Twelve Days Post Partem, Another Peanut Nurse-a-thon

OY, people.

Is it too late to go back to the hospital?

Sigh.

I'm fine, just really, really tired out and looking back at the past 12 days in a bit of a daze. My mom left a few hours ago with Al and Bean to go to the airport and then home. Which is fine - she was a huge help with the cooking and household stuff while she was here but it's time for us to start easing into being just the four of us, now, and I know my Mom needs to get home and get on with her own life in her new home.

But I could really use a day or two of bedrest and pampering, I think.

Peanut has been such a great little baby so far. Really different from Bean, although probably the difference is in ME moreso than in my two children. Peanut's had the benefit of a mostly calmer mother, a better start to breastfeeding, and even a sweet big sister to swing by occasionally to kiss and hug him.

I have so much to say about these first days - about this amazing emotional transformation I've been through since Peanut was born, about how incredibly happy I've felt, how much more ME now, in such a short time. There's almost a sense of enlightenment in my thinking, as if a blinder's been ripped from my eyes after nine months in virtual darkness. And it's not all about the physical discomfort of the pregnancy ending because really the end of the pregnancy was fine, physically, it's just the CLARITY with which I can now truly see the depression I was in, and how deep it was, and how completely it had pervaded my life and my thoughts. I have no real explanation for it other than, well, "Hormones!" I just know that now, comparing my feelings today with those I had two weeks ago, even, I am hardly the same person at all. I feel like I owe everyone around me a huge apology for being so down and lethargic and just ... pitiful.

I want to recount every minute I spend with Peanut, and with Bean and Peanut together.

I want to talk about breastfeeding - how much better things are but how even now the smallest little issue sends me crashing into fear and doubt all over again.

I want to talk about the nights - how Peanut (so far) has already been sleeping up to FOUR HOURS at a strech at night, so I can feed him once before I go to bed (between 10 and 11 PM), once in the wee morning hours (between 2 and 3 AM) and then one more time just as it's time to get up (between 5 and 6 AM). He sleeps into the morning after that last feeding, so I have time to get up and drink coffee and eat and get some things done before he's up again between 8 and 9.

I'm also anxious to get the birth story written and I've been working on it in my mind for the past few days, just trying to begin unraveling those hours in my own head. There's a lot to tell, a lot to try to sort out for myself in terms of timing and logistics, and so much to work through emotionally because as you can imagine, things didn't go at all the way I'd hoped or expected, and even though the outcome was perfect in the end, there were some moments that I know I'll have to mull over quietly and come to terms with before I can write though them here.

Today though, I just have to be content to get this much out and down on "paper" then rest and relax and wait for the right time to work on the rest. Peanut's had a rough day today, his first, really. He woke up in the morning at 8 AM and really hasn't settled well for another good sleep since then, and he's been wanting to nurse non-stop despite seeming quite unhappy at the breast when he's there. I finally gave him some Mylicon (gas drops) about 45 minutes ago and while I can still hear him stirring and grousing from time to time, he's finally drifted off to sleep starting around 2 PM. TOO LONG TO BE AWAKE for a little guy his age!

And the girls are protesting all the sucking in a big way, too.

Oh, and I've pumped at least once a day the past few days and gotten a full and easy 3 oz. each time, which is WAY MORE than I was EVER able to pump with Bean, no matter how old she got. So I was excited about that -- I just wish I could produce it fast enough to get Peanut all full up whenever I fed him, regardless of how long it's been since the last time, because Peanut LOVES to be completely stuffed before he goes to sleep -- nothing else will do for him! So when he stays up for such a long time, I have a hard time giving him what he needs when he's finally ready to go to sleep, because he's nursed so often and so recently.

But all the sucking today should make for a lovely, milky day tomorrow.

And the nibbles will recover in a few hours - they're amazing like that.