So long, Dairy

Owen is a breastfed baby, has been exclusively breastfed, and eats very well. I am so happy for this and thought things were going great and motherhood was so easy. Then, starting about 2 weeks ago, Owen would go through these times where he'd eat a little bit, then start to get very fussy, to the point where he'd get this horrible scared look in his eyes, scream, and push away from he. But he'd still be hungry. He'd try to eat more, and it would just make him scream more. It was quite distressing for me. He also started breaking out in a blotchy red rash on his face and head. The nurse at the dr. office told me a few things to do to try to figure out the problem. Was it something I was eating? Reflux? Just a growth spurt? Something else? Well, after doing several things for a few days, including restricting my diet very poorly, we discovered he seems to have a sensitivity to dairy products. Well, this little knowledge is affecting my life tremedously! I have stopped eating all milk products...milk, yogurt, sour cream, all cheeses, whipped cream, ice cream (the hardest one of all). It really does seem to help Owen out a lot. His rash is much much bettter too. (His face was so red for a while, it was awful!) I'm just not quite sure how long I'll need to restrict my diet for, and how strict I have to be. (even a lot of bread has milk it it!) I've talked to a few people and got very different opinions, from being super strict and extreme to much more relaxed. I think I'll probably do what the dr. suggested: no dairy as long as I'm breastfeeding. I was planning on breastfeeding a year. I don't know if I'll be able to survive a year without milk and cheese. And icecream! I've started to try the soymilk thing, but it's just not the same. The dr. said I should also restrict chocolate. Boy, this is going to be a LONG year!!!

Owen's checkup

Owen had his two months checkup today, even though he's only 7 weeks. But we had to do it early since we'll be moving out of the country next week! He weighed in at a whopping 10lbs 8oz and 21.25 inches long. He's growing perfectly! The dr. said he looks great, and that he's "a good looking stud." I'd have to agree with that assessment.

He had to endure his first round of vaccines, and he did really well. He got some combo shots so he only had two pokes, one in each thigh. He let out a long scream or two, but I had a bottle standing by which calmed him down pretty quickly. The only bad part was the dr. had just run out of the pneumoccocal vaccine, and he doesn't carry the rotavirus vaccine since it's not on the required list but recommended it since we'll be in Ecuador. So he sent us up the street to the a county clinic where they give out free shots. It wasn't bad. I just felt bad having to wake Owen up again to get poked again! He didn't cry as hard this time, just one poke. The rotavirus vaccine he just had to swallow. Then he slept most of the day. That was nice because I was able to get a lot of needed shopping done! I hope he'll sleep throught the night too! A few nights ago he surprised me by sleeping 8 hours straight! I am so proud of the little guy. :)

Updates

I meant to write this post last week, but things have been busy around here. Here's some of what we've been up to:

*Two weekends ago we took a trip up to Payson so Owen could meet his great-great-grandma. There were 5 generations there: great great grandma Helen, great grandma Jean, grandma Cathy, daddy Josh, and Owen. We felt so lucky to be able to have 5 generations together all at one time! And great great grandma Helen was just in LOVE with Owen. Seeing them interact was just precious.

*Two Sundays ago was Owen's baby blessing. It was such a special day. Owen was so cute dressed in his white outfit, and it was great to be surrounded by our families.

*Last weekend we went to a surprise party/music concert for my dad's 50th birthday party. He was completely surprised, which made it more fun. He writes and arranges church music, so everything performed were his pieces. I even got out the old rusty violin and played something! (And I did sound quite rusty, too.)

*Owen has been growing and growing, and has become much more aware of his surrounding and more playful too. He looks around at things all the time, and constantly has his head arched back because his favorite things to look at are lights and ceiling fans. He wiggles a lot, he smiles more, he's started becoming more familiar with his voice and he'll coo, and every once in a while he'll make a sound in his sleep that sounds like a laugh. He can still fit into most of his newborn clothes, but some of them are starting to get tight. He made me really really happy a few nights in a row because he slept for 5-6 hours straight! We'll see how much that persists. I don't want to get too excited though because two nights ago he was up every 2-3 hours.

*Josh finally made it to Ecuador safely on Tuesday. He was supposed to leave last Friday but his flight was cancelled due to Hurricane Ike (his flight went through Houston). He's just happy to be there now.

