Motherhood | HoneyBear Lane

Weigh-in Wednesday #7: So. Very. Tired.

February 21, 2012 By Heidi @ Honeybear Lane 5 Comments

I think I might be missing that part of my brain that tells me to stop eating dessert. And hence, no weight loss this week. Actually, I haven’t been trying to lose weight the last few weeks because I’ve been trying to figure out how to get my milk supply up. Monday was an all-time low. I thought I’d figured it out with Powerade and Fenugreek. But Monday there was almost no milk, all day. And it was a very hard day.

I was talking to my sister and she mentioned that her biggest milk-killer was not getting enough sleep. And Saturday night I’d gone to bed at 2:30 am. So Monday night I went to bed earlier and the next day my supply was fine. But last night E woke up at 4 am, then 5, 6, and 7. And I dwindled again today. Sigh.

So. Very. Tired.

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New plan: go to bed by 11 every night.

Other new plans: I’m starting up Weight Watchers again this week and continuing with the Powerade and Fenugreek. And now that my hubby’s darn Board exam is over (today!!) I am going to start running early in the morning a few times a week.

I’ve also been experimenting with different bottles, trying desperately to get E to start drinking from them. I tried a Playtex Nurser, which she liked the nipple, but not the flow. Those are the ‘drop-ins’ kind with the plastic bag and it makes the flow different than a normal bottle. She got frustrated with it. Then I tried the Avent because the nipple shape was similar to the Nurser and she took to it! She drank almost the whole thing.

Okay, I’m off to bed.

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Filed Under: breastfeeding, Uncategorized, weight loss Tagged With: motherhood, Weight Loss

Weigh-In Wednesday #6

February 15, 2012 By Heidi @ Honeybear Lane 38 Comments

Did I weigh myself this week? Yes. Did I do Weight Watchers this week? No. Did I lose weight? Um…yes. Weird.

So I’m finding that I’m SLOWLY losing weight no matter what I do. I follow all my points to a T and I lose a pound. Then I throw caution into the wind and eat like a pig and lose a pound. Huh.

On another note, I’m having milk supply problems. After I weaned her from the shield, my supply got better and I didn’t have to supplement anymore. But no matter what I did, I never really made much milk in the evening, for her last feeding before bed. So I would try to give her a bottle. But suddenly my fastidious baby turns up her nose at bottles. The same baby who drank bottles just fine a month ago. And even still she will take a bottle in the middle of the night. So I nurse her anyway so she can comfort herself but I always worry that she is still hungry.

But now my milk starts dwindling in the early afternoon. Thanks to my advisory board (also known as the Honeybear Lane Facebook Page) I am now taking Fenugreek and Mother’s Milk herbal tea. I’ve only taken it for a day, so I’m hoping it helps. For those of you who have taken these supplements, how long does it take for them to start working? And how much does it really help?

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Filed Under: baby, breastfeeding, weight loss Tagged With: baby, motherhood, Weight Loss

Breastfeeding at Two Months

January 27, 2012 By Heidi @ Honeybear Lane 25 Comments

Miss E is two months old now. And I’m still breastfeeding! Doesn’t sound like much of an accomplishment but I’ve overcome a lot.

Finger feeding to nipple shield with tube.

Nipple shield with tube to nipple shield with formula squirted in the tip and supplementing.

Nipple shield with formula to Nipple shield alone, still supplementing.

Nipple shield to nothing, no supplementing!

Well to be honest, I have to give her an ounce of supplement in the evening because my milk supply is always just low in the evenings. I’ve had rough spots here and there with some very painful clogged ducts. But overall I feel like a normal breastfeeding mom now. And that is huge!

At six weeks she went from taking an hour to eat to taking 20 minutes. And now she takes less than 10 minutes.

I want to say thank you to all of you who encouraged me or sympathized with me because it HAS gotten easier and it’s SO much better. But it definitely wasn’t easy.

