Giveaway Winner!

Thanks to everyone who entered the Hapari Swimwear giveaway. The winner of a free Hapari tankini is Mindy!

Congratulations Mindy--please check your email for information on how to claim your prize!

Didn't win, but still looking to snag one of these sassy suits for yourself? Go to Hapari.com and get your shop on!

Hapari Swimwear Giveaway

**This giveaway is now closed. Thanks to all who entered!**
I don't know about you, but I'm not quite ready for swimsuit season. I'm still rocking a pretty good mom belly, and with no time (or energy!) to work out I don't exactly see it disappearing anytime soon. Which is why I'm so excited about today's giveaway!

Hapari has a line of modest tankini swimwear, perfect for covering up those bits and pieces you don't want seen!


These cute tankini tops and sassy swimwear bottoms are sold separately so you can mix and match for the look you love best. Sizes range from juniors to plus size and the tankini straps can be worn as a halter, criss-cross, or tank style for even more versatility!



ENTRY RULES:
To enter this giveaway and win a Hapari suit of your own, check out Hapari's line of modest tankini swimwear and comment on this post telling me your favorite one by Thursday, April 29th at 11:59pm CDT . Your comment must include an email address to be eligible to win (either through your blogging ID or typed into your comment entry). This giveaway is open to everyone (no geographical restrictions!), and only one entry per person allowed. The winner will be chosen by random.org and announced on Friday, April 30th.

Good luck!

Who Wants to Talk About Boobs?

Other titles considered for this post included:

1. Significant Feeding Issues
2. Stuff No One Cares About Other Than Kate's Parents
3. Why I Hate Medela
4. Mommy's Going to Punch the Pediatrician
5. If You Come to My House I May Offer You Breast Milk Instead of Water Because We Have More of It

I figured the one I chose would at least get you this far before realizing I should've gone with #2 and deleting me from your Google Reader.

So let's talk about boobs, shall we? Mine in particular, although we may have time for a Tori Spelling discussion at the end. We'll see.

I first flashed my breasts to people who were neither my husband, my doctor, or strangers offering free drinks when Kate was about 30 minutes old. I had just been all stitched up and wheeled out of the You'll Have a Scar for Life Room and was hanging out in the This May or May Not Be a Supply Closet for recovery. I was determined to breastfeed Kate and to have that immediate skin-to-skin contact so important for reducing the number of times she'll tell me she hates me when she's a teenager. Since I'd had a c-section I was already 30 minutes behind schedule, so I pulled down my top to let the bonding begin.

Did you know you can breastfeed without even touching your own breasts?

All you need to do is ask a nurse, "Can you help me with this?" and soon there will be swarms of hands all over you and your baby, squeezing, shifting, squishing, adjusting. Your job is to just lay there and act like this is the sort of thing that happens to you every day.

We worked with the hospital's lactation consultant right from the start to be sure we didn't establish any bad habits, and Kate was a very quick learner. It didn't take long for her to have a perfect latch and for me to feel like this breastfeeding thing was going to be a breeze!

Fast forward one week later. After dealing with a dramatic and incredibly concerning weight loss with Kate and countless hours of working with lactation consultants, we finally met with a feeding specialist from the Children's Hospital who informed us that due to reasons G and I have decided not to share on the blog, breastfeeding was not an option for us.

I was heartbroken.

For weeks I couldn't even talk about it without crying. I had no idea how strongly my vision of being a new mom was tied to breastfeeding my baby. BOTTLE FEEDING WAS NOT IN MY PLAN!

G did a great job keeping my Hormonal Mom Mind in perspective by reminding me that the only thing that matters is that Kate gets proper nutrition--it doesn’t matter how she gets it. And of course he was right. But adding salt to my poor wounded ego was that every time I fed Kate with the Medela bottles she required, the message “breastfeeding is best” etched along the side of each bottle stared back up at me.

Ouch.

The good news is I eventually got over myself, my breast pump became my new best friend, Kate took to the bottle like a champ, and we soon had a happy, well-fed, growing little girl on our hands!

And then came reflux.

That sound you just heard was the collective groan of every parent who’s ever had to deal with reflux with their child. For those of you lucky enough to not know what it is, it’s basically baby heartburn. Kate’s reflux bothers her while she’s eating (for some babies it's after). She’ll be drinking and suddenly her eyes will get really wide, and then she’ll pull off the bottle and burst out crying because she’s in so much pain. And of course crying only exacerbates the reflux, so it’s a terrible, horrible, vicious cycle that NO BABY SHOULD EVER HAVE TO GO THROUGH!

