If it's not one boob, it's the other
Greetings, my lovelies. I'm hoping to get this in while my adored offspring catches a nap.
So, as my twitter followers know I have mastitis. It's been less than fun. Recently the pain and swelling went down on the left breast simply to regroup and attack the right breast. I'm going to call the doctor on Monday and rectify the situation. Go me.
I'm totally going to blame the fever, chills and general painful boob-itis and downplay the mental deterioration I've been experiencing in the last week. As awful as it is to admit, I'm struggling. I'm lacking the confidence in my skills required to be a decent parent when sickly. What's worse is that Nora is a challenging baby. She's lovely and I'm totally in love with her, but she screams for no reason. She refuses to give clear feeding cues and OMG the child hates to sleeps at night.
Sure, this is all typical baby behavior, but it can hurt to realize that nothing you do is good enough for your child. Well, that's the way that it appears. Nora probably just needs the freedom to cry out her feelings. I get that. I'm emo, too, but man it can be frustrating at midnight and you just want her to feel better so you can both sleep.
I tend to want to solve everything with boobie. It works and it's recommended for the mastitis, so I fall in to a pattern of, "Oh, you're crying? You're changed, and dry and comfy, so you must be hungry. Eat this." completely ignoring the fact that she just at 30 min.-45 min. ago and there's no way she can really be hungry. It results in her spitting up all over the place, getting upset, and the crying starts all over again.
Recognizing I was working us both in to a frenzy in my crazed attempt to be too accommodating in the whole 'feeding on demand' thing, I'm backing off a bit and trying a new strategy. It's a horrible, awful, very painful strategy: As long as I know that we've tried everything else, we hold he and let her cry.
While she screams, angry and unwilling to be comforted, I hold her close, rub her back, and chat softly in her ear. Mostly I tell her that it's okay to cry and that we still love her and I apologize for being tense or stressed out. I tell her that I realize that sometimes we just have to cry and as soon as she is done we'll do something else.
It's so against anything I know or experienced, but it seems to be working for her. She's calmer after a good hour cry.
And.....there she goes. I suppose my baby is ready to be awake and catered to.
So, as my twitter followers know I have mastitis. It's been less than fun. Recently the pain and swelling went down on the left breast simply to regroup and attack the right breast. I'm going to call the doctor on Monday and rectify the situation. Go me.
I'm totally going to blame the fever, chills and general painful boob-itis and downplay the mental deterioration I've been experiencing in the last week. As awful as it is to admit, I'm struggling. I'm lacking the confidence in my skills required to be a decent parent when sickly. What's worse is that Nora is a challenging baby. She's lovely and I'm totally in love with her, but she screams for no reason. She refuses to give clear feeding cues and OMG the child hates to sleeps at night.
Sure, this is all typical baby behavior, but it can hurt to realize that nothing you do is good enough for your child. Well, that's the way that it appears. Nora probably just needs the freedom to cry out her feelings. I get that. I'm emo, too, but man it can be frustrating at midnight and you just want her to feel better so you can both sleep.
I tend to want to solve everything with boobie. It works and it's recommended for the mastitis, so I fall in to a pattern of, "Oh, you're crying? You're changed, and dry and comfy, so you must be hungry. Eat this." completely ignoring the fact that she just at 30 min.-45 min. ago and there's no way she can really be hungry. It results in her spitting up all over the place, getting upset, and the crying starts all over again.
Recognizing I was working us both in to a frenzy in my crazed attempt to be too accommodating in the whole 'feeding on demand' thing, I'm backing off a bit and trying a new strategy. It's a horrible, awful, very painful strategy: As long as I know that we've tried everything else, we hold he and let her cry.
While she screams, angry and unwilling to be comforted, I hold her close, rub her back, and chat softly in her ear. Mostly I tell her that it's okay to cry and that we still love her and I apologize for being tense or stressed out. I tell her that I realize that sometimes we just have to cry and as soon as she is done we'll do something else.
It's so against anything I know or experienced, but it seems to be working for her. She's calmer after a good hour cry.
And.....there she goes. I suppose my baby is ready to be awake and catered to.
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