I know that sometimes it just doesn’t work and a mom shouldn’t feel guilty for doing her job, which is just to keep that baby fed. But having been in the position of feeling like a failure/judged for giving my baby formula, I feel like this is preferable. And now that I can do it without any props, it’s so much easier than worrying about going out and running out of formula or whatever. And it’s free (you can’t beat that!) And I feel more part of the ‘club.’

When I had a C section with my first baby, I felt so left out when moms started sharing their labor stories. I didn’t go into labor, I barely remembered the birth. And after I had my second vaginally, I finally had something to share. It feels like that now with breastfeeding. I have something to contribute. I can sit in the Mother’s Lounge at church with all the other nursing moms and chat about our crazy lives. I can ask my friends my questions about it. And I can act all cool about nursing like it aint no thang. Oh yeah!

But seriously thank you, my friends. I read and try to respond to all your comments. They give me so much encouragement.

And now that she’s getting older, I have found some time here and there to start sewing again. I got some fun tutorials coming up!!

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Filed Under: baby, breastfeeding Tagged With: baby, motherhood

To Have a Baby. Or Not.

January 23, 2012 By Heidi @ Honeybear Lane 19 Comments

Have you ever seen a mom who is toting around what seems like a million kids, all who are whining/crying about something? And maybe you said to yourself, “Wow–why don’t people wait a little longer to have another child?!” Because clearly this mom is in over her head. Clearly she is not doing a good job because her kids are unhappy. And obviously you would do much better. Your child would NEVER scream in a store. Or run away from you. Or pee in the corner.

Or how about the opposite scenario: A young couple has been married for six or seven years. “Why don’t they have any kids? Are they just so into their careers that they don’t want to bother with kids?” a person might think to themselves. Maybe that couple has been trying to have kids for years and years and haven’t been able to. Or maybe they were pregnant but miscarried. What if they are trying to adopt?

Everyone has or doesn’t have kids in their own timing for their own reasons.

And the reason might simply be “Because God told me to.”

That’s the reason Miss E is here so soon. I was dead-set on not having another baby while my husband was in school. I was so overwhelmed with my two energetic boys I just didn’t think there was any way I could survive. I would look at those moms who kept having kids 18 months apart and wondered how on earth they could do it (I still think that, btw.)

I had dreams about a baby girl. And as months went by, I just kept feeling so strong like I needed to have another baby soon. And here we are, folks.

There are sometimes pitiable moments of hiding in the bathroom and wondering what possessed me to even want kids in the first place. Often these days I long for the days of just going out to eat or a movie without a babysitter. At the store I am a traveling circus, juggling a newborn and a toddler who likes to run away while my three year old begs for everything sugary in sight. But not one day goes by when I don’t thank the Lord for my miraculous little girl. The love that I have for this little baby pushes all those thoughts out the door. For all my children.

And when they say that motherhood is the toughest job you will ever do, that’s true. But I wouldn’t trade it for anything.

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Filed Under: baby, Motherhood, Uncategorized Tagged With: baby, motherhood, slider

Why I Love Driving a Minivan

January 20, 2012 By Heidi @ Honeybear Lane 10 Comments

1. They’re awesome.

Four years ago we moved to AZ so Husband could attend dental school. We had one car. One little compact car. Cute, but cozy. And we had one kid. We lived pretty close to the school but my husband drove the car to school. Where I live there are lots of stores within walking distance so I just pushed the stroller everywhere I needed to go. It worked for awhile.

But then it stopped working. It got hot. I was sick of walking everywhere and I wanted to go places that were further away than walking distance. We tried the whole drop-you-off pick-you-up routine which was super annoying. We tried having my husband carpool, but the guys driving left SUPER early. We tried having my husband ride a bike. He discovered a new knee problem, yay! And we’d just had baby #2.

