Breastfeeding Our Big Baby and Dog Park Woes

Me with Wiley and Lupe <3

Wiley went in for his one week check-up today and he is good and healthy! The only thing we need to work on is getting his weight up, he's 9.3lbs which is actually 3oz down from what he was when we were released from the hospital. I've been feeding him, I swear. I try to feed him every two to three hours (generally every two) and we'd been supplementing with formula but I backed off 'cause I could tell my milk had come in and was worried he was fighting me over breastfeeding specifically because he had the formula... So now we're back to breastfeeding him followed by giving him formula afterward 'til we get his weight back up and can get my supply of breast milk up enough to satisfy such a big baby. They keep telling me that with larger babies like him it's sometimes hard to breastfeed at first because it's harder to produce all the milk they need so I'm trying not to feel too bad, I just hate that he's hungry and I'm not realizing it. Breastfeeding has managed to mess up my wrists, though... Well, even more than they already were. I was favoring my right wrist I hurt while pregnant (plus I had carpal tunnel pre-pregnancy), pregnancy brought out my carpal tunnel and then Wiley is as strong as an ox (and stubborn) and wants to have his hands in his face and seems like he wants to breastfeed himself so he fights my hand with his head/neck (he has been able to lift his head since birth) and his arms/hands. Now I have shooting pains up in my left wrist if I move it wrong, on top of my right wrist... Yay.

Of course, I got over-zealous on the formula as soon as we got home from the doctor's office (we'd also run to the bank, taken the dog to the dog park and visited my grandmother before we got home) but we hadn't had much sleep last night (Wiley was refusing to sleep in his cradle--we'd get him down and put him in it and within ten minutes he'd start crying and the only way to stop him was to let him sleep while we held him or  let him sleep in the bed with us, which we finally broke down and did even though we know it's not suggested and would rather not (well, I love having him sleep in the bed with me but I also love not having to worry about suffocating him by accident) so we just wanted to get him good and full and happy and ready for a nice nap so that we could also nap. It ended with him having his first spit-up and it got all over his bedding and back and I just washed an emergency load last night 'cause he got poop on his bedding so now we're without spare bedding 'til I get enough laundry to justify another load (I'm not starting the wash just for spit-up, poop is a different story).

Taken last night before we even made it to bed, but this is pretty much how the night went...

We tried taking Lupe to the dog park and she was over-aggressive when another dog started humping her. Luckily the owner seemed to think his dog deserved it (she stopped as soon as she ran the dog off a big, but she managed to get some of his fur out... of course, he's a pomeranian so I can't imagine that was that hard. Still, two other dogs came running up to her and she went at them with the same anger she had gone at the first dog with and Patrick yelled and I immediately jumped in and scooped her up and told him to get her out of the park and that I'd get the baby and for him to just run her around the track outside the park (on leash) so that we could get her energy out. Still, we aren't going to be taking her to any dog parks every again, we'd already been hesitant to and stopped for the most part but that was the last straw. She's a dog that needs space 'til she gets to know the other dog, but that was just extreme and we don't know if it was just because the first dog upset her with the mounting (Lupe humps other dogs, she does not tolerate being the submissive one) or if she was extra on-edge because Wiley was with us and she's protective of her baby... But I'm not willing to take that chance again, I'm even nervous seeing her around my friend's dogs that she's played with before a bit, at least with Wiley around. Even though these dogs ignored Wiley, my friend's dogs might want to check him out and I don't want to risk her freaking out on them.

We did get a photo of them on their first car ride together, though!

I'm sure there's more but I can't think of what else right now. I need to be productive but I'm babying myself because of the c-section... Well, I wouldn't consider it babying if it was any other major surgery but I feel bad for Patrick working two jobs and still having to take care of me and the baby and animals when he's home, even though he's a saint about it all. So I'll end with this photo of Abel with Wiley because poor Abel doesn't get enough recognition on here when it comes to stories about the baby since he's still getting used to him/feeling out the situation, though I think he's doing marvelous.

Abel joined us while I was feeding Wiley some formula the other day :)

Oh, and before I forget I'm going to share the photo we got today of my now missing baby-bump. I put on one of the three shirts I wore the most at the end of the pregnancy and started getting weepy about not having my sweet baby bump anymore. I'm happy Wiley is here, but I do miss being pregnant with him. I loved my pregnant body and being pregnant, but I'm not sure that I'll ever be pregnant again simply because of having to have a c-section for a large baby and we never figured out what made him so big (it's likely just Patrick and I make big, healthy babies)... so I can't try to watch to prevent it in another pregnancy. Plus, sometimes I think with how the economy is it makes much more sense to just have one child, but we've also considered adoption. I may change my mind about not wanting to go through a c-section again in a few years and we may decide to at least try for one more biological child (I really would like to adopt at some point if we can ever financially afford two to three kids) but right now it's still up in the air. My surgery went great as far as I can tell and he's here and perfect but I'm just still traumatized by it because of my own deep, deep fear of surgery. I lived through the pain of getting prepped (even the numbing agent for the epidural hurt me a lot to receive--and they had to give me extra) and the post-surgery pain, but it wasn't an over-all pleasant experience and I'm still struggling a bit with feeling like I missed out by not getting my natural birth and all that. Anyway, we'll see when the time comes, I definitely don't want another baby for another three to four years regardless.

One-week after delivery.

The day before the c-section/Wiley's arrival!