Finding the Rattle

About once a day, if we're doing well, Ephram gets some play time on the floor. I've been trying to give him more "tummy time" lately and he genuinely hates it. So, after we're done with that torture, we usually roll him over onto his back to play with him more. We often take out some toys to capture his attention, but he undoubtedly prefers to stare into the corners of the room or at the ceiling fan in the kitchen. However, there's one toy that has always caught his attention... the rattle.

Andy was playing with Ephram one day when he was six weeks old, and put the rattle by his hand. Ephram grabbed onto it. This was the first time that he'd grasped a toy. He'd had lots of practice with grabbing that week... just a few days earlier, he'd surprised me by reaching up to grab my glasses and then promptly threw them on the ground. They narrowly missed our brick mantle.


Once he had the rattle in his hand, it took some coaxing to get him to move it. I honestly don't know if he had a clue that he was causing the rattling noise... probably not... but he did have a good time shaking it around until he threw it, (just like my glasses.)



But he was still up for more play as he took it back in his other hand for awhile!


Ephram was pretty proud of his new accomplishment, and played for quite awhile in that session... here's his smiling face!

Ephram at One Month

Ephram hit the one month milestone on January 31st. A facebook friend of mine recently asked why time seems to go so slow in the present but so fast in retrospect... that sentiment perfectly represents how I felt about Ephram's first month. In some ways it felt like ten years, especially with all of the worrying I did, but in other ways it went as fast as a blink of the eye.

So here were Ephram's stats at his one month check-up...

Height: 20 1/4 inches (9%)
Weight: 6 pounds 15 3/4 ounces (2%)
Head Circumference: 38 cm (44%)

Yes, we have a tiny guy with a big head. Several people have told me that his head isn't that big, and I just keep repeating that it is for his little body! I was really, really hoping that he would be to 7 pounds by his one month appointment, and he was so close. I am just happy that he fought his way back from the 5 pounds, 4 ounces that he was at homecoming.

I want to keep track of some things from month to month, and I'm sure I'll have more ideas in the coming months... but for now, here are some things I want to remember.

Milestones:
2 weeks - rolled from back to side
3 weeks - smiled and started cooing

What he's eating:
2/3 breast milk and 1/3 formula

Favorite things to do:
Eat, eat and eat
Sleep, particularly in mom or dad's arms
Play with his hands (he could clasp them together by the end of the month)
Take a ride in his swing (the only place he'd let us put him down!)

Least favorite things to do:
Spit up (especially through his nose)
Be alone, or even just not being held by someone at anytime

Nicknames:
Houdini (the nurses gave him this one because he could escape any swaddle from birth)
Fuzzy (I gave him this one because he was very, very fuzzy at first... still is a little)
Spock (a la Andy - yes, Ephram's pointy ears revealed in the ultrasound months ago really do exist!)

We took our first non-doctor outing when Ephram was four weeks old and headed to the outlet stores that are about a half an hour away from our home. We had a lot of fun, and the outing was successful... this is a good thing because we really enjoy shopping.

Ephram got a new blanket on our outing and he really likes it. Here are some pictures taken a few days after he turned one month!

Ephram's Fourth Week

When Ephram was 3 weeks old, Charlie developed a nasty runny nose. Then Andy caught it and about two days after the initial symptoms, Andy started running a fever over 102. Then I got worried because I did not want Ephram to catch something with a high fever potential when he was still fighting his way toward 7 pounds. So we went to the doctor and found out it was bronchitis. Not fun for Andy, but also not contagious. Andy promptly went on antibiotics and as Ephram entered his fourth week, was able to start helping out a little bit again. Just in time for Ephram to get sick too. Thank heaven he didn't develop a fever above 100, but he did have the sniffles and goopy eyes for the whole week. He also showed me that he is an excellent sneezer and cougher... at least I know he is capable of moving congestion through his body on his own.

The week was a rough one. The pictures are not great or plentiful... but here you go. :)

While Andy was running his fever, I ran a 3 day marathon with about an hour of sleep each day. It is not easy to take care of a recovering 4 year old, a newborn that eats every 1.5-2 hours and a sick husband. All while I was crossing my fingers that my fatigue didn't wear my immune system down so much that I would get sick too. I hope never to relive that experience. So when Andy was finally better, I couldn't hand Ephram over fast enough. This is what they spent most of their time doing...


