Nursing Your Kids

I have 2/3 of a bottle of fenugreek supplements in my bathroom closet leftover from when Sam was a baby and my milk was slow to come in. In retrospect, I had no idea of what I was doing and just took the 1 to 2 recommended dosage on the bottle instead of the 6 or more recommended on kellymom. I’ve seen several questions about fenugreek on the baby message board I frequent and saw this interesting post by a woman from India.

Hope this helps!

I thought this information was fascinating and answered a lot of questions. It’s also good to know that fenugreek doesn’t have to be cost prohibitive. One more note: I haven’t researched any of this information, I am just cutting and pasting with permission of the author. So if you’re having supply issues do your research and talk to a lactation consultant or doctor before taking any supplements.

Massachusetts moms, please act now!

I’m a resident of Massachusetts, one of only three states that provides no legal protection for nursing in public. There is some hope of that finally changing this year, but we need to act quickly. Here’s a notice put out by the Massachusetts Breastfeeding Coalition:

Massachusetts is one of only three states without any laws to protect a mother’s right to breastfeed in public. Senator Fargo’s proposed bill 2438 is currently stuck in the House Ways and Means Committee and unless we can convince the Speaker of the House to move it out of committee immediately our chance of passing the bill this year. Deadline is the end of July.

Speaker of the House
Salvatore F. Dimasi
State House
Room 356
State House
Boston MA 02133

On the back of the photo write “Another family for Senate Bill 2438! Please send it to the floor for a vote!

That’s it! Any cute baby photo will do, whether it was taken two days ago or twenty years ago, and no, they don’t have to be breastfeeding in the photo. In fact, we’d rather they weren’t. If you do send a photo of your baby breastfeeding please make it discreet. We want to flood these offices with pictures of cute babies, not breasts!

For those of you with the time and energy you get extra credit if you also send a photo/request to:

Chairman of the House Ways & Means Committee
Rep. Robert DeLeo
Room 243
State House
Boston, MA 02133

You may also email email Rep. DiMasi, Rep. DeLeo, or your own representative an embedded photo, but not an attachment. Keep the photo size small.

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I tried to post this last wee but the site has been down forever and I couldn’t log in to do it. So here it is now.

My baby is one month old. It’s kind of tough to do a monthly update for a month because at one month not much happens. Babies are still so fetal, and my little one-month-old is no exception. But he’s getting so, so big. He’s grown out of some of his diapers already and moved to a more generous snap setting on the diapers that were so huge just a few weeks before. His face is losing that newborn puffiness and starting to look more like the baby he’s going to become. His hair, while still dark, has lightened considerably from black to brown. His eyes are still a dark navy blue, a blue that makes me wonder what color his eyes will become.

He still spends the majority of the day sleeping, but when he’s awake he spends his time looking around with those dark blue eyes. He’s mostly calm and content and very rarely cries for reasons I can’t figure out immediately. He’s a good sleeper and naps on his own for hours at a time in his crib, the pack n play in my bedroom, or on a mat on the floor. At night he wakes to eat twice between 11 and 6 but generally goes back to sleep immediately after nursing for a few minutes. Last night he pleased me by sleeping for a good six-hour stretch. I am grateful.

He nurses quickly and efficiently and doesn’t spend a lot of time just hanging out on the breast, which I really appreciate. The quick and efficient nursing makes him pretty gassy which leads to spectacular spit ups once or twice a day. It’s astounding how much liquid can spew from a newborn’s mouth without them really noticing or caring. The pooping seems to have slowed down, and while there’s still plenty of poop (one of the downsides of parenting) I no longer have to change three diapers in a 30-minute period because of it.

The poor little guy hasn’t had the best health so far. He’s already had a staph infection, a nasty yeast rash (which the other pediatrician in the office told me was not yeast when I brought him in the first time. Two days later she wrote me the prescription for the yeast cream and it promptly went away), and now he’s got a cough. The same cough his brother and I both have. It’s awful to hear his little body coughing, especially since I know how much it hurts. But it hasn’t seemed to affect his mood and it hasn’t affected his sleep.