I took Kate to the pediatrician when we first realized she was having problems, and he dismissed my concerns telling me, “She’s just a fussy baby.” I argued that actually she was an incredibly happy baby, and that the only time she was fussy was when we tried to feed her. As soon as we set the bottle down she was all smiles again. To me that sounded like an issue that had something to do with feeding, but he disagreed and sent me on my way. Refusing to accept that answer I emailed the feeding specialist we’d met with at the Children’s Hospital when Kate was one week old. She emailed me back that it sounded like Kate had reflux, so G and I changed how we fed and handled her in hopes that it would help (keeping her upright during and after feedings, rubbing her back for burping instead of patting, elevating her sleep surface, etc.).

We noticed immediate improvements as a result of these changes and Kate went from having painful feedings at every feeding to having only one or two difficult bottles per day. But that still wasn’t good enough in my opinion. Kate deserved to have all of her feedings be pain-free, so back to the pediatrician we went. Once again he dismissed my concerns and told me Kate was “just a fussy baby,” and once again I told him that the ONLY TIME SHE FUSSES IS WHEN WE’RE TRYING TO FEED HER!! We went a few more rounds with him telling me we should switch from breast milk to formula, and me telling him that wasn’t going to happen, before he finally agreed to prescribe a reflux medication to see if that would help.

And luckily it did.

For about a week.

Let me tell you--there is nothing more upsetting than knowing your child is in pain and not being able to make it better for them. Nothing. Kate’s reflux continued getting worse and nothing we did seemed to help. I got so desperate one afternoon when it was so obvious that Kate was hungry but she just couldn’t eat because she was in so much pain, that I ran to the store and bought the reflux formula the pediatrician had previously mentioned. That bottle of formula was the first bottle Kate was able to drink without pain in over a week. When she finished she had the most beautifully satisfied look on her face and I was so overjoyed I cried.

Today we have a new pediatrician who is absolutely wonderful and we finally feel like we’re getting the support we need. We continue to try different things to help Kate’s reflux, but so far what seems to be working best is a combination of the reflux formula and medication. I continue to pump in hopes that we can switch her back to breast milk, because as I’m sure you can imagine formula was not in my plan either dammit, but once again G puts things in perspective by reminding me that the only thing that matters is that Kate gets proper nutrition--it doesn’t matter how she gets it.

There are definitely those days when I think it would be so nice not to be strapped to my breast pump 24/7, or to not wake up with a wet shirt, or to finally wear a normal bra again, but each time I decide I’m going to stop pumping I just can’t bring myself to do it. So for now our freezer is piling up with so much frozen breast milk that we’re almost out of room for G’s Hot Pockets, our daughter is happy as can be drinking formula from her "breastfeeding is best" bottle, and I continue to pump and hope.

Kate: 2 Months

At what age does your child start being annoyed by you?

Luckily Kate can't talk yet, but if she could I'm pretty sure she'd be saying, "GET OUT OF MY FACE, MOM!"

I can't help it. I'm obsessed with her.

Personalized baby shirt from The Cotton Cupcake Shoppe
Come on. If you could look at that face all day, you'd be all up in it, too!

Something I won't capture on film are her less ladylike habits--like farting. This girl can toot! I call her Toots MaGoots, and G is even starting to categorize them. His favorite is "the machine gun." I'm guessing there's no need for further explanation...

Another one of Kate's favorite "tricks" is lifting up both her legs at the same time, along with her little tush. And once she's got them lifted she likes to hold them up there for a few seconds--like a baby reverse ab crunch. Ever since she discovered she can do this, she loves to practice. She'll do it for us when we're changing her diaper (oh, she's so proud!) or when she's on her play mat. My favorite is when she does it when she's sleeping. She'll wake up, do a couple lifts, seem satisfied that she's still got it, and then go back to sleep. Such a little cutie!

This past month (at 2 months old) marks the beginning of Kate finally taking an interest in her baby swing. Before, she'd sit there for a few minutes but not seem engaged in it at all, but now she loves swinging and enjoys watching the mobile that rotates overhead. There have been a few times when she's been really upset (like when she got her shots a few weeks ago--eek!) and nothing seemed to help her feel better--except the swing. Thank goodness for that thing! Of course most of the time I can't just let her sit there and enjoy the ride. I feel the need to let her know I'M STILL HERE so I sit in front of her and talk and play and sing.

(You just shaved another year off your answer to my original question, didn't you?)

