World Breastfeeding week 2012 - Our Breast feeding experience

The photo above is of me, at a matter of minutes old doing the most natural thing possible and thanks to what my mother learnt from her own breastfeeding journey and the support and advice she could pass on we're reached month 5 of exclusively breastfeeding Alfred and have the confidence to continue.  If it wasn't for my mother, telling me to follow my instincts and stick at it, I'm not sure we'd have made it this far so thank you mum, Alfred and I owe you big time.
The photo below is also of me, with my son only minutes old doing what generations going back as far as time itself have done.

 As natural as breast feeding is, I now realise it's as much a skill that has to be learnt as every other aspect of parenting. In ante-natal classes you're told how it all just falls into place and told about a video of a newborn crawling to get up to the breast. No one tells you it's actually quite frustrating, both Alfred and I had to learn how to breast feed. It sounds daft, learning how to feed, but it is hard work in the first few days. Initially Alfred could latch on, and could suckle but not together and despite trying different placements, it was upsetting to struggle so much. They also didn't tell us how tired he would be after birth, he was born in a birthing pool naturally after about 8 hours of labour. He was breathing fine but didn't cry (cue influx of doctors) was loving the cuddles but just wanted to sleep. Eventually the midwife got us to express and fed Alfred with a syringe. I had major mixed feelings at that stage, happiness that at least he'd eaten and was settled down, but also complete and utter terror that we may not be able to feed as we'd intended. When he woke up at about 4 a.m. and still wasn't feeding properly my heart sank, and after getting no real help at the hospital I was on the verge of devastated. Luckily I had my mum on hand to re assure and re position him so he could feed.
Over the next few days we spent a lot time perfecting it, my darling husband even took pictures of our most successful latch ons for "reference purposes" if we were struggling. My husband was fantastic throughout, supportive and understanding he knew when to leave us to work things out, kept us supplied with drinks and snacks and was just there. He only offered the breast pump once during a difficult feed, I think he got the hint...
A combination of events with the midwife meant that I was left feeling like an absolute failure by her on more tan one occasion, I vividly remember one of the early days sitting in floods of tears wondering if I was doing the right thing sticking with breast feeding, my mother told me how well I was doing, told me to stick at it and I'm so glad I did. At 5 months my little man cub has only had one mild cold, has beautiful skin, is developing perfectly, is active and hitting milestones. We have an enviable close bond, perhaps because he know every time he's a bit upset because he's hungry he's guaranteed close individual mummy attention. I will probably be breast feeding him for the next 7 months, for the knowledge of the benefits it carries, for the bond it builds and of course for the post feed, milk "drunk" cuddles;

Breast feeding has awarded me with such confidence now I've got the hang of it, I've fed him in so many places when before having him I thought I'd be too nervous to feed him anywhere. My husband finds it a beautiful thing, me feeding our son, so there are actually quite a few photos of feeding in strange and wonderful places.
Some of my favourites are below, thanks for reading and if you ever doubt your ability as a mama to nourish your baby, trust your instincts, and your own mama!

Post feed at Whipsnade view, by the penguins. Excellent view.

 At Truck (music festival) hardly anyone noticed that we were actually feeding Alfred! Loved the mama smiles you get from ladies who have babies

 I didn't know this picture had been taken until I uploaded my camera! This is on a steam train at Didcot Railway Centre, takes about 4 consecutive rounds trips to feed a hungry man cub.

At our NCT group, it's lovely to be in a room where no matter how you feed your baby you can feed them without judgement. Alfred has a tendency to get Boob envy though, so has to directed away from our breast feeding mamas!









(this was inspired by another blog, http://ht.ly/cJ1J1 , pop by and have a look)

Baby Rockstars are high maintenance

Man Cub is definitely developing his own personality right now and it's quite fascinating to watch. He's quite chilled out overall taking in everything around him. Everywhere he go he likes to look, and from the height of the Moby he gets a pretty good view of everything. Buses in particular are amazing, napping on buses is now out of the question as there is just too much to see, he does however go out like a light when we get off the bus. He's babbling away non stop at home, talking to his toys, the cats, his books and us but as soon as we are out it's like he's in "study-mode" and is just too busy watching to chat. I'm curious to see just how much of his world he is taking in, as he doesn't seem to be a passive observer type. He's already recognising certain people, other than family, and seems to find them in rooms at playgroups. There are two friends that go to more than one playgroup with us each week, and we often go swimming together, he seems to notice them over everyone else in the room. He's developing a musical taste too (very important in our house) and it's funny how that's growing. Classical music seems to be a hit, but seeing as how he's had that in the background since forever I'm not terribly surprised. Today we discovered that Weezer hits the spot, and lullabies in the car actually send him to sleep. Win. It doesn't detract from the fact that his favourite song is "B is for Boobie" sung to the tune of "C is for Cookie" from Sesame Street. He's a rock star like that.
We're enjoying watching our little man become his own little person but it's with a pinch of sadness too, it already feels like he's growing up too fast and he's only 5 months!! At least he's growing up lovely, calm, happy and sociable (and a fan of Iron Maiden!!).

