Stress

Yesterday was a crazy day! In the morning, Rachel decided to wake for a feed at 5.30 (usually it's 7). So she had a feed and went back to sleep 'til 8.30, which meant she woke at the time she's usually going back down for her long morning sleep. So she was up for an hour or so before going back to bed again and having another snooze. Then we were off to Gymbaroo, from there straight to a cafe for lunch with my mothers group. She should have been asleep then but nope, there were people to schmooze with. She's a very social little monkey. And because she didn't sleep then, I took her home for a snooze instead of going to rhyme time at the library, which she loves as much as she loves Gymbaroo. And that's when the maternal health nurse called. So, in order to exlain that I need to tell you about yesterday. Which means I also need to tell you about last week. And our 4-month maternal health nurse check-up. Kapish?

Last Tuesday, Rachel started to lose her voice. She got really quite hoarse by Thursday, so I made an appointment with her GP. Earliest I could get in was yesterday afternoon. So off we toddled, despite Rachel being markedly better. Thought I may as well get her checked out. The GP declared her very healthy, and decided the little monkey had had a bout of laryngitis caused by a virus. Made sense to me, as she'd also had a bit of a runny nose the week before. The GP also described her as a sticky beak, particularly alert and really quite a lovely little girl. Which was also the general consensus of all the men in the waiting room she'd been smiling at. Anyway, at our 4-month check-up, Rachel's weight was on the low side, as I've mentioned before, between the 25th and 10th percentiles. Length and head circumference were on the 25th. The maternal health nurse suggested weighing her again at 5 months to track what was happening. So, as I forgot to ask the GP, I ducked into the maternal health centre on the way home to use the scales they have set up in the breastfeeding room they provide. And horrors - she'd lost weight. At 4 months she was 5.34 kg, and at as-good-as-5-months, she was 5.26 kg. I went into a bit of a funk about it, thinking of all the people who'd said "she's so little!!", "isn't she dainty/petite/a cute little thing" etc. And then I thought about her being so alert and smiley and happy and a pretty good sleeper (she certainly does the 14.5 hours recommended for her age, without being what's the word, insipid? Not quite, but can't get it at the moment), and I thought, the scales must be wrong. So, I called the maternal health centre when I got home, as there had been no one in the office when I was there, just to have a chat and see if their scales were stupid. I got the central office and left my name and number for the nurse to call back. Rachel had been held up side-by-side with other babies her age at mothers group, and goodness me, she really is little. So I was starting to stress a bit. And then the maternal health nurse called and started banging on about "give her formula". Nope nope nope. So, after she tried that a few times more, she clicked that I wasn't into the idea and suggested giving her top up bottles of expressed milk. Lucky we'd given her a bottle for the first time the night before, and she took to it like a duck to etc. This afternoon I gave her a top-up 40ml after her afternoon feed, and then another 120ml with her last feed. I am on an expressing mission. And I think I'm going to start solids. She is certainly interested in food. For the brief time at mothers group lunch when she was on my knee (rather than someone else's, getting in cuddles all over the place), she was trying to get into my salad. Or was it the goat's cheese? I'm still sceptical that the scales are a bit dodgy - she's been growing out of some of her clothes. Hm. So now I have to take her back to the GP to make sure there isn't something wrong, even though she was declared healthy yesterday. Sigh.