Another thing Kate's taken an interest in this month is her nursery. Considering how much time I spent on it, it's been so gratifying to see. When we rock in her chair she seems to really love the graphic lines of the Nate Berkus panel I hung on the wall, and the big bold print of the floral curtain. Both get lots of stares and lots of smiles!

Kate is also starting to enjoy baths. Well...maybe not so much "enjoy" as it is "no longer screaming her head off when she's naked and there's water touching her." It's a good start.

I pretty much talk to Kate nonstop. If she's awake, I'm talking. Whether it's on a walk ("Look both ways before crossing the street--and don't do drugs."), driving in the car ("That's a house. That's a car. That's some asshole who just cut Mommy off."), or folding laundry ("This is a pink shirt. This is a pink blanket. This is a pink dress. This is a pink sock."), I pretty much never shut up.

(Just lost another year, didn't I?)

G is just as talkative with Kate, but much less annoying I assure you. One of the most exciting things to happen over this past month is that Kate is starting to join in on the conversation! She's beginning to make vowel sounds and once she gets going she's quite the little chatterbox! It is our absolute most favorite thing to hear, and I'm so thrilled that we got video of her chatting away when she was 11 weeks old (see it here)!

Earlier this month I packed up the clothes that Kate's already outgrown. Now that was an emotional afternoon! I labeled the most special ones with little tags that said, "This is the outfit we brought you home from the hospital in." and "This was Mommy's favorite outfit to dress you in when you were a newborn." I like to think I won't forget these things, but you just never know!

And speaking of cute clothes, here's a sneak-peak of Kate's personalized 3 month onesie from The Cotton Cupcake Shoppe:


It was so hard to get a picture of her without her hands clasped together, but I finally got one! Being in her face 24/7 seems to increase my odds, so I've got that on my side.

Does she look annoyed to you yet?

You Know You're No Longer Pregnant...

...when you wash down your birth control pill with a glass of wine.

My Pregnancy Overview

I continue to receive reader emails asking questions about my pregnancy, so here's a post on (hopefully) everything you'd ever want to know about it!

Weight
I'll start with the most popular question, which is weight gain. I gained a total of 26 pounds during my pregnancy which was right in the "normal" range for my body type. One thing I found helpful for tracking my weight gain was this chart from ParentingWeekly.com which my friend Jill (who was also pregnant at the time) shared with me. Around 20 weeks I began to get concerned that I wasn't gaining enough weight, but as you can see (my progress is the orange line in the picture below) my body quickly made up for it. It was also really helpful to see that even though I had some weeks with dramatic weight gains, I was still within "normal" limits.


Food
It didn't take long for my normally huge appetite to go into overdrive when I was pregnant. I'm not sure I ever felt full those entire 9 months! To keep myself in check I kept a food journal during most of pregnancy, keeping track of what I ate and at what time. I didn't count calories or any other information--I just kept it simple. I primarily wanted to make sure I ate every 2-3 hours (to prevent binging later--a horrible habit of mine) and to make sure I was getting enough protein. I also used these daily logs to keep track of taking my vitamins and supplements, and to make sure I was getting enough water. A typical day's log would look something like this:

7am--Carnation Instant Breakfast, vitamins
9:30am--Oatmeal w/wheat germ
12pm--Salmon, wild rice
2pm--Peanut butter granola bar
3pm--Nerds candy
5pm--V8
6pm--Cheese & crackers
8pm--Pancakes

Nothing fancy, but it got the job done. I tried to make a few dietary changes for the sake of the baby. This included drinking more milk (I hate milk), drinking a V8 every day (I hate vegetables and choking down one of these down sans vodka was often the hardest part of my day), and adding wheat germ to my daily bowl of oatmeal. I read somewhere that wheat germ is a "pregnancy superfood" so I decided to give it a shot. Two tablespoons per day is what was recommended and I found that adding it to my oatmeal or cereal was the easiest and least noticeable way to get it in. My grocery store carried two brands of wheat germ and of those I liked Kretschmer's the best. The other kind--I can't remember the brand name, but it came in a bag versus a jar--tasted like ass. I only mention it to save you the potential gagging (and the $4) if you decide to give wheat germ a try.

Cravings
I remember during my first trimester my friend Jill asked if I was having any cravings. I told her I wasn't, but then G jumped in and asked, "What about pancakes?"

Me: "Pancakes aren't a craving. They just sound reeeallly good to me."
Jill: "Um. What do you think a craving is?"

Good point.

