M nursed at 2 am and hasn’t since. I pumped at 7 am or so. He latched on and off at around 10 am, and wouldn’t nap. So I made a snack for him (Cheerios, halved raisins, Corn Flakes) and we all trucked to Costco.
He fell asleep for less than ten minutes on the way home.
At home he wouldn’t nurse. Wouldn’t nap, so gave him lunch shortly after noon. He certainly wasn’t tired then!
Tried nursing around 1:30 pm. Nope. Wouldn’t even latch – just fought me.
I’m pumping now, as he naps. Well, now I know I can still get engorged, a bit.
It makes me so sad and emotional. It was hard when the others stopped, but they were all over a year! And he used to nurse a lot. I used to feel like he was in a constant growth spurt – remember I used to complain that he would go through cycles of waking an nursing three times a night? I’d like to be able to complain again.
You can lead a horse to water, but you can’t make him drink.
You can offer the boob to a nursling, but you can’t make him nurse.
However. DH thinks M might still make it to a year. With a bedtime nurse only, and maybe one at night. I’m hopeful. I’d like at least one during the day, but that hasn’t happened for two days now.
And M will be ten months this Wednesday, the 23rd.
Seriously.
He last nursed at around 3 am this morning. At both nap times, he cried and cried and tried to roll off my lap. He would latch on and off and on and off. Could be teething, but it doesn’t matter – him not nursing = me making less milk.
And I pumped first thing this morning (no let down), when he went for his first nap and when he went for his second nap.
Maybe, just maybe, he’ll do his bedtime and middle of the night nurse for months. That’s the one hope I’m holding on to.
And yes, I bawled today.
Lasted about ten minutes, But that had some hill bits (ie, on the way back).
I haven’t jogged since before, or at least from the early stages, getting pennant with M.
Phew! And puff, puff, puff 
My mom wanted to try riding a bike today. It’s been twenty years. She’s 71. She tried DH’s bike.
She fell.
I thought she smacked her head, but it was her arm and she’s fine.
I don’t like being reminded that my mom is getting older. Getting frail. Unsteady.
DH’s father has passed away and his mother has Alzheimer’s (so did his dad). But that’s his side of the family, not mine. No disrespect meant. But my parents aren’t allowed to get old.
Doesn’t everyone feel that way about their parents? That they’re not allowed to age, get old, become an “old person”? They have to always be there and be just the same as we remember them from when we were kids.
It really scared me when she fell. To her credit, she did get back on and try again while I held the handle bars for her. To keep the bike straight and steady as she peddled and I walked beside here. It felt kind of weird to do as R biked around back and forth. I’d done that for him and for A. Never thought I’d do it for my mother.
I’m kind of glad, though, that she has decided to not pursue the idea of buying a bike for herself. And I’m glad she asked to try one of ours first before purchasing one.
And, just as importantly, I’m glad my dad wasn’t there to see it happen. I think he would have freaked. At her, at what happened, etc.
R and K wanted to play on the iPod and laptop, respectively. So I had them do some more “work”. I’d prepped R and A’s books last night, courtesy of some of her spelling words from the year. They were in her agenda book. I had to come up with K’s in the fly and then adjusted to just letters instead of words when he got tired and wouldn’t do “blanket”. Ironically, he did more letters with the a’s and c’s than if he’d done “blanked”!
And yeah, this shows K’s name, I know
R had two pages and K one, though the picture only shows one page for each.
Day two done!
It seems really easy for then to “earn” the computer time, but I’ll be adding more words for A and R or having sentences for then to copy. But! They’re working on their letters and I’m watching for proper formation and size!
Yay!
I’m sure I’ve complained before about my kids printing. Did you see A’s in the comic she made that I had in my last post. Just horrid. She doesn’t seem to care about lines and letter height and …
So here’s the deal. Printing practice to get 20-30 minutes on the laptop/iPad/iPod. Time to be determined by me – they don’t know the difference yet, bwahahahahaha!
