Ahh, he'll never know. I've eaten a fair few of his chocolate desert things too (again, keenly bought waaaaaaaaaaay too early). When I'm bored, sometimes I make him model his hats for me and I take photos and send them to friends with 'amusing' catchphrases. Have also definitely broken out the Gin to calm self and get him to sleep better too (am breastfeeding). Didn't work.

Great minds think alike, because I have been mulling over the same question for weeks! Jelly Babies is meant to be v good I've heard. We were going to take The Night Owl next week but then we had to have his 12 week vaccines delayed because we were both at death's door so will have to wait a while! We have a swim nappy for him and a wetsuit type thing, because I am new at all this (slightly ridiculous now I think about it!) We also have an inflatable ring with a back on it. The main problem is myself; if you're worried about the pool being crowded, wait 'till I show up and everyone will scarper at the sight of my lattice-pie esque stomach. Mmm, nice.

I *may* have trained my baby to get excited and to jump around maniacally in his doorbouncer to the 'Superman' theme purely for my own entertainment. With you on Sporticus. Yum. My younger sister says she finds Robbie strangely attractive. Righto, then...

I've only been here a short while, but the support, humor and advice I have received is phenomenal and probably saved me from losing my mind in the past few weeks. I'm really looking forward to meeting everyone at the meet-up on the 16th April :)

How inconsiderate and sad :( Something similar happened to my sister when she was having chemo (when she was 7, she's 17 now) and someone loudly asked my Mum why she was still 'so bald' at her age. My Mum went on to explain that she had leukemia and the person in question remarked how it was a shame for her to lose her hair because she wasn't pretty now! For the record, my sister is gorgeous even without hair and she promptly threw up on the woman's coat and shoes (a side effect of the chemo or good timing? Hmm, who knows?)

Hi Molly, Thanks for your replies. We've managed to get him to have breastmilk 3 times since I made the post and also around 1.5oz of the electrolyte stuff. He has done one wee, which is a vast improvement over the weeing strike he was on previously. Our GP advised us if he refused fluids/couldn't keep them down, to head to Kings but we are holding off for the minute. Just tried the toenail thing, he pinked up nicely. He was smiling and lying on my chest lifting his head up for a bit before so *fingers crossed* he's on the mend, poor bubs. REALLY want to avoid A+E, as don't think hanging around Kings for eons will help him at all. Will keep offering him the breast and keep my fingers and toes crossed.

Hi all. Baby Baldock seems to have this stomach bug thats doing the rounds, as do I. We were both vomiting like crazy yesterday, and both unable to keep anything down. My GP came out to see us, and gave me an IM injection of anti-nausea stuff (which bloody hurt!). I can now keep down fluids and have been having that electroylte stuff in the sachets. We tried to give it to Baby, but he's having none of it. He won't take breastmilk either and whenever we try to give him any, he normally throws it back up! We're terribley worried, should we take him to Kings? We're both writhing around on the bed in agony, it's horrible to watch. He's not his normal happy self either, obviously. How can I get him to take fluids? We did drop some electrolyte stuff into his mouth, probably only managed about 1/2 an oz though, which I suppose is better than nothing?

@ ryedalema, I say the same thing about my Dad every fathers day :( Happy mothers day, EDF Mums! You're all hilarious and lovely. Last night, The Night Owl slept through for the first time but has just thrown up all over himself...still, swings and roundabouts! Have a great day, Mummies! xxx

My son is only 3 months old, but we did have to push for him to take a bottle of EBM for my own sanity at around 4 weeks. We just had to keep pushing through with it, refusing to give him the breast (Yes, am terribley cruel) until he gave in :/ It soon worked. Also, turning it into a game helped somewhat- lots of idiotic 'OOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOH WHATS THIIIS FLYING THIIING??? OOOH SEBASTIAN! ITS FOR SUPER SEBASTIAN! OM NOM NOM NOM' helped too.

Wait, hang on- are you ALLOWED to have a life post-baby? I thought that was against the law? Now that expressing is going really well, as is saying 'YOUR TURN NOW DADDY!' whilst handing over The Night Owl to DH, I'd be up for this!

I had to breastfeed my nocturnal son, otherwise known as The Night Owl. Domitianus Wrote: ------------------------------------------------------- > "I had to BF The Night Owl..." > > Translation please? Is this rude?