And this is how Ephram looked for most of the week. Poor guy...


Although he did show us his first social smiles between the tears. I never caught one on camera... but here is a sleeping smile that is kind of close.

Alone for a Moment

When Ephram was a week old and I was struggling with astronomical blood pressure while my mom was here to help, my mom insisted that I get one night with real sleep. So my mom and Andy took care of Ephram from 10pm that night until 4am. I was happy for the sleep. I needed it, truly, and it definitely marked a turnaround of my condition. But it felt really weird to be away from Ephram. Not to have him right by me felt a little wrong. At the time I remember thinking that it was odd how quickly I had become attached to him. The next night I was happy to be awake every hour again.

Since then, I hadn't left Ephram. Yes, I'd gone upstairs while he was downstairs with Andy... but that was about it. I definitely got used to having him within reach. And I didn't feel the need or urge to get away from him ever. I was happily obsessed with my cute baby.

This past Saturday Charlie attended a birthday party. Andy didn't know how to get to the house, and I didn't really know how to explain it, so it fell on me to take Charlie. That morning nothing went as it should. Ephram wouldn't eat when I wanted him to, which put everything else behind. Suddenly it was time to go and I didn't have Ephram dressed yet.

"You can take Charlie and I can stay here with Ephram."

Have Andy stay with Ephram, alone, while I take Charlie to the party? I actually had to think about it for awhile, and then I realized that there was no reason that I needed to keep Ephram glued to my hip that morning. Charlie and I walked out the door.

Without a diaper bag. No stroller. No car seat. No crying baby who is angry that he is no longer being held by a warm mommy.

It felt nice.

I dropped Charlie off at the party and then decided to head to the grocery store. I got home about 40 minutes later with our groceries and was welcomed by a hungry baby. So I fed Ephram and then took off to pick Charlie up from the party. Alone again. All together I probably had about an hour and a half without Ephram that day.

I could get used to it.

Ephram's Third Week

By the time we started into our third week with Ephram, things were feeling a bit more sane. We were still going to the doctor every week for Ephram to have a weight check, and to the lactation consultants for help with feeding. We were very tired of going to the doctor, but Ephram was gaining some weight and his bilirubin level had dropped from a high of 15.9 down to 7 very quickly. Ephram also "woke up" and was having an average of two long alert periods every day.

Unfortunately, our house also got hit with an illness... courtesy of Charlie's preschool a cold entered our home. First Charlie got it. We did our best to keep Charlie and Ephram seperate from each other. But next, Andy caught the cold. And for him it took a quick turn for the worse as he developed bronchitis. This made for four very long days for me, and a bit of a set back on my sanity. But we survived.

And then Ephram got sick, one day before he turned four weeks old. His poor little eye started oozing yellow and he was sneezing and coughing. Luckily, it wasn't very bad and he never ran a fever that merited attention. He was mostly over the cold one week later. I also caught a very minor version of it... thank goodness Andy was well enough to take over a few things for me again!

Ephram seemed to get cuter and cuter to me throughout the week. Here are some of the pictures we took!

Dzana's Birthday

I ended my 34th year two weeks and one day after Ephram was born. My dad would say that I’m actually now 35. And that January 14th was the last day that I was 34. I think. I get really confused by his logic surrounding birthdays. :)

I didn’t expect much for my birthday with everything else that had gone on. I was still sore from the surgery and a little bloated from the liquids they gave me – although that had improved a lot in the days leading up to my birthday. I hadn’t really slept in about a month.

I told Andy that all I wanted for my birthday was an extra nap. He gave that to me, and took care of both of the boys for the majority of the day. He made me dinner, fried eggs and english muffins at my request. It might sound weird – but I’d been craving fried eggs with runny yokes since I first found out I was pregnant. (You aren’t supposed to have undercooked eggs when you are pregnant!) Andy did a great job of preparing for my birthday and surprised me with gifts from him and both of the kids. Charlie had picked out a microphone for me. He promptly took it and started singing into it himself. :) Andy also had a cake made for me and we enjoyed pieces of it with chocolate ice cream.

It was an awesome birthday – one of the best that I’ve had. It was nice to take some time and concentrate on something besides the baby!