Finally we broke down and bought another car. We debated between a Toyota Rav4 and a Honda Odyssey. The Toyota guy was kind of a jerk and pressured us To. The. Max. (Ya I’m bringing that back.)

Guy: Okay I’ll give you that deal but I CANT go any lower.

Us: Um…that’s still above our budget…

Guy: Alright fine, I can give you THIS new cheaper deal but seriously, if I go any lower I will be losing money.

Us: {Stony Silence}

Guy: OKAY! You twisted my arm, I will give you the low price you originally came in wanting!!

We walked out on that guy. Mostly because the Rav4 was just not what we really wanted. It was too small. So we headed back over to Honda and they welcomed us with open arms, like one of the family. And they (meaning a friend of ours who worked there) gave us a stellar deal.

We were hesitant to embrace the Life of the Minivan and all that entails (such as my current haircut.) It was goodbye to youth, goodbye to the carefree and sporty versions of ourselves. Goodbye to driving down the coast in a convertible as we toss scarves over our shoulder doing the snooty laugh. Bwa-ha-ha-ha!

But once we did, we never looked back. Gone were the days of scooting the passenger side chair all the way up to fit in our carseat and taking the wheels off the semi-truck double stroller to cram it in the trunk. Our van fit everything. And I mean EVERYTHING. We visited Utah for two months this summer and on the way back it was packed to the ceiling, literally, with our stuff. No more borrowing trucks from people when we needed to transport a large piece of furniture.

It seats all our kids and us plus two more. ’Nuff said.

I can drive like a maniac and not get pulled over by the police cuz really, do they even LOOK at minivans? They just blend into the asphalt. Also I love making unexpected swift maneuvers around smaller cars. My engine’s got game, yo. They look at my car and imagine some cranky lady in hair rollers (they’re half right) and would never expect it. I guess I get to do the snooty laugh after all!

But don’t worry, I NEVER drive like that. I drive 10 mph below the speed limit at ALL times. I am a Cautious Carl. Maybe.

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And perhaps someday we’ll saw off the top of our minivan and drive down the coast…

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Filed Under: parenting, parenting humor Tagged With: Family, motherhood, Parenting

How I Survived the Grocery Store with Three Little Kids

January 13, 2012 By Heidi @ Honeybear Lane 17 Comments

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Once upon a time I used Reusable Grocery bags. And I even shlepped all my empty water bottles to the store for recycling. And once upon a time I also only had one child. But gone are the days of easy shopping trips and meager attempts to be “green.” I have three kids now and I must brave the grocery store with all of them.

Heres how it goes:

I time it carefully so that we are going when Baby E is recently up from her nap and fed. I stuff my purse full of snacks and sippy cups and we race off to Wal-Mart. In the parking lot we prepare for battle. I get the cart and put #2 in the basket (he refuses the front now.) #1 is walking. #3 gets nestled snugly into a Moby wrap that I wear since I know she will fall asleep as she will NOT in the carseat. Plus that thing is super bulky and I can barely see around it.

Once we get inside the store, I can be seen pulling the cart behind me with one hand while I hold my newborn’s wobbly head in the other. I have to cuddle her a little to get her to sleep. We navigate our way around the million old people (Arizona in winter) crawling the store and refusing to get out of the way as they chat at length about their various prescriptions. I loudly announce, “CAN I GET BY, PLEASE?” And seriously this one old lady followed me around the entire store. Borderline creepy.

The trip is going well so far. I haven’t forgotten anything yet and my brain seems to be functioning enough to manage it all. #3 is sleeping soundly and #1 and #2 are eating their snacks. There is a crummy trail of colored fishies and graham crackers all around Walmart.

But time is waning and it’s getting obvious. #2 starts throwing food around in the cart and gets demoted to sit in the front cart seat, with the added bonus of me opening up a bag of pretzels that he can access at his leisure. #1 is beginning to wander off from time to time, prompting me to raise my voice, “Keep up!! Stay by the cart!” I really think I am THE only young mom in Walmart. All septogenerian eyes are on me. And #3 is beginning to stir, letting out the occasional squeak of displeasure.