Pigeonholing Parents, or how we fell into Natural Parenting

This is my happy, healthy babby. In 5 months he has changed 80% of my views on how I thought I would want to parent and has shown me a new way of raising a child. A lot of media channels have done biased articles on attachment parenting recently, which has led to quite a few hurtful comments at us when we're out. I don't pigeon hole, I don't think it's fair and personally I think that how a family raises a child is up to them.

We decide to try a bit of everything and work out what's best for us which, for the foreseeable future, means that my little man is exclusively breastfed. Formula just wasn't an option for us, I was determined to Breast Feed and fought hard to get it to work. I found it quite hard to bond with Alfred at first, even convinced myself that he didn't like me and if I wasn't feeding him then he wouldn't want to know me. This sounds ridiculous now but I'm sure many mother swill understand where those feelings came from. Being able to feed him myself helped alot, for a lot of the day we are sat down together sharing something that no one else has and learning that we need each other. I'll admit I grimace when he clamps and twists, but watching his little feet fidget as he nods off at the end of his feeds is something magical. He's still exclusively breastfed, despite my midwife at 10 days telling me I should feed him formula so that he put on weight faster. He's developing quite nicely at his own speed and certainly seems to be thriving on boobie milk.

 Hopefully he'll be good on just milk until 6 months, he certainly isn't ready for food yet. I suppose the approach we're going to take for his food falls mostly into the baby led weaning category but once again I despise the fact that you have to pick one style and label yourself. We're going to follow the Alfred method of weaning. He's interested in food, but he's been interested in food since about 10 weeks. If you offer him food he'll take it, drool on it, taste it then get stuck unsure of what to do with it. There's no attempt to bite or suck food, so I'm quite sure he's not ready yet. Ideally he'll be able to sit up mostly unaided before we start solids, so he can sit at table and swallow his food safely. He's so close with sitting, but 10 seconds and he's over like a drunk trapeze artist. He'll share what's on our plates when we're out, get an adjusted version of our meals at home and have boobie milk in between. There are even packages of frozen milk in the freezer for baby rice / porridge when the time comes. I haven't the patience to puree everything, nor do I think it is the way I want him to learn about food. I appreciate it works for some people, but everyone's different.

The main point of difference seems to be the way in which Alfred is transported around town. We have pushchairs and they are sometime very practical and useful, but 90% of the time it's easier in the Moby. We've already convinced at least one friend on their brilliance and she now too has a happy carried baby. The term "babywearing" is everywhere right now, it's a trend apparently. Mothers have been carrying their babies since time began but it's a new fashion... go figure. I have only ever seen two other people with Moby wraps (before the convincing of friend), one of whom is a friend from an NCT group and the other was a lady just strolling round town. Everyone else seems to have argos' latest wheels. We don't use the wrap to lord our views over everyone, we use it because it's a nightmare travelling on the buses near us with a pushchair, Alfred likes to be close and doesn't like being in the pushchair for any great length of time and I feel it's safer with him upclose when we're somewhere busy or new. Why oh why we get "look it's one of them attachment parenting things" baffles me. I choose not to judge other people's choice on how they parent so we should be mocked? If only they could see whats catching Alfreds poop!

We are cloth bum converts. I'll admit I walked away from the Baby Show last October poo-poohing the idea of cloth nappies. Turns out the over engineered fiddley things that daunted us there just weren't right for us. We used disposables for the first two months, if only to get through all the cheap / free packs we'd acquired whilst pregnant. Then we saw a trial offer for miosolos, essentially they were free you just paid p&p. We gave it a go and haven't looked back. Turns out pocket nappies / all in ones work best for us in the day time (including the darling Spiderman one modelled above) and two parters with wraps work best overnight.We still use disposables now and again but they're a dying breed in out house in favour of cloth, turns out it's much easier for us, more economical (all our nappies are birth -potty) and miles better for Alfred's skin. No nappy rash since switching is enough for me. Which is good because my boy is still predominantly chemical free.

I am actually proud of the fact that at 5 months the infacol and calpol are still sealed in the cupboard. This boy is disgustingly healthy and touch wood is doing well without artificial junk. All of the lotions and potions that go on him are natural, his skin has been perfect since birth and he always smells lush. There is not even a hint of dry skin on him and the cradle cap is pretty much non-existent (thank you Burts Bees!). I wouldn't have thought this would be the way we would parent, wouldn't have guessed the crib would go largely unused as we shared a bed as a family. Ever since we started co-sleeping Alfred's slept right through, if we need to check on him in the nigh he's right there, if he needs feeding we're right there and there is nothing more lovely than your alarm clock being replaced by a tiny hand stroking your face until you wake up.