He’s really pretty strong. He surprised everyone by lifting his head and looking around immediately after his birth and he’s continued to show off his impressive head control since. When he’s on his belly he pushes up on his arms and looks around. He’s also got strong legs. Sometimes when he sleeps he’ll push himself several inches forward. One day he turned a full 90 degrees. I’ve also seen him turn from his back to his side. He’s so advanced. (doesn’t every parent say that about their kid?)

My little baby is growing up. It’s amazing how easily and how immediately we loved him. I’ll miss the newborn stage when it’s over. I love how soft and cuddly he is and how perfectly he fits under my chin. But I can’t wait to see what he’ll be like as he grows.

When it comes to milk production I am a champ to the point of embarrassment. Yesterday all of my nursing pads were in the wash. I was at home alone so I figured I’d just hang out and if I leaked a little it was no big deal. I was wrong. Within 20 minutes my entire belly was soaked and I had huge wet circles on my shirt reaching from my breast to my waist.

This extra milk production is probably the cause of my mastitis. Ben eats when he’s hungry and I can’t force him to take any more when he’s not. I haven’t been engorged this past week, but I’ve definitely been full and block nursing is the only way to ensure each breast gets emptied. That means one side is visibly larger than the other and depending on how long he waits between feedings, one side is noticeably lumpier and wetter than the other. I can’t pump for relief since that will just encourage production, so when he nurses on one side I have to make sure I have a burp cloth nearby to catch the drips that sometimes soak through my nursing pads.

Since Ben’s my second child I’m better at anticipating my flow so I’m less likely to squirt milk across the room when he latches. But I still have no way of controlling the flow when he unexpectedly lets go mid-feeding. The poor little guy’s hair is often plastered to his head with breastmilk.

The biggest problem is that the force of the flow laves little Benny gaping for breath and gassy. The kid can burp like a trucker.

Now that Benny is almost three weeks old it’s obvious that he’s a completely different baby than Sam was. I know that will come as no surprise to anyone with more than one child, and while I certainly didn’t expect him to be just like Sam, the differences are still surprising.

First of all, they look completely different. Sam, who was bald until recently, is blond and light eyed with skin so pale it makes me wonder how he could have come out of olive-complected me. Ben is darker, with tons of hair, skin like mine, and dark blue eyes that are sure to change color. He’s also bigger, so much bigger than Sam was.

The next huge difference is that Ben sleeps by himself in a crib. He naps for hours without being in a swing, car seat, sling or stroller. It astounds me that I can have a child who actually sleeps in such conditions. I know that it won’t last forever. Habits change and all babies have sleep regressions, but right now I’m enjoying this while it lasts.

Nursing Ben is completely different from nursing Sam. Sam used to nurse for hours, falling asleep at the breast and crying for more when I tried to remove it from his mouth. He nursed around the clock, waking often to eat long, leisurely meals. The first few months of his life I didn’t have an hour to myself he nursed so often. Ben is a fast eater, taking huge noisy gulps of breastmilk then stopping to look around. He eats every few hours, sometimes taking a 3 or 4 hour nap before meals. It’s almost freeing.

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
May 23, 2008

Media Inquiries:
Rita Chappelle, 301-827-6242
Consumer Inquiries:
888-INFO-FDA

FDA Warns Consumers Against Using Mommy’s Bliss Nipple Cream
Product can be harmful to nursing infants

The U.S. Food and Drug Administration is warning consumers not to use or purchase Mommy’s Bliss Nipple Cream, marketed by MOM Enterprises, Inc., because the product contains potentially harmful ingredients that may cause respiratory distress or vomiting and diarrhea in infants. The product is promoted to nursing mothers to help soothe and heal dry or cracked nipples. Product labeling specifically states that there is no need for mothers to remove the cream prior to nursing. However, the ingredients contained in the product may be harmful to nursing infants.

Potentially harmful ingredients in Mommy’s Bliss Nipple Cream are chlorphenesin and phenoxyethanol. Chlorphenesin relaxes skeletal muscle and can depress the central nervous system and cause respiratory depression (slow or shallow breathing) in infants. Phenoxyethanol is a preservative that is primarily used in cosmetics and medications. It also can depress the central nervous system and may cause vomiting and diarrhea, which can lead to dehydration in infants.

