One month: We made it!

Matthew and his one month accomplishments!

With each baby I remember my mother-in-law's advice to circle the date on the calendar a month after the baby is born. That way in the dark times during the first month when nothing is right, you can look at the calendar and know that at that point, almost all the problems you're facing will be resolved. It has been great advice.

February 2014 will be known in our memories as the month we all made it through (barely). 

Matthew was born an incredibly healthy baby, praise God! He also naturally put himself on a schedule of being asleep for about four hours and awake for an hour or two. We can work with that kind of schedule. I had to get stitches, which I wasn't happy about, but which I was also pretty much expecting. Our difficulties the first couple of weeks mostly involved my recovery. (Spoiler: getting stitches down there is not fun at all and kind of affects everything you want to do, including sitting up, moving around, and walking.) I seemed to be getting better, and then something happened at about two weeks and suddenly my stitches started pulling and stinging. It was so discouraging, since stitches are easily my least favorite part of recovery. I talked with my midwife about it and she said that because of the way she'd had to tie the stitches, they might not have dissolved and may need to be removed. That elicited one of my two breakdowns during our first month. I just broke down and cried at the thought of anyone having to mess with my stitches at all. It probably had nothing at all to do with post-pregnancy hormones. ;) Thankfully, a friend read that I was having problems and stopped by with a bag to help me feel better. It had cold packs, homeopathic arnica montana tablets, a donut pillow, and an herbal sitz bath mix. I could have cried. It was so amazing! I used those for a couple weeks straight and miraculously one day the pain and stitches disappeared. It was such a blessing! That was something I really really wanted to heal up on its own. I'm so glad no one had to look at it or mess with it. 

Breastfeeding was also, pretty much as I expected, excruciatingly painful. I'd describe it as being stabbed repeatedly in one place over and over again. In addition, I managed to develop cracked nipples on both sides, which just made it, if possible, even more painful. I only screamed once. I only broke down sobbing once because I wanted to feed a crying baby but just couldn't face the pain. Mostly I just bit down on a rag and tried to bear it. When I developed cracks, I decided to give myself a break for about ten hours, so I just pumped and fed Matthew from a bottle during that time. After that, things got better very quickly. By about two weeks, breastfeeding was definitely bearable, and mostly painless.

Then The Cold hit.

Not the weather- no, that comes later. Liam was the first to come down with it: a productive cough even

Sick and tired Liam.

though he didn't seem to have a runny nose, and what he indicated was a headache. He was whiny and clingy and generally miserable. A couple days later, the runny nose appeared along with a high fever of 103. The fever (between 101 and 103 degrees), runny nose, and stomach upset continued for FIVE DAYS. Poor little guy just sat miserably on the couch not moving and barely keeping his eyes open the whole time. He tested negative for influenza, so as far as we could tell, he just got the worst cold ever. Three or four days after Liam got sick, Diana and I came down with the cold. Thankfully for adults it just seemed to involve a sore throat, headache, runny nose and cough. I was happy to get sick because I hoped as an EBF (Exclusively BreastFed) baby, Matthew would avoid it entirely that way. Unfortunately, it was so contagious that at the tender age of two weeks old, Matthew ended up catching it too. He didn't get the fever (thank goodness!), but he did get a runny nose and most unfortunately, a cough. It was so sad to watch a little newborn having painful coughing fits. It caused him to spit up more often than he usually did. Thankfully, he still kept gaining weight. But they definitely seemed to bother him. He snuffled and coughed and choked during the night so much that we got another humidifier for our room and put him to sleep in his swing for a couple of weeks until the drainage was mostly gone.

At the same time, there was an unusually heavy snowstorm and we ended up with over a foot of snow at our house and no way to really get out. Imagine, if you will, two sick, sleep-deprived parents, one still healing from having a baby and struggling with painful breastfeeding, the other beginning to feel the effects of cabin fever; two children with coughs and runny noses alternating being listless and being whiny because they're sick and confined to the house; and an infant with his first icky cold. There were some nice moments of family bonding, but there were also some rough times indeed.

So here we are, all healthy again, all healed again. Matthew is growing like crazy (11 lbs 11 oz at his six week appointment!), really tuning into people, and starting to give out more and more smiles. We're getting into a rhythm of being a family of five. I still take sleep where I can get it and only manage to get one thing from my long to-do list accomplished each day, but we're working on adjusting to this new normal. I've been so blessed to have the most amazing help from Joseph, our families, and our friends. They brought food, gave us space when we needed it, watched kids when we needed, and were around to just talk and help around the house. Joseph and I always talk about how we're open to moving because we love travel and new experiences, but I am incredibly grateful that we've been able to spend our family-growing years with such a wonderful community of people. I think it's that and a lot of praying that got us through the first month. I'm excited to see how life changes and keeps getting better in the months to come!

Matthew giving out baby smiles!