Pooping and Puking

I have been pooped on and puked on so many times in the last month. If someone had told me I would be exposed to so much puke and poop, I might have thought twice about this whole business. But it's weird how you sort of get used to it and it doesn't gross you out anymore. I remember when my Grandma used to come over to when we were little and had hamsters and a guinea pig, and she would just pick up their poop like it was nothing and I would be so grossed out. Now I get it. What's so gross about hamster poop? All they eat is hay and seeds and stuff. And all Lilli's eating is milk. After you've raised a few kids, a little poop is nothin'!! But I have had some incredible poop/puke experiences (hey, how many times do you think I can write poop and/or puke in one post?). Like when Lilli was only a couple weeks old she had this incredibly explosive poop. Unfortunately, at the time, I had her diaper off and her butt was pointed at the wall. That yellow, mustardy, seedy poop shot across the room onto the floor and across the chair and hit that wall that must have been about five feet away. And here comes, Atticus, ready to do cleanup on Aisle 5!! Why do dogs like poop? But that is a whole different post. And then the puke. The puke is enough to make someone a nervous wreck, because you never know when it's coming. It'll be smooth sailing for a good day or two and then out of nowhere it's like poltergeist. And usually it's all over me, down my bra, sometimes down my pants, and I have to change all my clothes and Lilli's too. And clean the couch. That's a fun thing to have to do at 3am when you're dead ass tired. Not that it's any fun for her either. Although maybe she was secretly laughing inside that time I'd put her to bed next to me, my face next to hers, and I was almost almost almost in a well deserved slumber when I was rudely awakened by hot milky puke all over my face. Mmmmm. Then you have to change all the sheets too! Fun! I did end up taking Lilli to the doctor because I was afraid she was sick or had acid reflux. Doctor said it could be acid reflux but if she was gaining weight well (which she has. . .almost three ounces a day!) then it wasn't a problem and we could wait to see if it got better. Maybe I am overfeeding in my neurotic fear of starving her.

Another instance my sleep psychosis craziness. All who know me know that I am deathly afraid of spiders. Well, one night, as I was putting Lilli to sleep by having her on my chest I began to doze off myself. In my half sleep, I thought I saw a HUGE SPIDER making it's way over the lip of the comforter and starting to crawl onto Lilli's back. In utter panic I flung back the covers, rolled over so that Lilli was on her back next to me (at least I was aware that Lilli was on top of me!), and started to run out of bed to turn on the lights, all the while screaming at the top of my lungs. Bob, awakened by my screaming and feeling that I was getting out of bed, mistakenly thought that there was a stranger in the house pulling me out of bed. So while I was screaming, desperate to get out of the spider ridden bed, Bob was screaming (like a girl, I might add :)) and holding onto me, desperate to pull me away from the hideous stranger trying to steal me away. My desperation being stronger than his, I finally managed to pull away and get the light on, when we finally both realized how silly we were, and managed to stop screaming. All the while, there was Lilli laying in bed, eyes wide but not making a peep! Bob said he's never been so scared in his life, but. . . why in the world would he assume that the reason I was getting out of bed, albeit screaming, was that there was a weirdo pulling me away? It's not like that is a common occurence :) Oh well, we can laugh now. . .Bob is afraid I will transfer my spider fear onto Lilli. . .

Great grandma and Lilli

Grandma (ha ha!) and Lilli

Grandpa took pictures as always.

Our first outing away from Lilli was to go Christmas shopping! Both Bob and I felt it was such a waste to spend such precious time at the mall. Lilli was still taking a bottle at that point though so she did pretty well, plus she got to spend some quality time with Grandpa and Grandma.

The first two weeks of Lilli's life were so exhilarating, and at the same time so utterly exhausting. She was having a really hard time breastfeeding at first, and so we had to go get an industrial grade breast pump and feed her by bottle. No one has really suffered ultimate humiliation until you have been hooked up to a double electric breast pump and sucked dry. You just have to sit there helpless holding those suction cups to your boobies, at the mercy of anyone who wants to come in and laugh at you. Bob had a good laugh, let me tell you. But what we had to do was, we had to try and let her breastfeed, which was so frustrating at first, and then give up and pump. And while I was pumping, Bob would try to feed her. If he didn't get much down her, then I would try while he washed up all the pump parts. And so on repeated every two and a half hours or so. Its really enough to turn anyone pretty psychotic when you combine that with complete sleep deprivation. I look back at pictures of me from this time and I kind of look like a zombie. A happy zombie, though.

Plus, the first week she was really jaundiced, as you can see from her Thanksgiving picture. Appropriately, she was yellow as a pumpkin! This was not only worrisome, but it made her really sleepy. Everytime we wanted her to eat, breast or bottle, she's tend to fall asleep. In fact, she was typical in that when we wanted her to eat she'd sleep and when we wanted her to sleep, she wouldn't! I basically had to get used to sleeping with her in the crook of my arm.

But anyway, all that work payed off, because after several trips to the lactation consultant she eventually figured out the eating thing. After a week and half we didn't use the pump at all anymore. And eventually she got better at sleeping at night too, and not being so sleepy during the day, especially after the jaundice wore off. It's weird to think that I used to look at her and worry that she was so skinny! Maybe I was a little neurotic about being afraid of her starving and so I made sure she ate whenever she wanted. Anywho, you can see that she had no problem putting on weight. But really, this period was a test of our sanity!

Just wanted to remember for myself a funny thing that happened when Lilli was only a week old or so. I was still trying to get her to sleep in the bassinet sometimes, (which I have since largely given up) but also had her sleeping with us too. I woke up in the middle of the night, and saw through my foggy vision that Lillian was sleeping soundly. Then my eyes cleared a bit and I realized that what I had thought was the baby was actually part of the blanket. I woke Bob up screaming, "Where's the baby???" and was frantically searching for her under the covers when a terrified Bob finally figured out that she was in the bassinet. See. . .look what sleep deprivation psychosis can do to you.