Well, my last post was about the birth of my baby boy, and he's about to turn 4 months now. Oops. Our first 3 months together were less than relaxing. Though I was hopelessly in love with his adorable Daddy-ish face from the moment he was pulled onto my chest, our first three months had me constantly exclaiming "I'm never doing this again!"
His birth was perfect. Nursing was kind of a nightmare. Again. Lots of pain and parts-bleeding-that-should-never-ever-bleed followed by lactation consultants, moments of nursing peace, serious supply issues, pumping-nursing-pumping, T's slow weight gain followed by weight loss, herbs and supplements, more pumping and a little formula, horrible face rashes and all-night-upset-baby, allergy-to-something-in-my-milk diagnoses... and I quit. I made it a month, which was a far cry from the 1-2 years I had planned on nursing him, but I just couldn't handle it anymore. Sigh. I still have moments of regret and some serious mommy-guilt, but looking at his round, smiley-dimpled face it's hard to seriously believe I've done him any harm. He's happy. He's healthy. He's a sweet little cuddlebug who loves nothing more than falling asleep in mama's arms. So why do I still feel like I've failed?!? Ugh.
Other than the nursing, he's definitely been our most challenging baby. And I say that with full awareness that our girls completely and utterly spoiled us. When T didn't sleep through the night at 7 weeks we thought, "What's wrong?" When he would only nap while being held and screamed if *ever* put down I vowed that our family was done. NO MORE BABIES!!
Recently I realized, at not quite 4 months, that almost all of the hard parts are over. Already. He isn't a fan of going more than 5 hours at night without a baba, but he's only up for 15 minutes and sleeps great the rest of the time from 7:30 to 7:30. He naps on his own 3 times a day. He isn't ever fussy unless he's tired or hungry... and even if one of those things is true he still takes the time to flash us one of his HUGE smiles before letting us know we better get a bottle QUICKLY. He's happy to hang out in a stroller now until it's naptime, and then he will instantly fall asleep on me when I put him in the sling or Mei Tai. He's become a little angel baby, and I don't even mind that he still wakes up at night because I love snuggling back to sleep with my sweet guy in my arms. He's still probably our last baby, but now it's just because our family feels complete.
Okay, a few of the quick stats that 3rd babies usually don't have in their nonexistent baby books...
Smiled: 5 weeks
Laughed: 11 weeks
Held head up: 6-7 weeks
Slept through the night: ...TBA :)
Rolled over (accidentally) from stomach to back: 3 months. He's become quite a hefty guy, so some of the physical milestones might take a little while :)
Oh, and one other cute thing before I forget. Thatcher started literally "turning in" for the night at 2 weeks old. He would turn his body towards us and bury his head when he was tired in order to shut out the world. At almost 4 months he still does it...such a cute and quirky little guy. :)
