Tongue Tied October 15, 2008

When I was pregnant with Magdalena, I practically devoured every breastfeeding book or article there was out there.  Friends like Beanmom and Rachel pointed me to terrific books.  I felt solidly prepared for the journey we were about to start.

And then Magdalena was born.  It was a really long labor followed by a csection.  Erich did everything I asked, and stayed by her side the entire time they did their assessments.  When they got me back to the room, I was anxious to see her, hold her, but most importantly, I was anxious to nurse her. After asking about when she would be done, a nurse casually mentioned that she appeared to be tongue tied.

Tongue tied? It seemed like such a curve ball to be thrown.  Erich wasn’t tongue tied, and I wasn’t either.  And all the literature said that tongue ties were usually hereditary, so where did this come from?  12 hours after her birth, I asked if they would clip her tongue.  I was lucky that there was no hesitation and the pediatrician immediately clipped her tongue in the hospital.

Our walk down breastfeeding lane started as a rocky one.  By the time they clipped her tongue, I was already sore.  Then she was super sleepy on day 2, as most newborns are, and she seemed to not know what to do with her newly clipped tongue.  By the time I left the hospital I was bleeding and blistered and using a nipple shield. But I was determined! Some might say I was stubborn.  And after a couple of weeks, Magdalena and I fell into a routine and breastfeeding became that wonderful journey that so many talk about.

When Carmina was born, it was the first thing on my mind.  Was she tongue tied?  And while she was a lazy nurser, she was not tongue tied, and breastfeeding was a smooth journey.

With Kevin, I never really thought about him being tongue tied.  With all the drama surrounding his birth, then his respiratory difficulties, it was honestly the last thing on my mind.  The few times I could really look inside his mouth when he was crying in that first week, I saw what I thought was a tongue tie. When he was 7 days old, he came off of all respiratory support and I was allowed to nurse him for the first time.

Kevin was born to breastfeed! He was a champion nurser right from the start, an impressive preemie with a great suck.  He seemed to do okay with his tongue tie, but he had his moments.  I asked the NICU nurse if someone would be available to clip his tongue before we left, but I was told it was unusual to clip tongues in the NICU.  Everyone seemed confident that it would stretch and he was doing well- gaining weight.

But he did have some issues latching.  This time though, with two other breastfed children under my belt, I was able to help him latch better and change up positions.  But he still seemed to have a shallow latch at times and sometimes had issues fully extending his tongue under the nipple.  I asked our dentist if he would clip his tongue, and he agreed!  So on Tuesday we had his tongue clipped.

Before:

And after:

The procedure was simple and I assume painless because he did not cry at all. Best thing of all, about half an hour later I nursed him and found him to have a perfect latch.  Clipping his tongue was an instantaneous fix to his latch issues!

Kevin Clayton September 15, 2008

6 lbs, 11 oz.

19 in.

We are happy.

I’m so hungry… September 10, 2008

it’s a bit irrational.  Every where I look online someone is talking about food and I’m thinking, man that sounds good!  I don’t need to eat more nor do I need to go to the grocery store and try and find the ingredients to make all of these things people are talking about.  Sheesh.

This week was eventful.  We had an ultrasound and appointment.  Little Dude is guesstimated to weigh about six and a half pounds at this point.  Since ultrasound guesstimates this late are usually a little high, and because my husband seems to create children with really long legs that really mess up their calculations (I think), my guess is that in two weeks he will be no bigger than eight pounds.  Really I’m guessing about seven and a half pounds.  He has super super chubby cheeks.  He frowned at us when we were putting pressure against his head to get a nice face shot, he’s not a fan of the ultrasounds!  He also blew us a little kiss.  He looks like his Daddy.  We are all really excited to meet him.

I also received all of my pre-op paperwork.  It’s insanely bizarre to me to see this stuff.  They already have my appointment made to come the day before and get my blood drawn.  I have the lab work orders, and they type and screen two units of blood and reserve them for me in the blood bank.  That’s weird.  I’m glad it’s there (obviously) it’s just odd.  It made me think of all the preparation that the hospital staff will go through the day before my surgery, all this preparation that *I* used to do for others is now being done for me in anticipation of this Little Dude’s birthday.  I’m excited and nervous and a wee bit scared, ha! Only 14 days to go!

I’m nesting… September 2, 2008

That would be the reason for the silence on this blog, at least that’s what I’m claiming.  I recently had to shut down my business to customs.  It was a hard decision, because I have major issues telling people no and I enjoy the knitting. But I realized that time was going much quicker than my fingers.  I have this long list of stuff to do for the Little Dude who will be here in 3 weeks (!) and I couldn’t work on all of it, unless I give up something, like sleeping.

So I shut down my store to customs and hope to open it again by Halloween.  I woke up one morning with the incredible urge to either knit every yarn I have in my stash, or to sell it.  So I sold a BUNCH of stuff and started knitting a bunch of stuff.  If you frequent my Flickr account, you probably see how much stuff is coming off of my needles.

I also decided that I needed to work on a homeschooling room.  It turned out really nice and Magdalena is very excited about it.  I have plans to order the rest of her books for this quarter of her curriculum on the next payday.

We are also excitedly anticipating the local Pork Festival.   Magdalena has been talking about going to parades since the festival ended last year.  It’s also the last thing on her calendar before her baby brother is scheduled to make his appearance.  She’s a very experienced and excited big sister you know.

Carmina is also seems to be understanding that their is a baby in my belly.  And I think she gets that he will want to nurse and that she will have to share. Of course, telling her that the baby will nurse, just makes her want to nurse right away.

Anyway, a busy month.  Hopefully I’ll get better about posting.  And Erich will be posting here and there and will also update when the Dude makes his arrival.

Republican Vice Presidential Candidate Palin’s Daughter Pregnant

What do you think? Does this make you want to vote for McCain more or less now? Does it matter? Should we care?