(no subject)
(I know that this entry is rather pointless. I just wanted to get my emotions and feelings written down so that I can look back at this later and remember everything.)
Today, I feel better. I was able to get Evan to latch on last night for several minutes. I am feeling good about that. I am still working on getting him to fully go back to breast, I have some new information that I plan on trying out soon. I can do this!! And you know what? Even if I can't, I breastfed my baby for the first 6 days of his life. I know in my heart that I'm doing my best for him and for myself. I will at least keep pumping/attempting to get him to latch until his first doctor's appointment. And at least until I try out all of the possible methods that I can. I'm not sure that I can keep pumping long-term, but I am at least going to keep at it for now.
I honestly cannot describe the way that I feel when I look at my baby. Just typing that brought tears to my eyes. I love him. All of my worries about how I would feel about him are gone. When I look at him, I feel nothing but love and want nothing but the best for him. Even if it means staying up all night so that I can pump/feed him/put him back to sleep every 2-3 hours.
2-3 hours. That might seem like a lot of time, but it honestly is not. I get his diaper changed, put him to breast for several minutes to see if we can have any success, warm up him bottle, get us both settled down and get him to eat his bottle, then I like to spend some time cuddling him and just looking at him. I could spend hours looking at him. Then I usually either get him to go back to sleep or find something to entertain him (he loves his swing), try to make myself drink a full glass of water, get all of my pumping supplies in order, pump for 15-25 minutes, get myself cleaned up and apply lanolin, measure how much I've pumped and divide it into bottles, clean the pumping things, and try to relax. At that point, normally I have an hour before he'll be up and hungry again. Sometimes it's an hour and a half. And sometimes, he wakes up and just wants to be cuddled and held for a while. I don't mind cuddling him or anything. I love having him lay on my chest. I love having him in my arms.
I love my baby.
And I love my husband, have I mentioned that recently? He is a wonderful father and I could cry just watching him be with the baby. He is so good with little Evan, and I know that he loves him just as much as I do. When I was in the recovery room after my c-section, I saw my husband cry for the first time. It wasn't like big-time crying or anything, but he definately teared up. It was the absolute sweetest thing I've ever seen come out of him. And he's a very sweet man. Later, I asked him why he was crying and how he was feeling and he told me that that he totally overcome with emotions. He told me that he was very worried about me (I was shaking uncontrolably after surgery and afraid to hold Evan for several minutes) and that he was very happy to have little Evan in his arms and know that everything really was okay and that we were all good. I love this man. I'm actually crying right now while I write this. I'm so lucky to have him. He's taken really great care of Evan and me know that we're home from the hospital.
I think that my nesting kicked in after I got out of the hospital rather than before the baby came. I never felt motivated to do ANYTHING when I was pregnant, but now that I'm home, I've been cleaning house every single day and being very productive. Danny told me last night that he's going to make me spend today in bed because I overdid myself yesterday. My legs are hugely swollen. Also, I have this nasty fat pouch that hangs at the bottom of my stomach. It sticks out really far, almost as far as my boobs do. It's disgusting and it makes me feel gross. Everyone keeps telling me how good I look and how I'm really bouncing back, but I feel disgusting, seriously. None of my clothes look good on me and I can only fit in sweatpants or gym shorts. Sexy, yeah?
A note on my sleep...it's really not happening. I think I've been sleeping like 4 hours a day, but it always comes in 1-2 hour streches. Danny usually takes the baby in the afternoons/evening and I sleep for small amounts then. I've been letting Danny sleep as long as he needs to though. I don't want us both to be zombies and I'm really feeling quite alright without the sleep. Last night, Danny stayed up until 5am because he was organizing things and hanging out with the baby and playing on the computer (also, doing coupons lol...I'm on a break from it so he's been doing it. i love him, again). I took my last nap from 2:30am-4am. I've been up since then (it's 10:30am) and I'm honestly not tired. My legs are very swollen and they hurt...as well as my back...and my incision is very painful, but I'm okay! I quit taking my pain medication yesterday. It makes me very sleepy and since I'm not sleeping, that just results in this awful headache. The headache is intensified by the stress of trying to breastfeed and gets so bad that I can't even concentrate. I prefer things this way.
Well. It's time to feed the baby again and start the cycle all over. Hopefully I will have time to write tomorrow morning as well, I want to remember everything about this first week home.