#2 drops his fishy baggy, spilling fishies everywhere. #1 helps me pick it up. #2 starts trying to stuff pretzels into said baggy, getting about 1 of every 10 actually in the bag. I take away the bag of pretzels. One more item I forgot…those darn black beans!

Finally we are at checkout. Fortunately the line is not too long. There needs to be a special checkout just for moms shopping with multiple kids. #2 drops his special plate I was buying for him to encourage better eating. Plate breaks. #1 helps himself to some Light Saber shaped candy and distributes them out. I collect all the candies back, causing #2 to begin his relentless whine-cry. #3 is awake but not yet crying, thank goodness. #1 helps me by holding my purse but then leaves it on the floor across the aisle. I am barking out orders right and left: “Pick that up! Hold this! Put that back! Calm down! We’ll eat it at home! Yes you can have veggie juice for lunch! Yes, that IS a light saber! No, we’re NOT going to buy it!” All the while shoving bags and bags of food back in the cart and paying the cashier.

Finally we are out the door. I race to the car and manage to get everyone and the groceries inside within minutes. I sit myself in the drivers seat and check the clock. 12:00. Once I’m home and everyone is down for naps, I plop down on the couch, too exhausted to do anything else. It wasn’t my finest hour, but we all survived.

And that is why I try to go on Saturday.

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Filed Under: how to deal with toddlers, mom humor, Motherhood, Uncategorized Tagged With: motherhood

Life With Three Kids

January 12, 2012 By Heidi @ Honeybear Lane 9 Comments

Life With Three Kids…(a few thoughts)

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Life with Three Kids is…not always picture perfect…

But filled with lots of funny and memorable moments.

Life with Three Kids can be a little tense at times…

But filled with boundless amounts of love and kisses.

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And Life with a new baby is as good as it gets.

Cherish your kids today.
Hug them twice.
Speak words of encouragement.
Tell them, “I love you!”
Get on the floor and just play.
Be their friend as well as their mom.

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Filed Under: baby, blessings, family Tagged With: baby, Family, motherhood, slider

Part 1: Meeting My Daughter

January 3, 2012 By Heidi @ Honeybear Lane 15 Comments

I was 40 weeks and one day pregnant. I had spent many nights wide awake with contractions, wondering “Is this is?” But no. Almost as if my body was like, “I think I can, I think I can..” and then chickened out at the last second. I’d tried tons of the ‘natural’ methods–had my membranes stripped FOUR times, tried sex, spicy food, walking for miles and miles, pineapple, that weird cumin drink…all but castor oil which I was wary of. Nothing was working.

My first baby was a C Section. My second was a vaginal (VBAC) and I wanted this one and every other one after to be also. Not that C Sections are the worst thing ever but I just prefer VBACs in every way possible…except the waiting. The waiting is just killer. Due to my circumstances, I wasn’t allowed to be induced with Pitocen, since it could cause problems and lead to emergency C Section or worse, scar rupture. And I didn’t really want to be induced, since I liked having the excitement of going into labor on my own.

More circumstances: We live away from all my family and I was due the week of Thanksgiving. This would be a good time for my husband to be around since he wouldn’t have to work at school. My mom was planning to come, but we decided to not have her come due to OTHER circumstances (lots of circumstances going on here.) And well, I was just sick to death of being pregnant. I needed to have this baby.

We decided to try induction by artificially rupturing my membranes…(having the doctor break my water.) I was a little nervous about it and almost backed out, but the nurse calmed my fears and I trust my doctor. I have a GREAT Ob-Gyn. One of the things I will miss the most about Arizona is my amazing OB. I know how hard it can be to find a good one! He wouldn’t let me try this method of induction before with Lukey, so I knew that he was a cautious man. But I was dilated to 4 cm and 80% effaced. So basically I was nearly there, I just needed a push.