I do have pictures with me in them - but Charlie is in them too, so I can't put them up on the blog. Sorry!

Ephram's Second Week

So, if you read my last post you know that things were crazy as we started the second week of Ephram's life. The morning that Ephram turned one week old my mom arrived. I was really, really glad to see her. I knew that things would be better with another set of hands!



That day we had an appointment with my doctor to follow-up on my ER visit from the previous evening. It was so nice to be able to leave Charlie with my mom so that he didn't have to sit through it. My blood pressure had dropped to 140/90 with the single dose of medication I'd taken that day, and my doctor added a second daily dose to help reduce it further. The next day we had a follow-up with lactation. Ephram had gained 8 ounces! This lactation consultant was much more reassuring, and I left feeling somewhat empowered. She was honest with me in saying that I may have to continue supplementing for the duration, and that it was possible that breastfeeding would not work long term for me. But I felt good about what I was able to do... which was a huge improvement on how I felt after the previous appointment! We also found out that Ephram's bilirubin came back at 15.9, still just barely under the mark for treatment. I wasn't very happy about that, but I didn't feel so desperate about it either.

We also had Ephram's first appointment with his pediatrician. She said that she felt he was doing fine, and eluded to an opinion that the postpartum clinic had overreacted. At that appointment we learned that Ephram had gained 11 ounces in one week. I was so relieved!

To treat my blood pressure I took a five day course of a diuretic to help clear the excess water out of my system. By the second day my feet were back. It was really nice to be able to walk again. However, my poor skin is still healing from all of the stretching it endured.

Ephram had a pretty good week. He started to get more alert. The day my mom went home, he stayed awake for a four hour stretch. He also started to gain a personality.

All in all, week two was 100% better than week one! Here are some pictures I took on the day he turned two weeks old.

Ephram's First Week

Our first week with Ephram was... an experience. Of course, we spent the first three days in the hospital, so there were really only four days to survive after that. How much could happen, right? The answer: plenty.

Before I go through the hard part, I'd like to remember the good. :) We were so amazed and grateful to multiple friends that made sure we didn't have to worry about finding food for dinner. We actually did not have to prepare a new dinner for ourselves for the first three weeks of Ephram's life. Just when we thought we'd received our last dinner, another person (or two) would call to see if they could bring us something. And the dinners we received were really good, they gave me a lot of ideas for future meals that I might make. It is so nice to remember that there is a support system out there and that the world is bigger than just our little family. So, I realize that most of the people reading this didn't bring us dinner - because most of you live much too far away... but I am sure that you have brought dinner to someone else another time. So I'd like to say thank you to anyone that does this for another person. It was truly something that we needed as we struggled through our first few weeks.

When Ephram was born he weighed 6 pounds, 6 ounces. And then he started pooping. He pooped seven times on that first day, and continued at the same rate while we were in the hospital. When we checked out two days later, our little boy was 5 pounds, 4 ounces.

That's right. I said 5 pounds, 4 ounces.

I knew babies lose weight at first, as they're waiting for their mother's milk to come in... and I knew that they could safely lose up to 10%. I knew Ephram had crossed over that 10% line, but I didn't realize how far. They let us go home from the hospital on a feeding plan. We started supplementing all of his meals that day with either colostrum that I had pumped or formula, fed through a tube while I was breastfeeding. They'd tested his bilirubin levels in the hospital too... bilirubin tests are done to see if a baby has jaundice. The marker that they use to treat jaundice here is if the bilirubin level reaches 16. Ephram was 15.7 the day we checked out.

I didn't realize that he'd lost so much more than expected, so I wasn't freaking out too much. That is, until the next day when I couldn't get him to wake up and take a feeding for the life of me. I tried all the tricks they'd taught us in the hospital. The boy wouldn't wake up. He suddenly looked extremely sallow to me... and very yellow.

What did I do? Tried not to freak out. Went online and tried to educate myself about jaundice. This was not a good idea. I freaked out. I didn't sleep at all that night because I was so busy watching Ephram to make sure he was still breathing, and trying very hard to get him to eat. He did eat... it was just a big struggle each time.