Mothers and caregivers should watch for a decrease in an infant’s appetite. More serious signs would be difficulty in awakening the child, limpness of extremities or a decrease in an infant’s strength of grip and a change in skin color. Please seek immediate medical attention if your child is showing these signs and symptoms.

“The FDA is particularly concerned that nursing infants are being unwittingly exposed by their mothers to this product with dangerous side effects,” said Janet Woodcock, M.D., director, FDA’s Center for Drug Evaluation and Research. “Additionally, these two ingredients may interact with one another to further compound and increase the risk of respiratory depression in nursing infants.”

Though the FDA has not received any reports of injury to infants, the agency is alerting the public because of the potential harm this product can have on a child.

Chlorphenesin can also harm the mother by causing dermatitis, a skin condition that can worsen the drying and cracking of nipple skin.

MOM Enterprises, Inc. is based in San Rafael, Calif. The company has stated that it has discontinued marketing the nipple cream with the potentially harmful ingredients. The FDA is advising consumers to discontinue use of Mommy’s Bliss Nipple Cream and to consult a health care professional if they experience problems or believe that their infant may have experienced problems due to this product. Nursing mothers with cracked, painful nipples, which is often a side effect of nursing, should speak with their health care professional or a certified lactation consultant if the problem is severe or for other treatment options.

Consumers are strongly encouraged to report adverse events related to this product or any FDA approved product to MedWatch, the agency’s voluntary reporting program, by e-mail at www.fda.gov/medwatch/report.htm, or by phone at 800-332-1088, or by fax to 800-332-0178. Consumers may also mail reports of adverse events to MedWatch, Food and Drug Administration, 5600 Fishers Lane, Rockville, MD, 20852-9787.

At my 9.45 weekly checkup yesterday my doctor told me that since she was on call I’d better go into labor that night. I said I’d be happy to, if there was anything she could do to move it along. She said she’d have to check out my cervix and see if anything was happening, and if there was she could give me a little push to get going. I was 3 cm dilated and 75% effaced, a huge change from the week before so she stripped my membranes and told me I could either go straight to L&D to see if I was contracting or I could go home and wait. My dad was babysitting and I’m pessimistic by nature so I went home.

Sam and I took a walk up to the playground. I started feeling some contractions on our walk, but nothing painful and nothing regular. I was uncomfortable though, and Bob had locked his keys in his car so we left the playground early so I could drive to his work to get them out. On our walk home the contractions grew stronger. Once we got home I plugged my cell phone in to charge and decided to lay down on my left side for a bit to see if they subsided. They did not and lying on my left side was uncomfortable. It occurred to me that 2 hours after she stripped my membranes I was really, truly in labor.

I called Bob and asked if he’d be able to break into his car to get his keys. I called my mother-in-law to see if she was able to come and take care of Sam. The contractions grew stronger and closer together and I was no longer able to sit or stand comfortably. After about an hour and a half and a number of phone calls (including one to my OB where I was told to head to the hospital right away) my friend arrived to drop Sam off with my mother-in-law and Bob arrived a few minutes later to take me to labor and delivery.

We got to the hospital around 2.30 and my contractions were 1.5-2 minutes apart. I was dilated 6 cm and wanted an epidural. They had to get me hooked up to an IV first, but there were two anesthesiologists on the floor and the epidural was working by 4. My contractions slowed to 2-2.5 minutes apart, but they were steady and regular. My nurse told me she just wanted to leave me alone and let the baby come when it was ready. As long as I was comfortable and things were moving I should just wait. She sat me up so gravity could help the process. So we waited. And waited. And waited. The epidural made my right leg completely numb and it made me shaky, but aside from that I was fine. We watched several episodes of The Family Guy.

I was 9 cm and fully effaced then I was 10 cm and at a 0 station. We waited some more. The nurse changed my position so I was on my left side. The baby, who had been hanging out on my right side for most of the pregnancy started to move. I could feel a lot of pressure down low. About 45 minutes after they’d found me to be complete they checked again and the baby was at a +1 or +2 station. The nurse took a look and showed Bob the baby’s head, ready to come out. The resident came in, took a look, and went out to get my doctor. My doctor came in and I started to push. Five minutes later my son, my second son, was born.