Pancakes were my first pregnancy craving, and holy hell did I eat a ton of them! It also didn't take me long to realize that when I wanted pancakes I wanted them FIVE MINUTES AGO DAMMIT, so prep time wasn't something my hormones could be bothered with. To keep my hunger from turning into a Code Red Situation, I made huge batches of pancakes and kept them in freezer so I could quickly heat them up whenever the urge struck. In addition to pancakes, pretty much ALL breakfast foods quickly became cravings of mine--cereal, eggs, waffles, toast, and cinnamon rolls. Especially cinnamon rolls. I went through a HUGE cinnamon kick for a while there. I couldn't get enough of it.

Activity
To balance out all those pancakes, maple syrup, and cinnamon rolls, I tried really hard to keep active during my pregnancy. Luckily I was able to keep running all the way through my second trimester which really helped. I also continued low weight/high rep strength training classes at the gym (Body Pump) through my second trimester and a bit into my third, but gave it up once being on my back became too uncomfortable. I used the elliptical all throughout my pregnancy and it was pretty much the only thing I did during my last trimester. I tried one water aerobics class--which is supposed to be excellent for pregnant women--but it just wasn't for me.

In addition to trying to remain active, I also started seeing a chiropractor on a regular basis. I've dealt with hip and sciatic nerve problems in the past from running and wanted to be proactive about not experiencing those same problems--which I've heard are common--during my pregnancy. I had some very slight, occasional hip pain as my belly grew and my body expanded--but nothing compared to what I'd experienced in the past. And thankfully I didn't have any problems with my sciatic nerve! My hope was also that keeping my body properly aligned would help with delivery, but since I ended up needing a c-section I can't really speak to that.

Symptoms
I was incredibly blessed to have no morning sickness or nausea during my pregnancy, however I was horribly tired all throughout. I think I've shared this before, but I remember one day during my first trimester when I was so exhausted that I could barely make it up the stairs to get to bed. I ended up stopping mid-flight and just crying over how tired I was before finally crawling the rest of the way up. It was awful. Luckily that extreme exhaustion didn't last all 9 months, but I never really experienced that burst of energy I hear people talk about during their second trimester. I was pretty tired the entire time. My sleep, on the other hand, was a bit varied. I had a lot of sleepless nights late in my second trimester and early in my third trimester, but luckily I slept really well at the end of my third trimester.

Another symptom I had all throughout my pregnancy was congestion--although using a humidifier in our room at night really helped. I also had really low blood pressure, so I was pretty dizzy and light-headed quite a bit until I got used to moving more slowly. I fainted once (and almost twice) during my pregnancy, but luckily it wasn't too serious. Another prominent symptom was just being ridiculously forgetful. That is hands-down what drove me the craziest! I hated that I couldn't remember ANYTHING and spent most of my pregnancy saying, "This is what stupid people must feel like."

I had very minimal swelling during my pregnancy. I experienced it once during my second trimester during a three-hour flight (that was horrible) and then had some slight swelling in my fingers during the last week or two. I also got a bloody nose once, which was strange, but luckily not reoccurring.

At the top of my list of symptoms I managed to avoid is stretch marks! This was one I really couldn't believe. With how big my belly got (my belly circumference maxed out at 44") I was POSITIVE I was going to get stretch marks. I would've bet the house on it. I rubbed Palmer's Tummy Butter on my belly every night and it's hard to say if that helped prevent the stretch marks or if I just got lucky, but many of you have asked what I used so I thought I'd share. I also managed to avoid skin tags, varicose veins, heartburn, and other pregnancy horrors. And last but not least, my belly button remained an innie! It was hanging on for dear life at the end but it never popped out!

Overall, I had a really wonderful pregnancy and absolutely loved being pregnant. I'm pretty sure this answers all the questions I've received, but feel free to let me know if you have any more!

What's My Name?

I just have to share this picture of Kate because:

1. I'm a mom.
2. She's the cuteness.
3. I can't resist showing off her adorable hat!

Kate: 11 weeks
This personalized hat was made by Amber from The Cotton Cupcake Shoppe--the same talent behind Kate's personalized monthly onesies--and I put it on her every chance I get. It's the perfect "weight" for spring and it has a little knot at the top (not pictured) which allows for it to be adjustable. As Kate grows I just loosen the knot and move it up a bit to make the rest of the hat longer--perfect for covering those little ears from the wind when we go on our walks!

Now you would think with "Kate" plastered across her forehead we wouldn't get those, "What's her name?" questions, right?

You'd be surprised.

The other day a woman complimented her hat and added, "Kate. Is that her name?"

Um...no. It's the hat's name.

Seriously?

You Know It's a Bad One...

...when you go through half a dozen wipes before you even get the diaper unfastened!