High

Well, internet, I guess the diapers are going to get pretty rank now. My boy has started eating solid foods. If what you mean by "eating" is pushing a substance around with with his tongue (I assume we will have further debates on this point when he gets to be a toddler), and what you mean by "solid" is the consistency of pea soup, and what you mean by "food" is a granular substance that comes out of a box.


As far as I can tell, rice cereal is basically wallpaper paste. I would taste it to tell you if it's any good, but we mix the grains with breastmilk so it tastes familiar to him, and so...not doing that. I suppose I could make a special batch mixed with water just so I can try it, but honestly, let's just assume it's wallpaper paste. It has basically no smell. That can't be good, right? Food should have a smell.

Anyway, we're easing into the solid food thing, and so far the newtlet is digging it. Me, I'm digging the high chair. It's nice to have a new place to restrain the child. With two dogs and no Martha gene, my floors are not of the variety off of which one could eat, so putting the baby down there within licking distance of the dogs, even on a blanket, is not really an appealing notion to me.

Hence, I've tried to put a baby depository in every room, so there's always somewhere to stash the kid if I need my hands free. We have a swing in the den and a different swing in our bedroom, a crib of course in JW's room, a bouncy seat in the living room, and I can move the stroller or car seat around if I need a spot in the office or the hallway or the bathroom or something.

(You know, there should be a whole fancy apparatus for bringing the baby into the bathroom with you. I'm always bringing that baby into the bathroom with me; I mean what else are you going to do? There should be a little hammock you can use to hang him safely from the towel bar or something--I am so full of great ideas for inventions; why doesn't anyone steal this stuff from me? There's just a gold mine in this here head).

So anyway, the kitchen had no baby depository, and it was a glaring omission in our system. You definitely need somewhere to stash a baby within sight in the kitchen, so you can make coffee or toast a pop tart or chop celery or something without squirmy baby danger red alert!

So that high chair is earning its keep these days, for duties well outside of the wallpaper paste administration program. I can strap him in there with some nice toy he can put in his mouth, and no worries! I have five, maybe six minutes of uninterrupted grown-up time. I hardly know what to do with all my freedom. Maybe I'll take up a new hobby, like brushing my hair or eating foods that don't come in microwavable containers? The sky's the limit, baby.

Mini-Me, You Complete Me

Ah, this takes me back. Remember the Skeletor phase?

Or when my boy looked kind of like the evil doctor from Brazil?

Well it's nice to know that being out in the world hasn't changed the little fellow's propensity for impersonating fictional supervillains.




Thanks, Katie, for this adorable outfit! The newtlet wants to wear it later to go shopping for some sharks with laser beams attached to their heads. I told him he can have some sharks, but no lasers until he is in middle school. That's called parenting, y'all.

The Lopsided Lactator

Oh, sorry about that, internet! I didn't mean to leave off the last post with a cliff-hanger.

( Will Newt continue breastfeeding? Will she start eating ice cream again, as she so richly deserves to do? Will the Newtling develop x-ray vision as a result of his mother's awesome boobs? To find out, stay tuned for the exciting conclusion of The Lactation Notations!)

I really and honestly just ran out of time in the middle of the story. So anyway, here's what we have done: Since the baby has been about 11 weeks old, I breastfeed sometimes and give formula sometimes. Seems kind of common-sensey and anticlimactic after all that build-up, but honestly it came as a revelation to me. I somehow had it in my head that I could breastfeed or I could formula feed, but it never occurred to me that I could do both. I can do both! It's pretty great, you guys.

For one thing, I can put the newtlet in part-time daycare without pumping. At daycare, he gets formula and I prefer that, actually. There's something problematic, to me, about bringing bags or bottles of bodily fluids to a public place and leaving them there for my child. I know, I'm weird about this, but I read somewhere that a daycare was sued for giving a baby the wrong mother's breastmilk in his bottle, because several children's stashes were in the same fridge. I mean, it must happen more than we hear about, right? I don't mean to be alarmist, and formula has its own risks (melamine, anyone?), but I want my baby's food at daycare to come out of a nice clean factory.

Another benefit of the breast-formula system (the breformula system? the forbreastula system? Ok, that sounds like a disease) is that I can have the occasional evening of going out, or even have a second or third glass of wine, and the baby just gets a bottle for that evening. I never knew it could be this easy, you guys! I have taken the newtlet to several grown-up parties now, with a bottle in the diaper bag, something I never would have dared to do in my exclusive-breastfeeding days. I feel so much more mobile and free and more myself now. I'm pretty sure the newtlet likes it too, getting out and meeting people, spitting up in new places, that sort of thing. It's never too early to help your baby make new friends and puke on them.

The downside of this giddy freedom is that my supply is slowly dropping, while the newtlet is rapidly growing. I'm pretty happy with where thing stand at 4 months: I can still nurse him in the late afternoon, before bed, overnight, and once in the morning. But increasingly, we are supplementing with a bottle if he still seems hungry after nursing. We aren't there yet, but we are heading in a direction where the nursing will seem like an appetizer. I expect to lose my supply in another month or so.

If I pumped more or took fenugreek or domperidone, I'm sure I could stave it off, but honestly I can live with the loss. We've gotten through the critical first three months, and my baby is happy and healthy and thriving. (See? Here he is at four months, thinking deep thoughts about what he's going to do with his x-ray vision once it kicks in. Use it for the betterment of humanity? Or rob banks? It's a close call, and his dad and I have promised to support him either way.)