My friend called the other day to tell me about the front page news of the study that shows breastfeeding may boost IQ and I pretty much ignored him, saying, “duh,” like the 10-year-old I am. (I mean really, doesn’t everyone already know that breastfeeding is the best thing you can do for your baby, the IQ points, which have been hotly contested in the past, are just gravy.) After my mature reaction he explained that he was just telling me so I could write about it on my blog and I felt like a jerk for blowing him off. So I feel like I should at least mention the recent MSNBC front-page article with the headline, Breast-feeding may boost children’s IQ and the tagline, Study provides new evidence that nursing makes kids smarter.

The study follows up other studies that have pretty much shown the same thing. The question was whether the IQ differences were based on nature or nurture, since breastfeeding mothers in the US and Canada tend to be more well-off financially than mothers who formula feed. This time, researchers followed babies born to mothers in Belarus, randomly assigning babies to a group where breastfeeding was encouraged.

Previous studies had indicated brain development and intelligence benefits for breast-fed children.

The design of the study — randomly assigning babies to two groups regardless of the mothers’ characteristics — was intended to eliminate the confusion.

A BBC article about the study explains,

They found that those who breastfed exclusively for the first three months - with many also continuing to 12 months - scored an average of 5.9 points higher on IQ tests in childhood.

Lead researcher Professor Michael Kramer said: “Long-term, exclusive breastfeeding appears to improve children’s cognitive development.”

I think Micky at Mocha Milk said it best when in response to the latest “news”:

And by the way, breastfed babies don’t have increased intelligence. They have NORMAL intelligence. Formula fed babies, unfortunately are at increased risk of lowered intelligence. Think of it as an investment in your child’s ability to get college scholarships!

I’ve started worrying about the what-ifs. What if the birth is difficult and the baby won’t be able to nurse? What if I have an emergency c-section and the baby can’t nurse right away? What if the baby doesn’t want to latch? What if the baby has tongue tie and can’t latch? What if the baby has food allergies I can’t eat anything? What if my milk doesn’t come in this time? What if Sam wants to start nursing again because the baby is nursing all of the time?

My experience with Sam, relatively speaking, was easy. He latched (badly) right after his birth and stayed latched until they had to kick me out of the delivery room more than an hour after his birth. Even though my milk took five days to come in he nursed around the clock and after we fixed his latch my nipples stopped looking and feeling like I’d taken a cheese grater to them. Despite the bouts of mastitis, the overproduction, and the weeks of discomfort, Sam was a nurser from day one.

I didn’t know what I was doing but I knew that I could feed my baby and that was enough to make me feel confident and competent.

Now there will be another child, a child that I’m already attached to, that needs my love and care. I won’t be able to focus all of my energy on feeding the new baby. What if I don’t have the energy to make breastfeeding work? What if I’m not as good as a parent?

The bad news first:
Sam has not napped for three days in a row. Maybe more. I can’t remember if he napped on Friday, though I suspect that he did not.

The good news:
He has slept through the night for three days in a row. He slept in his old room Friday night and his new room both Saturday and Sunday nights. He loves his new room and happily played in it for a few hours after the big unveiling Saturday afternoon while I vacuumed and organized some of the resulting mess from the move. He’s currently playing upstairs without me, so at least I have a few minutes to myself but I am disappointed that he’s not napping. All of the nesting I’ve been doing has been taking its toll. I’m exhausted. I hope this is not the end of naps forever. He’s only two.

Speaking of nesting, yesterday I made pancakes, cranberry muffins, chocolate zucchini cake, and baked ziti, freezing half or more than half of each batch. Tonight I’ll cook something, again freezing half. My plan for the rest of the week is to cook and freeze as many meals as possible so we’ll have food to eat without my having to cook it when the baby is born.

This weekend I need to garden. If I don’t get flowers and herbs into pots now the chances of it getting done later are slim to none. Aside from a few tomato plants (Amish paste tomatoes if I can find them, Roma tomatoes if I can’t) I’m not planting any food besides herbs. I’ll plant some petunias and impatiens because they seem to survive neglect better than most other flowers. Though I feel guilty about not planting much, I imagine I’ll be grateful about it later.

Here’s the new room:

According to the website Holy Moly, Kanye West is a jackass who blames his fixation on boobs with being breastfed for too long. I couldn’t find anything on the New York Magazine website to back up their quote, but here it is anyway.

