Man, breastfeeding is hard work! Elias and I have been having a little bit of difficulty in the feeding department and at his first pediatrician appointment yesterday, we discovered that he's lost a bit more weight than they'd like. He's down a whole pound, which of course sent me into one of several daily sobbing episodes, but the pediatrician wasn't overly concerned...yet. She recommended we pump and feed him from a bottle for a couple of days to get his weight, hydration, and energy up and then go back to the breast. And he's been doing great. I was a little weepy after the first bottle, but he's still breastfed a couple of times in between, and he seems to already be benefiting from not having to work quite so hard for his nourishment. We've had to rouse him from active sleep for feedings when he seems to want to nap for more than three hours. I know that might sound like a blessing, and going for four to five hours at night between feedings would be okay. But during the day, ideally we'd like to feed him according to his cues, not have to wake him up to do it. Like most newborns, he seems to want to take longer naps during the day, but he's doing better. The first couple of nights at home he was up for three to four hours of eating, "active alert" time, and crying. But last night we had a couple of hours of mostly alert time between two closer feedings late in the evening. We were all in bed by about 11 and up at about 5:45 this morning. But he only woke up once in between; again for two closer feedings with about an hour or so of mostly alert time in between. We got a solid 4 1/2 hours of sleep overall and it's amazing how much better I'm feeling this morning. I even took a shower and had breakfast and it's only 9:30!
Of course, who knows if this will continue. I'm sure it's too early to see a pattern developing, but I'll take what I can get. We go back to the pediatrician for a weight check tomorrow morning and we'll assess the breast/bottle situation from there. Here's a picture of Elias in his car seat, ready to go on his first outing since returning home from the hospital.
Precious, ain't he?
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