R’s is in the left, A’s is on the right. And I had to had the dashed lines for her to visualize the height spacing. And she she had to redo flower because her f’s started at the bottom and not the top. Same with R and some of his words with d’s.
R had seven words to do three times to my satisfaction. A had ten. His letters can be bigger since he’s almost six. Hers are smaller since she’s almost eight.
I have a bigger book for K, and will work with him tracing dotted line letters. Which I know he can do because he can do it in an iPad app. With an iPad stylus. I may reward him with stickers too. Because he’s almost four and still a little fella
Of course, A just asked me if she did more words, what else can she get to do?
Ha ha ha! No. No more time earned. Ironically, she said she wouldn’t do it in the first place. And said “fine, then I won’t play on the computer!”. Ten minutes later, she was asking for the notebook, LOL!
We’ll see if I can keep this idea up. I can only keep saying “their printing is horrid” for so long – then I have to do something about it myself.
I had another attack last night.
As I mentioned in that post, I had some celery and then an apple.
Then I went in to nurse M and … the pain subsided.
I could walk upright in the way back to my bedroom.
I … Could … Walk … Upright. After a short bit, any mild ache subsided and I dozed for half an hour with the heating pad under my back. I had the light on so I wouldn’t sleep to long with the heating pad on. DH didn’t seem to care about the light, LOL!
But still. What?!
Either that was a very mild attack, or the celery and/or apple actually made a difference. And I’ve had no ill effects today.
Not that I’m complaining
- knowing I made my kids – my body nourished them when they were inside me
- knowing the feeling of little kicks and jiggles and rolls inside me as each moved around
- knowing the joy – yes, joy – of giving birth
- knowing the joy of sustaining their little lives for their first six months – that my body made the magic elixir called breastmilk
- being blessed with the absolute trust a baby has in its mother
- knowing the bliss of nursing a baby to sleep, and then watching them sleep in my arms for a few moment before putting them in their bed
- being the only one that can make a hurt better – for a while, they only want their mom
- seeing the light spark in their eyes as they figure something out – whether it’s shaking a block, coloring something for the first time, or drawing an awesome picture
There are so many things about being a mom that I love. I may grumble and complain, but I also love it. Very much.
Again, M didn’t nurse when I tried before I went to bed. I’ve been doing that for almost as long as he is old.
And again, no letdown after half an hour of pumping. One side.
And now? Gallstone attack.
Oh, and I can hear him peeping.
I just ate some celery to help. Fibre to push things along, so to speak. And I’m eating an apple. I have no more apple cider vinegar to mix with equal parts water and apple juice. My doc recommended it to take the edge off an attack.
And that is some nasty stuff.
So an apple is the best I can do. I’ve been having one a day now for over a week. Except today. I may have had a piece, but not a whole apple.
Gotta go in to the boy soon.
stuff.
I don’t know why, but A is making little comic books now.
It was newspapers a month or so ago.
So she made one just now.
Cover:
Inside:
She’ll be eight in September, and I really need to do something about her printing.
She wanted me to make some too. I’m very detail oriented when drawing, so it can be a challenge for me to do “cartoon” stuff. But I’m happy with my two:
M has nursed better today. I’m trying a different hold on the left side. He’s grown, so perhaps what I was doing before doesn’t work anymore.
Or I’m just fucking loony and haven’t a clue grasping at straws.
Yeah, more profanity. Sorry. I’m tired because he didn’t nurse when he woke at 10 pm (with a fever) last night and I pumped for half an hour with NO letdown (the irony is that I felt, well let down about it) and then he mumbled a while and finally did nurse at 11:30 pm. Right side only. Then he woke at 3:30 am (nursed well for him) and my alarm went off at 6:20 am. Kids came in around 6:30 am and the day started.
He’s had both sides twice today (yay!). And the fever came back twice today too.
However ………… IT’S THE WEEKEND. YAY!!!!
Have a good one!
