Eleanor at 1 Month

As of this morning, Eleanor now weighs 10 lbs 10oz (75th%), has a head circumference of 15" (75%) and is 22 3/4" long (95%). Compare her to Will at this age.

Eleanor is one month old today! Where did all that time go? Things are going well. She nurses equally well on both sides now finally. Most of the time her latch is great but every now and again I have to adjust it as she tends to get lazy, so I flare out her top and bottom lips. For the most part though I have no nipple pain, which is great! She does this thing however that drives me bonkers. She will cry like she is hungry and start rooting around, but when I put her to the nipple and let down happens, she backs off and closes her mouth. Meanwhile my milk is spraying everywhere and I am desperately trying to get her to open her mouth again to stem the flow of sticky liquid. She will eventually latch back on and feed, but not until there is milk everywhere and a giant mess has occurred. I have started pumping to elicit let down first, then feeding her so that there is less chance of a mess to clean up. I will be glad when this phase is over though! Babies!

She has a more regular pattern of eating when she is not having a growth spurt. She generally goes to bed around 11pm, gets up for the first time around 2-3am, then again at 6-7am (though the other night she didn't go down until midnight, then slept until 5am and was up again at 8:30am). Then she eats every 2-3 hours during daylight hours. Of course, just today she is starting another growth spurt which means that she is feeding every 1-2 hours around the clock. Exhausting! She has gained two pounds in two weeks though, so all of this feeding is doing something! She is almost too big for her newborn clothes and size one diapers, and will be moving up in both sizes soon I think! 

Speaking of diapers, she HATES to be in a wet or dirty diaper. She starts fussing as soon as she feels the wetness. I am hoping this means that she will be easier and faster to potty train. William still could not care one whit about being in a dirty diaper and seems to have zero awareness about his bodily functions as of yet. Nora is also a very gassy child. She burps like a man and has the stinkiest farts. In fact, her farts smell worse than her poop! Its amazing for such a tiny creature! Also as terrified as I was to change a girl diaper (having only ever done it like twice in my whole life), it is surprisingly easy. I don't have to rush to put her diaper back on for fear of being peed on, and so far the poop isn't all that hard to get out of the many crevices (that might change once she starts solid foods however). It also helps that she only poops like twice a week. Thats nice! I do find it weird how different her pattern of wetness is though. With Will, his diapers are always wet right in the front of the diaper (as you might expect), but Nora's diapers are always most soaked at the back. There are fewer absorbent crystals in the back so we have had some very minor leaking going on. I expect that once she is mobile (and generally more upright), that wetness pattern will change a bit. For the mean time though we will have to experiment to find the best diaper for girls.

She is sleeping great in her crib and is so much better at being transferred from warm arms to cold sheets these days. I developed a method of wrapping her in a blanket as I am nursing her (but not swaddling her as she hates that), then laying her down in that same blanket so that her back wont feel the cold of the sheets. During the day she sleeps just fine (she will nap for 1-2 hours at a time in her vibrating chair or swing) but right after dinner she gets a little cranky and tends to fuss from 8pm-11pm before passing out for the night.

I nurse her a lot during this cranky time and just try to comfort her as best I can. She isn't really crying or screaming, just fussing off and on. This is probably the period of purple crying, only she doesn't outright cry thank goodness. Michael is actually the best at comforting her during this time. My theory is that she doesn't smell milk on him and so is more willing to settle down without nursing. I am usually just glad to get a break while he soothes her! Unfortunately she really hates pacifiers and gives me this priceless look of absolute disgust every time I try to give her one. After I take it out of her mouth, she usually smacks her lips as though she is trying to get rid of the awful awful taste LOL. So I put her to the breast a lot to comfort her. I guess that wont hurt my milk supply any!

Her rash is looking MUCH better. At one point it was so bad she barely looked human and looked like a little scaly lizard baby. It was awful, all pussy, cracked and bleeding. I think she had a combination of baby acne and eczema. Ever since I started applying eczema cream to it, it started healing almost immediately. I wish I had thought to do that sooner but I thought it was only baby acne for a long time. Its looking a million times better though and now I am just hoping that it ends up being normal baby skin problems from hormones, and not a food allergy from something I am eating! Nonetheless I am going to try and reduce dairy from my diet and see if that helps at all. I wish there was a better test to know for sure if it is an allergy, and if so, what kind. She doesn't really spit up much at all (a huge departure from how Will was at this age) so I am hoping that is a good indicator that its not allergy related.

My healing is going ok as well. I am still bleeding a little unfortunately (mostly just spotting, but still enough to need a panty liner). It feels like I have been bleeding forever, especially since I only bled for two weeks after I had Will. I never expected to still be doing this a whole month later. I am hoping it stops soon! The night sweats have finally stopped thank goodness, helped by the fact that it has started to cool down at night. I am only 7-10 pounds away from my pre-pregnancy weight, so I am feeling hopeful that it will all come off soon. Of course I was 5 lbs heavier than I wanted to be before getting pregnant, so I would really love to lose a good 15 lbs. We will see how motivated I can be this year. Hopefully just chasing a toddler around will be enough to lose at least half of that ;)

So all in all, things are going well. I am shocked that an entire month has already passed since I gave birth. It is both a blessing and a curse that babies grow up so fast. I am trying to enjoy every moment that I can with her and am particularly cherishing her tininess. Especially since she is already packing on the pounds so quickly and is getting heavy, she certainly wont be tiny for long!