oh man, my little man is four!

i am thankful he is four. i am thankful he is healthy and happy and growing. he's a small guy, but he had that heart defect, remember? that sets you back a little. he is still nursing sometimes more often and sometimes less often. i cannot believe he's four!

Last

Adam will be 4-years old on September first, today is August sixth, so his birthday is coming pretty soon. I don't plan to wean him, but knowing he is almost four makes me realize we are living in a year of lasts. Not just his last, last time to breastfeed on the Fourth of July, last time to breastfeed during World Breastfeeding Week, but MY lasts. I have breastfed all four of my children, and this year it was on the Fourth of July that I realized it was my last Fourth to have a nursling. It doesn't even matter in a way because I've never even had the thought, "Oh, here I am breastfeeding my baby on the Fourth of July" but once the idea got in my head I thought about it. I recently had the last birthdays of three of my family members with a nursling in the house. I will soon have my last birthday with a nursling child, on September first it will be the last time I nurse one of my children on their birthday. I don't know when Adam will wean, I think very likely it will be before he turns five. He IS small for his age, due to his heart defect, he only weighs about 26 pounds. And, he is NOT interested in using the potty chair or the toilet instead of diapers (sigh) so he may wean later than he would have if he hadn't been born with three holes in his heart. Most days he only nurses when he wakes up and before bed anyway, I just noticed that, I guess because he is quite busy being almost four. So, I am not sad really about this year of lasts, when I think about my last time nursing Adam on the Fourth of July, but when I think back to how many Fourths I had a nursing baby, and to think that within the next year it is likely that part of my mothering life will be over, it is kind of sad to think about. Mostly, I am thankful. I am thankful I have had support and thankful for the success with my first daughter which led me to feel more confident nursing my second and third daughters and then my son. Breastfeeding is hands down the most useful parenting tool I have and I am thankful it has been a part of my life. I wonder if the last time Adam nurses I will know it's the last time. We'll see I guess.

link

http://www.bellybelly.com.au/breastfeeding/breast-refusal/

the newborn. the newly born. brand new.

when a baby is born it's kind of magical. one minute she was inside her mother's body and the next minute she is outside. light and air and scents are new, touch is new, sounds are different. a human baby spends her first hours in her mother's arms, at her mother's breast, learning the scent and taste of her mother to put together what she already knows about her mother, her sounds. a cow's baby spends her first four hours nursing from her mother and standing. newborn kittens are blind and stay right with their mother, she feeds them and cleans them and takes care of their waste. it all seems quite magical to me.

three and a half

When I had my first baby my goal was to nurse for six months, then 9 months, then 12 months. Then I met a mom who told me I could let my baby continue to breastfeed after age one, that was new information to me because I thought breastfeeding was like bottle feeding and only went to one year. I worked in a lot of daycare centers before I became a mom and at one year they got a cup instead of a bottle. At the time, being just 22 years old, I didn't know breastfeeding past one year was an option. I was young and inexperienced. My first child went on to nurse for four years. I weaned her when she turned four because I heard a story on the radio of a mother who had her child taken away when he was six because he was still breastfeeding. It scared me. That was 2001. My second child I weaned when she was two years and one month old because I found out I was pregnant with her sister. I know some women do nurse through pregnancy, but I miscarried while breastfeeding my first child so I wasn't willing to risk it. My third child is my only self-weaner. She started sucking her fingers when she was one month old, so she was not much of a comfort nurser. She weaned herself when she was 2 years and 7 months old. My fourth child, my last child, my open-heart surgery survivor, is still nursing. He will be three and seven months tomorrow. Some days he will only nurse before bed, most days he nurses in the morning and before bed, some days he will nurse a few times during the day. His norm is that he can breastfeed if he wants to and it seems to me, logically, that is the norm for mammals. For me it's nice because I get to cuddle him and I get some quiet time. It also makes bedtime a piece of cake, nursing a preschooler is like a magic fix for sickness, hurts, falls, sadness, anything, any trouble he has will be fixed easily with just a few minutes of nursing. He will be my second self-weaner.

peaceful

I know, looking at this picture the word peaceful isn't exactly what comes to mind, but day-to-day life in our home, even with four kids IS peaceful. My thought about each of my children is they are their own person and I am the person lucky enough to know them, lucky enough to guide them, lucky enough to love them. The most beautiful part is they get to love each other too. My son is the only boy in a family with three big sisters, the big sister in the picture is the younger me, her patience with children, her innate knowledge of knowing how to react and what to say, she is magical, she is better than me I think. She is the defender of everyone smaller, younger, weaker, and everyone bigger, older, stronger. Here, in this photo, he was looking in her mouth and not opening her mouth very gently, yet she was gentle with him, she was laughing, and that made him laugh too. He likes to open my mouth then open his mouth and make noise into mine, with his sister he was just putting his hand in there. Invasion of space? Oh, sure, absolutely, and if she asked him to stop and he did not I would have swooped in, scooped him up, and distracted him, but she was laughing so I took pictures. I try not to spend my days admonishing my children for one thing after the other, and I have been doing it for so long that I hardly stop them from anything because they hardly do anything I don't like. My son is different as he is after all, three and a half, but even with him I will say one time to stop doing whatever I want him to stop doing, then I will just pick him up laughing and distract and redirect. So, it's a peaceful house. I wish I was as patient with my husband as I am with my kids, but I am working on that!

