Teeny-Tiny Pieces

Taryn had a rough night.

Which means I had a rough night too.

She was pretty pissy when I got home from waork yesterday evening. Her temperature un-medicated was hovering around 102F and I know that by the time it gets that high, you're just miserable. Her skin probably hurt from the roughness of her well-washed short-set, her nose was dripping, and here is Evil Mama trying to force her to eat. I chopped up some avocado, gave her cooked onion, rice, whole wheat pasta, and finally broke down and thawed a few fruit cubes, mashed them up with some plain whole fat yogurt and satisfied myself that she had ingested at least 4 ounces of food.

Then Papa gave her a bath, which was perfect since I was cooking dinner (potatoe and leek soup) and as soon as I finished, she was freshly washed a dried, so I slathered some lotion on her which pissed her off even more than the food. I was hoping she was just tired, nursed her for the third time (in three hours) and put her to sleep. I was hoping the Tylenol would keep her temperature low enough to let her rest a bit, but sure enough at 3 am, after a night of tossing and turning that kept me only half-awake (since I was listening on the monitor to make sure she was breathing okay and didn't have any seizures from her temperature) she was up and hysterical.

So we nursed, and I know it's not the best habit to get into but I can't stand to see my baby suffer and I know the boob has magical soothing qualities. And when she finished she rolled over, scooted up, and slept with the top half of her body on my pillow, her little forehead pressed against mine, and her arm draped around my neck.

About 40 minutes later, I still hadn't drifted off and my leg started to cramp. I slowly tried to reposition my body without moving anything from the neck up. But of course, the sweaty Angel draped across my top eighth woke up and was at the hysterical crying again. I decided to take her temperature and she was at 102.1F so I gave her some Tylenol, nursed her for a few minutes, and tried to flip her on her back to sleep between P and I.

That didn't work.

She dragged her limp, damp body across mine, until her head rested on my heart, one arm on each side of my body in a little baby-hug, and her knees on my bed, as if she were in prayer. She made it like that for another hour or so, woke up again, repositioned herself in a similar stance and fell back asleep. When my alarm went off at 5:20 she woke up, yet again, wailed, nursed, and then I stuck her in her crib since she refused to let P touch her, and by this time it was after 6am and I had to get ready for work.

And of course she woke up right as I'm leaving the house, nobody could calm her down so I had to stay, rock, soothe, and trick her into going to Johana so I could leave for work at 7.

So you see, I've pretty much been up since 3am. That's going on 5 hours already. My brain is dead, my vision is foggy, and I'm a tad irked that P was able to sleep though most of it. Kind of like the night before when he went to sleep downstairs just before she woke up crying, vomiting, and inconsolable by anyone but me.

*sigh*

My heart is breaking thinking about how much she's suffering right now. Because of some damn shots. I spoke to a decent Kaiser nurse today though who suggested I try baby Motrin instead of Tylenol, so we'll see how that works at lunch today. And all of this piled onto my sinus infection.... But I can't complain. At least I know what to do to help myslef. This poor kid can't even tell us what's hurting.

Continuing the Tradition

When we were dead broke, back in the day, Mom, Goldie (my brother) and I used to go to this sushi place off Kerner called Yu Shang for our birthdays. There is a Vietnamese guy there (shhhh...don't tell) named Henry who has an awesome creation called the Henry Roll that we order every time we step foot in the place. The place always reminds me of that TV show about the bar where everyone knows everyone, because regulars get a chorus of shouts when they walk in to welcome them.

Last night Mom and I had planned to do a small celebration for T-Boog's birthday, and also to celebrate that I made it through labor as well. We had plans of vegan cake and a hike, but since T-Boog is sick I didn't think she needed to load up on sugar or be out too late so last minute we decided to head over to Yu Shang. I was bummed at first to not be celebrating her first birthday with her father, but both he and the Nanny had classes last night, so instead of being bitter as I would have a year ago, I just made do with what I had.

Goldie met us there, and I realized I hadn't has sushi for almost two years, since before I was pregnant. We sat Boogie in a high chair at the sushi bar, ordered up some tea, cucumber salad and hot and sour soup. We took turns feeding T-Boog all of them, and she loved it, though I think the soup was a bit spicy for her. She loved the seaweed off the top of the cucumber salad, and the edamame, and I pulled some smoked salmon off the Henry roll and gave that to her as well.