Kanye West told New York magazine recently about his obsession with ‘big tits’, blaming the fixation on his recently deceased mother…

“I was breastfed for too long. It messed me up.”

Canada is expected to classify BPA (the chemical found in some hard, clear plastics and some cans) as a dangerous substance. Recent studies have linked BPA to breast cancer, obesity, and infertility.

And a Yahoo article reports that the The National Toxicology Program found that

“experiments on rats found precancerous tumors, urinary tract problems and early puberty when the animals were fed or injected with low doses of the plastics chemical bisphenol A.

While such animal studies only provide “limited evidence” of bisphenol’s developmental risks, the group’s draft report stresses the possible effects on humans “cannot be dismissed.” The group is made up of scientists from the Centers for Disease Control, the Food and Drug Administration and the Institutes of Health.”

This is a controversial topic for mothers these days. Most women, whether they breastfeed or formula feed, use baby bottles. Many of the most popular bottles are made from plastics containing BPA. Mothers who formula feed are also exposing their children to BPA through the formula containers- many brands of powdered and liquid baby formulas contain BPA.

Some mothers, especially those with older children, feel that the risks of BPA are just hype, and that their kids turned out just fine so why panic now. Plenty of women on my pregnancy board used X brand of bottle or X brand of formula with their last child and have no interest in switching. Other mothers understand that toxins are everywhere but would rather limit their children’s exposure to those they can control. These mothers are actively researching bottles that don’t contain BPA and the brands of formula that either don’t contain traces of BPA or have the lowest levels.

I fall into the latter category. I know that my children will be exposed to many chemicals throughout their lifetimes. I know my children will eat unhealthy foods and play with toys I don’t approve of. I know there will be lead, phthalates, and BPA in my kids’ environment no matter what I do. Even so, I plan on controlling their environment to the best of my ability for as long as I can. I sold my Avent breast pump and bottles and plan on buying glass or BPA-free bottles for the new baby. Sam’s sippy cups are aluminum or safe plastics. Whether it’s hype or not, if a chemical might be dangerous I want to keep it away from my kid for as long as I can. I can’t control things forever, but I sure would like to try to keep my babies safe while I still have the ability.

It’s tough to know what to do, especially when such a huge portion of the population has a, “I grew up on chemicals and I turned out fine approach,” but taking small steps and making minor changes is a good way to start. Safe Mama has a great post on how to avoid panic and confusion.

I finished painting the former storage/new guest room and the plan was to move all of the stuff from the old guest room/Sam’s new room into it so Bob could get some wiring done. In the old guest room they didn’t wire the ceiling fan through the wall- they threaded it through a metal chain and attached it across the ceiling and down the wall to an outlet where you had to manually plug it in. To wire it properly Bob had to put two or three holes into the wall.

I asked if he needed help moving all of the stuff out of the room and into the new guest room. It was packed with all of Sam’s old baby gear, furniture, lamps, things we’re selling on craigslist, and a ton of other things that haven’t been moved to the basement yet. a big 9x 12 area rug was on the floor. Our friend came over to help him. I moved the painting supplies out of the new room and finished cleaning/sweeping up. I didnt’ mop, but I wiped down the dust along the corners of the room and cleaned up some spilled paint. We moved the bed into the new room. I left to deal with Sam who woke up from his nap.

About five hours later the wiring was done. Holes needed to be patched and the room needed to be cleaned. I asked if they’d moved the stuff to the other room and they said no, but they covered everything. With the rug. The porous, woven, rug. Bob assured me everything was fine and nothing was covered in dust. The next morning I went up to help him move some furniture. He moved the rug, picked up a bag of clothes causing a huge dust cloud to fill the room.

All of the bedding, all of the clothing, all of the furniture, the rug, everything was full of plaster dust. He asked me to grab an end of the dresser we had to move. It was still covered in dust. I told him that we weren’t moving anything into the clean room until it was dusted. He didn’t understand why. He didn’t understand that moving dust from one room to the next would cause MORE DUST. He didn’t understand that the very act of transferring dust would send the dust down the open stairwell to the floor below. He didn’t get that he’d just caused me several loads of laundry, at least $50 worth of dry cleaning, and hours of dusting that could have been avoided. I told him, “This is very distressing to me.” His response was, “It’s plaster dust, not poison.” I burst into tears and didn’t calm down for close to an hour.