The newtlet also seems to prefer the bottles now, and honestly so do I. He is able to make better eye contact with me while he eats, because he is positioned on his back looking up, instead of trying to look at me while angled toward my rib cage. I love how he reaches out and tries to hold the bottle. I love how I can see how much he has eaten. I love how I can offer him more until I'm sure his belly is full. I love how other people can feed him, and get that delight that comes from holding a contented baby as he eats.

I feel like we are enjoying the best of both worlds in this brief and glorious window, in all ways except aesthetically. Because (and let me say up-front that this is entirely preventable and all my fault, internet), my boobs are now very lopsided.

Honestly, lefty was always the star of the team, but I made a point of putting righty in the lineup consistently and she did her best, she really did. But with our new diminished schedule and supply concerns, I think I was going to our go-to player a little too much. I must have let old righty ride the pine for too long, because two days ago I latched the newtlet on to the right side, and was surprised to learn that it hurt like a motherfucker. Holy shit. Also? Not much to show for it.

So, righty is now retired. Yes internet, I am lactating only on one side of my body, a fact that is plainly visible in the two or so cup-size difference between my formerly symmetrical (and perky!) breasts. I wonder, if I go to a bra shop, would they sell me just one of those silicone bra inserts? I assume they make you buy the pair, like with shoes.

Maybe some entrepreneur needs to come along and make special bras with inflatable inserts for the lopsided lactator. Feel free to steal that idea, internet. I won't ask for royalties, just a prototype.

Of course I've tried it...

...and yes, it made the baby's pee smell funny. The things I do for you, internet, I swear.

So anyway, to recap the Boob Lady updates, 1. breastfeeding has been painless and mostly great, but 2. the baby's tiniest discomfort sends me into an orgy of boob-related guilt. Also, breastfeeding is really interfering with my drinking, y'all.

To continue the conversation, here are some things I like about breastfeeding, besides the no-pain thing:

• It's sort of sweet. I like it when the baby rests a little hand on my chest. As he gets more dexterity, he is increasingly twiddling his little fingers like he's playing the piano on my breast. Or, I suppose more accurately, the accordion.
• Very little prep time. As Susan wrote in the comments of my earlier post, it is nice not to have to fiddle with bottles and measuring scoops and whatnot in the middle of the night. I just pull up my top and go right to work. I haven't however, mastered the skill of staying half-asleep through the whole feeding. I am paranoid about handling the baby when I'm sleepy, so I wake up all the way. When the newtling was smaller, I used to get up and watch a whole TiVoed episode of The West Wing during each feeding. Now that my boy is in day care during the day, I'm all sappy and I usually leave the TV off and spend our nighttime feedings gazing adoringly at the little tyke. Still, not half-asleep in either scenario.
• It's healthier for the baby. If breastfeeding advocates are to be believed, my breast milk is some kind of superfood, which will give my darling newtlet superpowers. I'm expecting the x-ray vision to kick in any minute.
• It is an excellent last resort against fussiness. Even when the baby isn't scheduled for a meal, I can often get him to calm down by putting him on the breast. In our house, we call this "the nuclear option." I stole that from somewhere, but I don't know where.
  

But despite these several and obvious benefits, I have been harboring a secret envy of formula-feeding moms. I know that's stupid and ungrateful, since so many formula-feeding moms wish they had the painless experience I have had with breastfeeding, but what can I say? I'm stupid and ungrateful. You can tell my mom fed me from a bottle.

Here are some things I dislike about nursing, besides the everything's-my-fault thing:

• I do not pump. I have a little manual pump, but hardly ever use it. I am glad to feed my baby directly, but pumping makes me feel like a cow. I do not like feeling like a cow.
• I will not breastfeed in public. This means the baby and I have been kind of trapped at home for much of his life. I have one of those cover things that you can drape over yourself, but have never used it. I don't live in a community where you ever see women nursing children in public, and I'm not prepared to be a trendsetter when it comes to the possibility of intimate public exposure.
• I don't know what to do about house guests. My mom and two sisters have sat on the couch next to me through nursing and if they have found it odd, they have been very cool about it. With my in-laws, I retreated to a back room. With my dad, I kind of positioned a chair so it was turned away from most of the room, and tried to make that work. It's really awkward any way you cut it. Afternoon guests are one thing, but if you have someone staying for a week or so, then a new plan has to be made for each relative and their probable comfort level with the whole breastfeeding thing. Sometimes this involves me sitting around with my shirt down trying to carry on conversations while a baby sucks on my breast (awkward!) or me excusing myself up to six times a day to sit in a back room with a non-verbal companion (boring!). I deeply yearn for the simplicity of just using a bottle.
  
• Being a non-pumper, I am always on the clock. The baby eats about every three hours. If I want to go to the grocery store, I always have had to look at the clock and decide if I can get home in time for the next feeding. I love that baby, I do. My little baby is cuter than Zac Efron in a room full of puppies, but that three-hour leash he has me on is enough to make anybody a little cranky.

Hey, Mom? Who's Zac Efron?

• Formula-fed babies sleep longer. File this under "No good deed goes unpunished."

OK, so, having amassed this list of pros and cons, I found that I was completely ambivalent about breastfeeding. Yes, it's lovely. Also, it's driving me a little crazy. And I have bottle-envy like you wouldn't believe.

So what's a girl to do? I'll tell you what we have done later this week when I get a little more writing time, but in the meantime, internet, what is your experience? I am finding breastfeeding to be a privilege and a burden at the same time. Anybody else?