Breastfeeding for Your Heart

http://tedmed.com/talks/show?id=292925

February 7th to the 14th is Congenital Heart Defect Awareness Week. Sometimes babies die because they are sent home with a heart defect no one knows about. My baby was sent home with a heart defect. For nearly two months we did not know. Our ultrasounds said, "possible hole in the heart" and my obstetrician said, "They will look at his heart before you take him home." LOOK at it... Two pediatricians saw Adam before we left the hospital. They listened to his heart but they did not look at it. We stayed one night and went home. Adam was a sleepy baby, I knew some babies were hard to wake, so I did not think it was abnormal. Adam took longer than usual to pass his meconium, and to get back to his birth weight. I went to a Lactation Consultant to see if I needed to hold him differently. When Adam was one month old we saw our permanent pediatrician, on base, for the first time. I told him about my pregnancy, I told him about the ultrasounds, he listened to Adam's heart. He said his heart sounded fine, but he was breathing a little fast. Had I noticed he was breathing a little too fast? Newborns are weird breathers. Sometimes they breath a little fast, a little slow, a little shallow, with a little sigh. I started to feel nervous. I had thought we were in the clear. Those two doctors at the hospital sent us home (why hadn't I insisted they LOOK at his heart!) We had seen two civilian pediatricians before we got into DEERS and could be seen on base. Why hadn't they noticed my precious baby was breathing too fast? We were moving from Kansas to Virginia in two weeks, our base pediatrician wanted me (David was already moved) to a pediatric cardiologist before we moved. The cardiologist said Adam had two holes, one moderate and one severe. He gave me a handout with an illustration. He gave me a hand out with warning signs to watch for. I did not understand what those signs warned of. He said to follow up with a cardiologist after our move. November 12, 2011 I got on an airplane with my four kids and our cat and flew from Kansas to Virginia. We found a cardiologist. She sat on the table next to Adam and ran the ultrasound wand over him herself, and she said, "That's a big hole." The reason no one could hear the hole, there was no blood wooshing through a hole, it was that big. That's a big hole. I have to stop for a minute and say, mothers have taken their babies home from being born not knowing they had a heart defect and those babies have died in their arms, at home, in the hospital. This is why we have congenital heart defect awareness week, so people can learn about heart defects, learn to watch for those warning signs I got a hand out about. They are the warning signs of congestive heart failure. Breathing that causes the ribs to stick out, blue lips or finger or toe nails, sweating while eating, rapid breathing, tired, hard to wake up. The signs I was watching for... Our cardiologist in Roanoke is amazing, she is one of my three favorite doctors in the entire world. She sent Adam home that day in November 2011 with diuretics. A few weeks later she gave him potassium. I had to give him those medicines with a tiny tiny syringe every day. He fought. Good boy, fighting and stubbornness is good. He wasn't too tired to fight most of the time. I asked if I should give him formula, I, a staunch supporter of breastfeeding, his cardiologist said no, he was doing fine with the nursing. On December 23rd, 2011, Adam had an appointment, he was seeing his cardiologist every three weeks. That day, Adam had lost one ounce. Until that day my mind was saying two sentences over and over, "Please let me keep him." and "Please, no heart surgery." On December 23, 2011 she said, that's it, he's lost one ounce, he needs surgery. I thought, okay, in six months, in a year... She asked if we wanted Duke or UVA, I'd lived in North Carolina for three years so I said, Duke. She said okay, we'd set it up, two weeks. Two weeks. Two weeks. Two weeks... I'm afraid for a time I was not a very good mother to my other kids. I think I was a shell. Two weeks. Merry Christmas, your son is so not well that in two weeks we will cut his chest open. We will make him very very cold, we still stop his lungs, we will stop his heart, we will cut him open... Two weeks. Two weeks. Two weeks. So, I said to myself, lets go outside. I took him outside all the time, walking and walking and walking and walking. If there was a chance I was going to lose this boy he was not going out of this world without having been outside as much as possible. What's scarier than open-heart surgery? Spinal surgery? Lung? Brain? Once I knew he had to have surgery to live I knew that was it. All my other hopes were gone, hope for no hole-gone, hope for the hole to close-gone, hope he wouldn't need surgery-gone gone gone gone so very totally gone. Okay, well, if he needs surgery he needs surgery and there is nothing I can do about it. I did not read a single word about it. I looked at pictures of babies who had open-heart surgery so I would not get scared when I saw him. Then on December 28th I was at the store looking for a light bulb for a crayon-melting kit one of the kids got for Christmas and my phone rang, and it was Duke. Come down January 10th they said, pre-op January 11th they said, surgery January 12th they said... The hard part right before I handed him over was I could not nurse him past midnight. And of course next morning he didn't go back as soon as they said. But once he went back all I could do was wait. I had met Dr. Jaquiss and I liked him, I knew Duke was a good hospital. Josephine came with David and me to wait. Just like when Adam was born, she came with us to the hospital that day too. Antonia took care of Caroline for us. The best three girls in the whole world. Adam had an allergic reaction to one of the medicines and stopped breathing, but other than that it was successful. He had three holes, one they sewed shut, one they patched with a bovine patch (moo) one they left alone. That's Adam's story. He is cool. We are damn lucky. So lucky. I do not know a stronger word for how lucky we are. So, share this story, it has a happy ending. Oh, and I think there were signs of CHD Adam exhibited that I did not recognize before I knew. He had puffy eyes, he never woke up to eat, his fists were always closed.