He said he’d clean everything (and he did, more or less) but he sucks at cleaning and I almost always have to clean up after him if I want things to be clean, not just look clean. Most of the stuff is now cleared out of the room and it’s cleaner than it was, but not clean enough to paint. If I’m going to start the room it’s going to take hours of prep work in addition to the hours of sanding and scraping we learned is necessary. I am feeling very overwhelmed right now.

(Yes, that’s the international image for “I have hit the wall.” Please let this room be finished and this pregnancy be over soon.)

Things around here are starting to settle back into normalcy. After my spectacularly bad birthday two weeks ago things actually got worse. I learned my paid for, reliable, did I mention paid for car was totaled by the insurance agency. Crying, I called Bob at work to tell him the news but he told me he couldn’t talk. I called him back half an hour later and he still couldn’t talk. Close to an hour after that he called back and told me that he was on his way to the emergency room- he’d been hit in the eye with a hockey stick stopping in to the gym to talk to another teacher just before I called the first time. He didn’t want to upset me more, which is why he’d waited to tell me.

Bob was out of work for a few days with a bruised retina and corneal abrasions. He’s expected to recover full vision, but for now, a week and a half later, he still can’t see very well and bumps into things. It could have been worse, but the timing was terrible. We were feeling pretty bleak for a while and our car search didn’t improve our moods. Sam stopped sleeping through the night AGAIN which made things that much more difficult.

Sam’s still not going down easily or sleeping through the night. We put a deposit on a new to us 2007 car that ended up being more than we wanted pay, but with our luck we weren’t willing to take a chance on an older car with more miles on it. I’m still pregnant and I’m getting more uncomfortable each day. I’ve started to swell for real and can’t fit into my regular shoes anymore. At least the sneakers still fit. To add insult to injury a cat peed in my bathroom and despite crawling around on my hands and knees sniffing everything I can’t find the exact spot. Anyone want to adopt a cat or three?

So that’s why I’ve been quiet the past week or so. Life has been rougher than usual. I’m looking forward to the birth of this baby and margarita season.

Elizabeth Jett, mother to an exclusively breastfed infant and a five-year-old, failed to show up for jury duty in Maryland this October. She initially attempted to get out of service until the summer, but court officials denied her request offering her dates in January instead. Rather than agree to a date in January, she just didn’t show up to court and called in the morning of her service to say she wasn’t going. In January she was asked to come in to talk with the judge about her situation and found she was actually being held in contempt of court.

Breastfeeding a young infant is incredibly time consuming. Even if Jett were able to find appropriate child care she’d still need to be excused from court proceedings several times a day in order to express milk. Postponing her jury duty for a few extra months makes it more likely that she’d be able to serve well, rather than being distracted by her rock-hard boobs and the fear of squirting breastmilk all over her fellow jurors. I don’t think that it was right of her to just skip out on jury duty and I don’t think that it was wrong of the judge to hold her in contempt of court under the circumstances, but mothers of infants should be given some leeway in regards to rescheduling jury duty.

Lawmakers have proposed legislation that would allow breastfeeding mothers with young children to be excused from jury duty. This hasn’t gone over well.

Brian Frosh, Chair for the Maryland Senate Judicial Proceedings Committee, said the law would cause more people to try to postpone their duties, “If you start saying, we’re gonna excuse people for breastfeeding, you’ve gotta say ok to kidney dialysis, chemotherapy and all the other maladies that afflict the human condition.”

Frosh was also quoted as saying, “I really hope we don’t have to get in the business of passing laws for every excuse you may have for jury duty,” because obviously chemo is a lousy excuse for skipping out on one’s civic duties. Did my sarcasm come across clearly enough there? Because clearly Frosh is a dick. I mean seriously, chemo isn’t a good enough excuse to be excused from jury duty? Has he ever met anyone going through chemotherapy?

Frosh’s dickheadery aside, I think that Jett screwed up big time by failing to report. The law is law. Had she responded to letters and agreed to reschedule she wouldn’t be in this position.