Someone alert the media! Ryedalema, they DO have to have public loos etc as far as I know. Peckham Registry office have very well equppied changing area/feeding rooms to demonstrate this (I had to BF The Night Owl a fair few times when we went there to give our notice of intent to get hitched and was suitably impressed...)

Molly; I do have PND, it was diagnosed very recently but I am not on any meds for it, as I had several bad experiences with various anti-depressents whilst at Uni :/ SW; My Mother thinks I have PTSD, as all I do is think/talk/cry over my son's birth- I was at Mum's this weekend and she said I kept staring into space and going quiet and she KNEW I was going over and over and over it. It's getting out of hand now and I think I WILL get my notes, I've had the form to give back to Kings College PALS for blooming ages now...I think I'll aim to have it all sent off by the end of this week. I will also look into the birth crisis helpline- I fear I have bored my friends and family senseless with it now...I agree that the majority of NCT Mums I have met have been absolutely lovely; it was just one or two that seemed to think parenting should be an olympic sport and that they were going for gold, but they are obviously not indicative of the NCT who I think are fantastic anyway- I've met up with a local group once or twice and they were all lovely, and no-one assumed I was in the first year of my degree when I mentioned Uni (I'm in the middle of my PhD, I'll have everyone know...!) Ko; In the end, I started using the car-seat on the pram's frame which is much lighter than what we were usually doing, so that's helped a ton. I have been dropping HEAVY hints about a bugaboo bee, and recently saw that DH was looking at the bugaboo's website, so fingers crossed! Ha! Smiler; if such a thread existed, my MIL could contribute to it HEAVILY. She reguarly tells me I am breastfeeding 'wrongly' (don't think so, Sebastian weighs over 15lbs!!!) and a few days ago I cracked and said 'Do you want a go then, LOVE? I think the last time you breastfed was thirty years ago...' HA! Would love to take up all offers of meetups, off to send some PMs now. Again, thank you to everyone for being so lovely!! Sebastian is looking at me with his 'Now, Mumsy, get ready for a screamfest face...' so I better dash. R xx

Thanks everyone for your lovely responses! Last night we DID try CC and it sort of worked...but by 10pm, Sebastian (Baby Baldock's real name!) was awake and screaming bloody murder. DH had said he would do the 10/11pm feed but the cheeky bugger came into the bedroom, poked me, handed me the baby and said 'He's hungry'. I thought my heart would break. However, when Sebastian woke up at 3am, DH did actually take him downstairs to give him a bottle of expressed milk, which was a nice change. To answer some questions- He does sleep in a separate room, he has a large (vintage, dahhhling) cot as he's outgrown the moses basket and there isn't any room for it in our room. We have a baby monitor which is pointless because you can hear even the tiniest snuffles clear as a bell. He also has a strict bedtime routine, the same one he's had since his cord stump fell off at 13 days and we could bath him reguarly: bath at 6, kicking around on his playmat whilst his 'bits' air, bottle of EBM (always 5oz so we know he's had a good feed) and then bed. The bed bit seems to be a lot of running up and downstairs, putting his dummy in and winding up his mobile. It's like a very predictable dance routine, which is why I call it the Danse Macabre. Anyway, he normally does go down for a bit then. Co-sleeping works for my DH who loves it, but he also has a habit of lying diagnonally across the bed so I'm squashed by both of them (cheers, darlings...). A swift kick to his (DH, not Seb's) kneecaps usually sorts it out. I'm a really light sleeper and need space so co-sleeping isn't really working for me, although I do get to nurse lying down. I think the lack of sleep isn't helped by fresh bout of insomnia I seem to have acquired since having Seb. I lie awake miserably going over and over his birth (bloody traumatic, and I have vowed not to talk about it for 24 hours as it's all I think/talk about nowadays...) and getting more and more distraught. I'm sure the NCT Competitve Mothers thought that my son's normal (by the sounds of it) sleeping habits were down to me being inept, or something. I'm only 24 so everyone assumes I haven't got a clue what I'm doing, and some have even asked if 1) I still live with MY mother (the cheek!) and 2) If Seb was an 'accident' (THE CHEEK!!!!!!) I've gone off on a tangent, but I think the gist of what I was saying is that if I wasn't so lonely and miserable the rest of the time, the sleep issue wouldn't be quite as nerve-wracking as it is! Nice to know that not every other baby in the history of babies were sleeping through the night at this stage! Ruth x