We parent naturally, choosing what feels natural to us regardless of what "trend" it falls into. And to all the people who sneer at us, check out my happy calm baby and leave us alone.

Our Brush with the 'lympics

We live in a London Borough, and as such we have a very particular view of the Olympics. Anyone who knows us will be aware we are not sporting types, the only games we participate in are video games and even they've taken a back burner right now. The fact that all the regeneration of sports facilities has meant the most inaccessible of our "local" pools got a revamp, whilst our actual local and perfectly adequate pool closed down is a bone of contention with me. Along with the "don't travel into London unless you absolutely have to" ... Londoners live here too ya know! And we're not all going to the games. Nonetheless Alfred's year of Birth is full of excitement and patriotism so we went to see the torch pass through our local area. The buzz and the atmosphere was overwhelming and quite fun. The torch itself was so brief it was barely worth the effort. Due to a 20 minute corporate stop-over it literally raced past, blink and you'd have missed it. But he can say he was there with his mama and his friends and he fell asleep. Yes, asleep. In amidst all the drums and whistles, and shouting and cheering Alfred fell asleep. He woke up when we got to the park afterwards though. Happy 'lmpics Alfred, you were there!

The birth of festival mama

For the last four years I've spent a July weekend in a field in Oxfordshire at Truck Festival , this year was to be no exception, despite our new addition. I think Alfred had more stuff than me and the mister combined but I decided I was taking no chances so took tonnes of clothes, blankets, toys and so so many nappies. Naturally he stayed clean all weekend so half the clothes didn't get used, the whole sha-bang was massively exciting so the toys were unnecessary blankets and nappies definitely got used though!
We left early on the Friday (after Alf's 5 a.m. feed) and he managed to fall asleep within minutes of being put in the car which was nice, just wish I could have switched off as easily ... Got to the in laws at about 7 (nice rush hour dodging by the OH) which gave us enough time for breakfast, rallying the troops and a guilt trip from the mother in law. I appreciate she doesn't see Alfred very much but it's really starting to get to me that I have to endure the "someone-sat-on-my-cute-fluffy-puppy-and-splurted-its-guts-everywhere" look. But anyway, I digress, we were one of the first lots to set up as we arrived at hlaf nine and were designated to the campervan section, which lies just outside the main camping field. This has always worked perfectly for us all,because although we love a festival, a beer or two or three and a late night, we also like to sleep. For this reason we take the trailer tent. I love the trailer tent, wholeheartedly. See below;

So yeah, you lot all enjoy your cold flimsy pop up festival tents and we'll chillax in our double beds with mattresses and eat our mahusive breakfasts made on propers hobs and grills :oD It makes camping with man cub dead easy too. I wasn't drinking this year, not too different from last, haven't really missed it or felt a need for it and quite happily my man cub comes first. OH was, so we took a bed each (we co-sleep with man cub and merry papas don't work well sharing with tiny man cubs). Fully expecting Alfred to mess up we were very tentative with everything but as it turns out he loved it, he adapted well to wearing ear defenders and being around strange smells and people. He slept through Tim Minchin's set quite peacefully! Completely contrary to what we expected, at 8 p.m. he just fell asleep in the sling and when I took him back to the tent at 11 he didn't even wake up as I got him changed and cosied up for bed. Friday night was COLD. I had visions of my MIL up panicking about the baby, who by the way was so toasty. Admittedly in the morning he needed some clever unwrapping from all of the blankets but this clever mama kept him at the right temperature all night :oD Of which I am quite proud! And thank you cloth nappies for no elaks on the trailer tent mattress!

Saturday was lovely and chilled out, being the responsible parents that we are, Alfred started the chilly morning in a nice cosy pram suit ...

 

I hadn't anticipated quite how much attention a 4 month old in a Tigger suit sttracts, apparently he was quite adorable. Saturday was a scorcher, all that surprise sunshine hit us like a brick between the eyes! Alfred napped under a muslin most of the day (highly effective sunscreen in combination with shade and hat) and as such was the only non burnt group member by the end of it all! He loved the music, and the balloon we acquired and all the people. Me, I love being able to lie down and breastfeed in public, theres certain freedoms being a field offers. Once again bedtime was a dream, I stayed long enough to British Sea Power then took a very sleepy man cub to bed. Despite the fact that we were in a tent he slept throuh till 7.30!! Turns out those blackout things would have a waste of money.

Overall we had a fantastic time, Tim Minchin was my favourite but also really enjoyed Gabriel Minnikin, Federation of the Disco Pimp, Clock Opera and the Villagers. Saturday highlights were Yellow Fever, Black Hats, The Low Anthem and of course British Sea Power. It was so easy to enjoy it with a little man cub and we're 100% back next year. Thank you Truck Festival!