*Much of my time the past week has been occupied with trying to get Owen's birth certificate. It's been quite stressful and frustrating!! It's a long long long story, but it's been hard because the only way to get it is through either a mail in request to have them mail it back to you, but that will take 3 months we've been told, or a parent has to go pick it up in person. Luckily, the supervisor at the vital records has tried to be nice and help us as much as she can, so we just might get it next week. Then I'll have to mail the birth certificate back to Chicago (yes, it's silly) to a company that can get Owen's passport in a day or two. The good thing is I won't have to fly to LA to get his Visa because they are going to let us do it through the mail. Hooray!! Basically, getting the birth cert/passport/visa would be 1000 times easier if we were still in Chicago, but we are thoroughly enjoying our time with family and friends in sunny Arizona, and we are so grateful to Josh's parents who are letting us take over their house and eat their food. Thank you!

One Month Old

Owen is 1 month old today!!!

Here's a vidoe clip from earlier in the week.

Just a warning: it might seem a bit long and boring, unless you're the parent or relative. :) But it gives you a picture of how much more alert and wiggly he is now.

I'll try to post more later.

Three Weeks Old

Owen has had a pretty busy third week of life! Last Thursday he took his first plane ride, and he did really well. We had to take two planes to Arizona with a stop in Denver, but I fed him before each plane took off and then he slept the whole way.

It's been fun being back in Arizona with friends and family. That also means that we have been very busy having Owen meet all of his family. We've had some fun get-togethers over the weekend. Here he is with one of his great-grandmas and Aunt Cassie.

He also was busy getting professional pictures taken. My friend Janelle took them and they turned out great! He was cooperative most of the time, and we even got a few smiles out of him. He just didn't enjoy being placed on his tummy. Here is a link to a slideshow of them.

http://bigshow.bigfolio.com/?s=000011485&t=780ae37a586f7853a5c545ae38599ae3

With all the traveling and running around we've been doing, poor Owen has been thrown off his sleeping and eating schedule. He still ends up eating about every 3 hours on average, but he's had a bit of a harder time falling asleep. He gets really fussy and fights going to sleep. Here he his in his new bed, a pack and play. He sill loves to wiggle his arms out of his swaddle.

When he is awake he is lots of fun and is still increasingly becoming more and more alert. He fixes his eyes on things, like faces, lights, ceiling fans. He's more vocal and sometime makes cooing sounds. And he's growing cute little fat rolls. :) He still loves bath time and loves the water.

I, of course, have fun dressing him up to look like a little man. We had to get him some cool shades for the bright Arizona sun! He still needs to grow into them though.

Check out his new shoes, thanks to Aunt Katy! We're trying to teach him how to walk early. :)

Two Weeks Old

Owen is already 2 weeks old!!! Life has been quite busy and sleepless (for me) as we've been packing up our apartment and getting ready to move this Thursday, but we are thoroughly enjoying our time with Owen. We are still working on following his sleep-eat-wake schedule (I'm trying to follow the 'Baby Wise' method). He eats well, every three hours, but he has started getting quite fussy at naptimes. He's still cute as ever and we have a lot of fun!

Some of our favorite things to do include watching him sleep. :) Doesn't he look so relaxed! He always wiggles his arms out of the swaddle and ends up sleeping like this.



We also love to watch all his funny faces. He can be quite entertaining at times.







We also have tried to get out of the apartment occassionally. We've run a few errands and went on a nice walk. We are really going to miss Chicago's great weather! Now Owen is getting ready to take his first airplane ride on Thursday. Arizona, here we come!!

My Birth Story

Being an L&D nurse, I love hearing people's birth stories. But I think most people are probably satisfied enough with simply knowing that a baby was born and what the time and weight was. Well, I'm going to post my story here, not because I think anyone else is really that interested in the long details, but more for my own record.

On Monday August 11th at 6:00am I checked in to Rush University Medical Center for a scheduled induction. I met my nurse and she did all her nurse duties, took my history, etc. I was only 1cm/25%/high, so Dr. Blatman decided to start me off with misoprostil/cytotec to help soften up my cervix to help get it ready for labor. He chose this over cervidil, which made me happy because it works faster. So at 9:45am the miso was placed. I just sat for a few hours and watched the olympics while being allowed to enjoy a clear liquid diet. Much better than just plain old ice chips that I was expecting!