The Night Before

The induction was scheduled at 8 pm. I was to call the hospital an hour before to see if they had room. We scheduled babysitters, packed our things, cleaned the house, and were ready to go. I called them up: ”No room at this inn,” the nurse told me. ”We’ll call you when things slow down.” Great. Now I was to spend the evening waiting, like a school girl waiting for her crush to call. At 11 pm, I gave up hope. I got ready for bed and went and laid down. And then I cried. My little pregnant self with tears always on the surface just cried and prayed that someday I might just have this baby. And literally one minute later, the hospital called and told me to get my booty down there. Hooray!

The Birth

After doing all the paperwork and getting all strapped down and IV’ed up, the Dr. came in. He took one second to check me and break the water. Done and done. He was there for 2 minutes. I forgot how messy this all was. Now I just got to wait. The contractions started in slowly, not hurting too much and I could breathe through it fine. We watched a movie, and as I laid there, I realized I wasn’t mentally ready to push this baby out just yet. I think I just wanted to labor for awhile. The contractions started to really hurt and I decided it was a good time for the epidural!

I hate getting epidurals…I am a huge baby about it and it hurts me so much. The nurse anesthetist (which, small world, was a girl from my hometown!) was really nice about it but seriously…it sucked. Picture sitting on the side of a hospital bed all wired up with a giant belly, oozing fluid (from my water) and hunching over trying to hold super still while they poke an enormous needle into my spine. Seriously, if I wasn’t such a baby about pain, I would skip the epidural. After that whole mess was over, the wonderful numbing relief seeping over me, I just laid there, loving life. But there ain’t no pretty way out of my situation…

Pushing

The nurse told me it was time. What! It was only 4 am. The doctor broke my water at 1. I just thought that was super fast. She started coaching me through pushing, which was super annoying. She kept saying, “Go harder, push harder! You can do more!” and every time I wanted to scream “NO I CANT!!!” because really, I couldn’t. I mean I was holding my breath and just pushing and straining and it felt like nothing was changing. Like it was just a fruitless waste of my precious energy. I was so tired and bugged and started to get nauseous. Finally she noticed a drop in the baby’s heart rate and had me rest on my side, breathing oxygen from a mast. That was all I needed, a little break and some O2 to get me through. I stayed on my side and pushed when I felt the urge. Much better. I even made the nazi nurse proud. Maybe even enough to forget that I, yes, vomited, peed, AND pooped in front of her. Three cheers for nurses willing to discretely clean that all up.

With Luke, I was so exhausted I thought I might die. I remember wanting to just faint and let it all go black. I just wanted to give up because all my pushing was doing squat. Finally the doc sliced me and sucked him out. So I was very proud of myself when I pushed the baby out by myself. I was finally doing so well that the nurse ran out to grab my doctor and he just made it in time to catch her. I tore a little. But with that finally giant push, her slimey little body wriggled its way out of me and into the bright light of that hospital room. And I let out a cry of relief and happiness when I saw her.

Pregnancy is a very emotional thing, and the birthing of your baby is even more so. Every experience is different, even if you’re in the same hospital at the same hour with the same doctor, the way you feel is always different. I was so excited and happy and relieved, but I was SO. FREAKING. TIRED. They handed my baby to me, all gooey, and I cuddled her cuteness for a second, very happy. But I also kind of wanted to be like, “Can you just take her and clean her so I can finally rest?” And I think they caught the hint and did that a moment later.

They cleaned her up in my room and once I was ready, I nursed her. I have horrible experiences nursing my babies, so when she latched on right away I was relieved. I knew it was not going to be easy or perfect, but it did give me hope that maybe she would actually be able to nurse. And I had a plan.

Most importantly, she was here. After all those months being pregnant and miserable, it was hard to believe that she was actually here, living on this world with us. We named her Ellie. And we love her, so very much.