How was I doing personally? This has been a big question from everyone as people wonder how I recovered from my surgery. The incision was good from the first day, and didn't give me any trouble in the first week - besides some itching. I also gained mobility quickly and was walking around without trouble. I just had to follow the rules to limit weight that I pushed or carried, as well as limit any bending, stooping or stair climbing. I was on pain medication, but very little... the nurses in the hospital were actually concerned that I was not taking more, but I felt pretty good. Except for the swelling.

I had no idea that swelling was a side effect of c-sections, but found out intimately how bad it can be. By the day that I was freaking out about Ephram and jaundice, I was as big as a balloon. My legs and feet were so swollen that I could only wear one pair of pants that I owned - a very loose pair of maternity pants. Nothing else would fit over my legs. I also couldn't get socks on my feet. This was very uncomfortable and added to my sanity issues.

We had a postpartum appointment the next day, January 4th, to check on my progress as well as Ephram's. The ride to the hospital was miserable. I was so worried about Ephram the whole way, and I was massively uncomfortable because of the swelling. When we got there it didn't get better. Ephram was 5 pounds, 7 ounces... a 3 ounce gain, but not good enough. She watched me breastfeed and had me convinced that I was not going to be successful at it by the time we left. Ephram's temperature was well below normal and she scolded me about how to maintain an adequate temperature. she took my blood pressure, and it was slightly elevated at 140/90, but we wrote that off as me being a bundle of nerves. And, Ephram's skin test for bilirubin was still high, so she sent us to the lab for another blood test. We were instructed to double the supplementation so that he would gain weight faster. She also made an appointment for us to return that Friday. This appointment did nothing to calm me down, in fact I was at least doubly concerned at the end.

I don't remember anything about that day except for crying, panicking, and spontaneously falling asleep only to wake up panicked again. I continued like this for another day. At that point I decided that I was not going to take any more pain pills for two reasons. First, I felt my pain was manageable. Second, I thought they were contributing to my hysteria. I hate pain medication and I typically avoid it at all costs... I didn't take anything stronger than tylenol and ibuprofen until my last day in the hospital. But at that point, even I had to admit that the pain was getting to me. So I acquiesced and took the pills. But I did not like the way they made me feel. Andy had noticed that my behaviors were on a cycle according to when I had taken the pills too - although he didn't mention this for a couple more days.

On Wednesday, on Ephram's 6th day, I was finally feeling a little better. I actually let myself sleep and was recovering a bit of my sanity. A friend came over to help and this made me feel better too. But I still felt off. I decided to take my blood pressure. The number I saw was alarming. I had never, ever seen a blood pressure reading that high. I tried not to freak out to keep it from rising higher. We called my doctor and they advised I go straight to the ER for monitoring. That same good friend let us drop Charlie off at her house so that he wouldn't have to sit through an ER visit. It was about 5 in the afternoon. We stopped at a drug store to buy formula and a bottle, because I knew that Ephram couldn't survive on breastfeeding alone... and I didn't know how long we'd be at the hospital.

Just how high was my blood pressure? Yeah, the reading I took was 189/123. Honestly, I didn't know that the bottom number could go that high. By the time I got to the hospital and had been trying to relax myself, it had come down a little bit... to 160/115. Still really bad. They monitored me for an hour and then the doctor told me they'd have to administer medicine through an IV to lower it. They gave me two medications - one to treat the blood pressure and a diuretic to help me shed the water I'd gained from the surgery. He told me that taking the diuretic may affect my milk supply. I was upset, but I didn't have a choice. After five hours in the ER, I was released with a bp that was staying around 140/85 and two prescriptions to fill. It was late and our friend let Charlie stay the night, so we drove through a McDonald's to eat something... (we hadn't eaten since lunch,) and went home. Ephram received his first formula-only feeding that night as Andy did a good job insisting that I get a little bit of sleep. It was nice to sleep longer than 1 hour at a time.

Speaking of Andy, he had planned to take a four week parental leave from work. When Ephram came a week early, that time was extended to five weeks. What a blessing that he was there! He was amazing at taking care of Charlie, food, laundry, picking up... really at doing everything. I still don't know how he managed it because I know he was as tired as me!

The next day Ephram was one week old. And reinforcements arrived. My mom came from California to start her five day stay with us. I was so relieved!

Even though I spent the majority of the week in an hysterical state, I did still take the time to appreciate how cute my baby was. Here are some pictures from that first week.