After a few hours, Owen's heart rate started to drop. I wasn't really feeling contractions, but the dr. thought I got a bunch in a row which stressed Owen out a bit. He recovered and an hour and a half later they started to give me IV pitocin to get the contractions more regular since I was almost 2cm. Owen didn't like the contractions that started and his heart rate dropped again, so 15 minutes later they had to turn it off. The dr.'s were getting worried because they didn't know if he'd be able to tolerate labor. They were afraid I'd need to have a c-section, which I obviously wanted to avoid. They just watched me a bit, and at 4:30pm the dr. decided to break my water even though I was still only 2cm. It was clear (good) and they put a scalp electrode on his head to better watch his heart rate in case it kept dropping. Well, once that water broke my body kicked it into gear and started to boom out contractions! Without any medicine! I was wimpy and only an hour later got my epidural. The anesthesiologist came right away (so amazing!!) and got it in easily. Another hour later the dr. placed an IUPC- a pressure cather to monitor the contractions internally so you can tell just how strong they are. I was having really strong contractions already, and Owen was still dropping his heart rate a little with each contraction. They though his cord was being compressed somewhere, and I had to sit in a specific spot in order to keep it from dropping too much. They decided to start and amnioinfusion, where they infuse saline back into the uterus to help cushion the cord more. This really helped the decelerations go away. I kept contracting a lot and at this point started to progress really well. At 11pm I was 5cm/90%/0, at 12:30am I was 8.5cm/100%/+2, and at 1am was 10cm/100%/+2! I was so happy I progressed quickly, and was still amazed my body contracted on it's own without help from medicine. Unusual for an induction! Well, once I was 10cm my epidural decided to wear off. It did this a couple times earlier on and the anesthesiologist redosed it and I was fine. This time it wore off more than before, and I was QUITE uncomfortable until he was able to come redose me again. I'm kind of glad, in a strange kind of way, that it wore off because I feel like I still got a little taste of real labor pains. Anyway, the redose did wonders, and I labored down for a little while longer, waiting for me to get the urge to push. The epidural redose was a good one because I never got the urge to push I was SO numb. At 2:45 or they had me start pushing, though I couldn't feel anything (really strange but really nice), and out he came by 3:17!



Dr. Strassner, along with a resident, delivered him. He was a great doctor, very very calm about everything. Owen cried right away, I was able to hold him right away too. Josh cut the cord. His apgars were 9/10! I was so happy he looked so good, and just happy to be a mother! I was so happy I was able to have a vaginal delivery, I was so nervous I'd end up with a c-section. I did end up with a 2nd degree perineal tear, but what can you expect for your first baby.



I stayed in the hospital for two more days, and really had a good experience at Rush, despite my lack of sleep. All the nurses and dr.'s were really nice! Overall, I had a really enjoyable labor experience. I'd even consider doing it again! :)

going home from the hospital!

One Week Old

Owen is already 1 week old today! Though I'm still adjusting to life with a baby, I'm finally starting to feel somewhat like my normal self again. It helps that Owen has been a really good baby...he eats really well and sleeps a lot. We've even gone out on a few outings together. He had his second dr. appointment today to check his weight and bilirubin level. His bilirubin was totally fine, and he weighed 6lbs 8oz, up from 6lbs even on Friday. So he gained a whopping half pound in only 4 days! I'm happy to know he's getting plenty to eat. :)

1 week old, and his newborn clothes are still too big for him.


We have started to notice little changes in him already:
*His umbilical cord fell off so he's completely detached from me!
*He is starting to fill out and already has the makings of a double chin. :)
*His head has rounded out nicely and we get comments all the time about how round it is.
*He seems more alert during his short periods of awake time, and ALMOST seems like he's actually focusing on and looking right at us.
*He uses his hands a lot more, and loves to open and close them while he's eating.
*His makes new sounds and has a little whimper cry when he's hungry.
*He smiles a lot in his sleep.


1st visit to the doctor


grandma came and got to spoil him and give him lots of love


(I don't know why this is sideways)


We love him so much and he makes our life so happy!

first days at home

Owen has been a very happy baby. He sleeps and eats a lot, and occassionally is awake enough to catch pictures like these.


so cute
big yawn
first bath at home
chillin'

Video killed the radio star...

Here's a little video footage of Owen (aka little man aka Jean Luc Picard aka Mt. Baldy)