And, as tradition holds, once we finished they brought out a dessert for T-Boog with a candle and the entire restaurant, the sushi chefs, waiters, host and patrons all sang Happy Birthday to her. I was standing up holding her when they started, and the whole time we were singing she looked around at all the strangers yelling to her with this shocked look on her face. It was classic. Then we blew out the candle, and dug into the dessert, which was mango ice cream with a dough on the outside. She was digging the ice cream, had it smeared all over her face, and I'm glad she got a special desert on her special day.

***

I am bringing her to Kaiser today though. I'm at home blogging this time. She's had a temperature about 99.2 the past two days, and this morning it was up to 100.3 so I'm taking her in to see what we can do to help her eat, sleep, and breathe. She's been kind of panting all day which worries me, but I'm hoping it's just because her nose it stuffed up. I hate to say this out loud, but one part I do like when she's sick is she turns into a little Snuggle Bunny. We were in bed this morning, and she buried her face in my neck, flopped her burning hot body across my chest, and passed out. And since she's congested, she has this adorable little baby (oops, toddler, now?) snore, and her hair is all matted from sweating last night, her little red nose and her fingers gripping a clump of my hair. I brought her back to her crib since the dogs were jumping on the bed, and really, I needed to blog (heh), and I was worried if I slept with her she might get too hot. At least in her crib she gets the air flow, not like in my bed when we snuggle under the covers.

But I'll keep ya'll posted if this is more than a cold.

Stupid Non-Mother Kaiser Nurse

I called Kaiser last night to check on a couple cold medications to make sure they were okay to take while I'm breastfeeding. While I was talking to her, since she seemed very nice and more informed than a lot of the other nurses I've spoken to, I decided to ask her the burning question: "Can Taryn go 5 hours without milk, twice per day?"

I hadn't gotten a chance to ask her pedi at her appointment yesterday because a nurse just came in to give Taryn her flu shot, then we left. Then nurse I spoke to was nice, and readiy admitted she didn't have any information on that specific question, since it was concerning my let-down being non-existent at work, and not weaning Taryn. She said she understood not wanting to give her formula, and decided to email Dr. M to get his opinion on the situation. She even read to me what she was sending, to make sure it was accurate.

This morning, a different, stupid Kaiser nurse called me at work. First off, I said to call my cell, but, okay, maybe she just wasn't completely on top of things that early in the morning. Right off the bat though, she started pissing me off.

"Hi, you called last night with some questions about breastfeeding?"

No, I don't have any problems breastfeeding. I'm having problems with my let-down reflex at work.

"Oh, okay. Well, have you tried fenugreek?"

I'm drinking that tea right now. But listen, I've probably tried everything you're going to suggest, like massage, and meditation, deep breathing, visualization, drinking more water...

"Well, have you tried Brewer's Yeast or Mother's Milk tea? Those can increase your milk supply."

But like I already said, I don't have a problem with supply, just my let-down. I can nurse her fine, it's pumping at work that isn't working. I really just wanted to know if nursing her every 5 hours is enough while I'm away at work, with solids in between.

"Maybe it's stress? Stress can affect your let-down."

Well, obviously. I already know that. I need help to fix this situation, and I need to know how long she can go without milk since I'm only getting 2 ounces each time I pump.

"Well, that's not enough milk for her. You're going to have to supplement with formula if you can't pump more than that."

[So now I'm thinking, this stupid bitch just told me I don't make enough milk for my child. She said stress will affect my let-down, but the wench tells me I'll have to supplement if it doesn't get better so my child basically doesn't starve, but still doesn't give me any suggestions] Right. I don't want to supplement, so is there anything you can tell me to help with my let-down so I don't have to?

"No. I've never heard of this problem before."

[Stupid, worthless excuse for a woman! Obviously you don't have kids or you'd have heard of this, and you might be a little more willing to help me out. Not say shit that's going to stress me out even more. I hate you! I have Kaiser! I hate advice nurses!] Well, okay. You're not very helpful, you know? I think I'll have better luck looking on the internet. Click.

Seriously, how do these people get jobs? I didn't even have time to shut my office door before the tears were streaming down my face. So all this coupled with a crippling stomache-ache, a sinus infection ... just too much. So I called P.

[Sniffling] Baby, I need to talk to ...

"I'm busy, can I call you back?"

I know the world doesn't revolve around me, but can I get a second of someone's time to figure out what the fuck is wrong with me? This is so damn frustrating.