Hi Claire, The dummy is both our bessie mate and worst enemy. We introduced it after a phase where I hadn't slept for four days because DS was comfort nursing. The MW came round and I was literally insane, so we gave him a dummy and lo and behold, a quieter happy baby. However, like you said, it falls out and we have to find it and pop it back in! We have a very strict and well established bedtime routine- bath at 6, tummy time and general kicking about without nappy/PJs (his favourite), feed, bed. That bit generally works 9/10 and we can get anything up to 5 hours out of him that way! It's just after he wakes up for his later feed (between 10 and midnight) that all the 'fun' begins. Weirdly though, he is able to settle himself no problems during the day- we put him in his cot with the mobile and dummy and his blanket and he'll settle himself within 10 minutes. Has a little chat and then he's out like a light. When we settle him at night, one of us stays with him for the first 20 minutes or so, and we leave a muslin cloth with my 'scent' on it to comfort him, but...no dice. :( Good point about not believing what others say- another Mum at the group said she thought everyone was fibbing- she also had a little night owl on her hands.

I know we have a lot of these types of thread on here, but I am going slowly mad. My son is almost 12 weeks old and his sleeping is...SHOCKING. He wakes up every two hours, and has a feed, but 99% of these are comfort feeds. He has a dummy, but it falls out of his little mouth and he goes BESERK crying his head off when that happens. We're co-sleeping, but he is a little thrasher and us being in the bed wakes him up- we tried putting him in his cot last night and he whined for his dummy but didn't yell like he normally does. He was asleep from 10-3, save the odd whine for his dummy.(He naps in his cot during the day for a bit, but if he naps in my bed with me, he sleeps for hours and hours) However, the 2-hourly wakings are slowly driving me mad; giving me shocking migraines, no energy and generally feeling teary all the time. I went to an NCT group recently and all the Mum's there said their babies slept through the night! Oooh, I was green with envy. i think the problem is his dummy falling out, so the most logical thing would get him used to falling asleep sans dummy, probably... We have tried CC but he yelled for about an hour straight with no let up, so it seems nothing works!!! Will he ever sleep through the night, or will he still be crying in the night when he's at University?!

I, for one, found it incredibly cathartic to see a positive aspect of a c-section. My son was born 11 weeks ago after a, frankly traumatic, failed induction which led to a crash c-section- I was under general anesthesia and missed everything. I, too, have had people say 'I'm sorry' when I tell them how my son was delivered which only serves to make me feel worse! We had planned an unmedicated homebirth, but ended up with the most invasive birth possible and I am totally still reeling from it, and doubt I will set foot in Kings again because of the memories it brings back. However, saying that, even though it wasn't my birth story, Joy and Fabio's birth experience almost served as 'closure' for me...if that makes any sense? Definitely the best thing on telly at the moment, all my Mum friends and I text back and forth during the commercial breaks about it :"That woman's partner is a right twat!" etc.

Along with the huge support and outrage on localmama's behalf here, there is also a lot of support and discussion going on, in a livejournal community for breastfeeding- so the issue has gone worldwide (on the internet, anyway)

That's awful! My son is 10 weeks old and on the (rare) occasions I do BF him in public, I've always seem to have a negative reaction from others :( I have to say as a new and unsure Mum, it doesn't help things one bit! I can imagine how that poor lady in the shop felt...

You have two options: 1) Contact your son's school's SENCO and SEN Department for some kind of guidance. They may very well be able to arrange a test, which would involve an EP (educational psychologist) and some written tests, but it may take a few weeks to sort out. 2) Arrange for it to be done privately, at your own expense. You could also call up Sunshine House (http://www.southwark.gov.uk/YourServices/childrenandfamilies/ChildrenandFamilyCare/sunshinehouse.html) for some advice, too. Personally, I'd go with the first option- if it's all arranged by the school, you'll cut out a LOT of faffing about with regards to setting up an IEP/ Statement of SEN in the long term. If you have it done independently, you'll probably end up having to chase various people at his school with his test results which can be stressful and taxing for all involved. I am not surprised at all that any difficulties he may have were not picked up in Primary School! I worked as an SEN Teacher/ Learning and Behavior mentor for several years and any 'problems' were usually picked up in years 7-9 of secondary school, but were completely missed at Primary level. Odd. Good luck!