my_weblog

Our baby doesn't sleep still..my elimination diet continues.

So we had Kai's 4 month appointment.. well he was 4 1/2 months. He weighed 15.9 lbs and is 26.5 inches. He had been hoarse for over 10 days. The Doctor said it maybe be acid reflux and prescribed medicine. I wouldn't keep Kai on it unless absolutely necessary. We weren't even sure we were going to try it but he had no voice and I figured let's try it and see if he sleeps better..maybe that is what is keeping him up at night.

I am pretty convinced that it is the food I am eating that bothers him and gives him restless nights. I just know it. I have been trying to eliminate foods and identify them. I am not willing to switch to formula, because I know breast milk is best, especially for an allergic baby. So I have been doing an elimination diet for a while. Most days I just have been eating chicken, rice, potatoes, rice products (rice milk, rice crackers, rice cereal) and fish. I thought it was going good and introduced eggs, almonds and started to introduce soy. But then he started waking a lot with gas pains- every hour or hour and 1/2. So now I am back to just rice, chicken, potatoes and rice products- oh and lots of oil. I tried canola but now I am doing just safflower. Last night wasn't good, so now I am thinking maybe chicken has been what bothered him, I have been having so much latley and his waking has gotten worse. Today I am just going to try rice, potatoes and beef also I am going to get some zucchini and pears because they are supposed to be ok.
The thing that makes it hard is- I hate eating meat. I was a vegetarian most of my life, so it grosses me out. After all this is done I am going back to being mostly vegetarian..It is what I prefer to eat. I want to try eating beans, but the couple times I did it was not good for Kai.

While at the doctor I asked him yet again about food and specifically about an allergy test. He said he did one, I asked if it was the ELISA test and he said yes. I heard that is the most reliable one for babies. So we got the blood test. It was horrible getting the blood out. But I am hoping it will help me out a bit with what bothers Kai.

Some kind person I contacted from Mothering.com (it has been a wonderful resource to me through the past several months) sent me a great blog about a woman on a quest to see what foods are bothering her baby. It's called My Allergic babe. Just hearing that other people go through this is inspiring and helpful.

Still Kai continues to be happy and easy going during the day. He laughs alot- there is nothing better. It seems like he is growing and developing so fast now. Here are some pictures from the holidays.

Happy Holidays!

I'll put more photos up soon!

Muppets and John Denver Christmas nostalgia

I remember listening to this record every Christmas when I was little.
I have been thinking about it and just bought it from i-tunes, downloaded it and two minutes later we were listening. From record to instant download- how things have changed. But the more things change the more they remain the same- it is still a great album. To me it is Christmas..now if I could just get some freezing temperatures and a little snow...
Anyways I highly recommend it.

Kai in his new exersaucer

Thanks mom and dad for sending this for Kai. It is a whole new world of fun for him.

Recent photos

I am up early, before Kai and I thought I would post some recent photos for family and friends to see.

Here is Kai in the Ergo. My friend Carla made that hat before he was born.Good thing because it is the warmest one and the only one that fits his head. Thanks Carla! (She knit him lots of great things, one thing I really have to put up is the knit turtle, so cute!)

We went to the Dr again..because he still had streaks of blood in his poo:( Turns out he still has fissures. He is still pretty gassy at night also. But sometimes he sleeps longer. Last night I think the longest he slept was 3 1/2 hours.

Oh and he weighs 15 lbs 2 oz now.. and s 25 1/4" He is four months!
How is that for only breastfeeding? from 5lbs 11 oz to 15 lbs 2 oz in 4 months and growing 6 ". Not bad.

We still have to go in for his 4 month appointment in a couple weeks and to get the dtap vaccine. It is so frustrating that Kaiser has the Dtap with the most amount of aluminum! Many times the amount of the other two brands :( we don't like that at all.

This is before I dyed my hair dark again..after 4 months it became apparent that I was not going to have time to visit the salon..nor did I want too! For me it is pure torture just sitting there!

Wes took this picture from the roof of our building a couple weeks ago.

We're back after a computer crash

Thanks mom for making this cute little outfit for Kai!

I haven't posted in a long tome because my computer crashed. It was a little scary when we thought we might lose all the pictures from the last couple months, luckily Wes was able to retrieve almost all of them, Pheww!
Just a reminder to always back up very often.!
Hopefully I will be able to post more pictures soon.

More recent pictures..

Kai uses your quilt every night Cheyanne! He says many thanks for keeping him warm and cozy and giving him lots of patterns to look at!

Sasha says what the heck? I get no blog time anymore..
Smafolk shirts... so cute!

Wes Loves fresh oysters from the Santa Monica farmers market!

It actually rained last week! Now it's been cooler and very very foggy at the beach..

Daddies should wear babies also!

Books to read BEFORE baby comes along

I have been meaning to write about these books for a month.. this one saved my sanity:

Well actually I read the earlier version that I took out of the library. I am not sure if Kai is what they call in this book a "high needs baby" but I know he doesn't go to sleep easily, go down to sleep like most babies or sleep for long stretches, needs to eat a lot, likes to be held a lot and is super observant. All things that are traits of what they call a high needs baby. Before I read the book I was wondering why he didn't sleep and was frustrated that all other babies seem to sleep more. This book showed me that although a not a typical baby and at times more challenging, he is normal and  traits that make a baby high needs actually turn out to be great characteristics when they get older, as long as his needs are met.

Along with the book below, it gave me the confidence to follow my instinct and stop listening to so much advice-contradicting advice that drives too many new mothers crazy. I also banned those baby trainers and sleep trainers, glad I haven't used those techniques. Both books taught me about attatchment parenting.

 Attachment parenting means breastfeeding, babywearing, belief in babies cries and bedding close to baby, amoung other things. I am not going to go into the  philosophy any further but to say I can't believe what I thought of before was the "right way to raise a baby.. these views that are currently accepted as the "right" way to bring up baby- expecting him to be completley independant right away it just seems crazy to me now and so obvious. I never read about this philosophy before, and even thought it sounded weird and some of the ideas were weird..BEFORE I had the baby. AFTER everything changed.

Ahh now I am at peace and we have gotten into a groove that fits us both well and we are happy! (even waking every two hours or so) Point of view changes everything!
   
I took both out of the library and then bought The Baby Book by William and Martha Sears. That book has most of the info of the other two and a lot more. I highly reccommend it, at least to read and become aware of a different way of thinking about babies..I myself am so thankful to the Dr and his wife for writing it! and to Kai who made me follow the ideas behind it before I even knew about it!

****update.. that peace didn't last that long! Within a couple months Kai was waking more than ever and I was utterly exhausted. Now I realized that the whole co-sleeping and nursing to sleep was creating a sleep association. He thought that was the only way he could sleep. When he was just over 6 monthes we did a cry it out (I Know I never thought I would, but now I think it was definitely the best for him to learn to sleep on his own. Our efforts to get him to sleep without crying were certaintly hindering his sleep. Not to mention that his mama was way to exhausted to function after waking every hour and a half to two hours) We used the book SleepEasy Solution by Jennifer Waldburger and Jill Spivack as a guide. I write about my process here on my blog.
I think there are still good things about attachment parenting but there is not enough info on how to survive and get sleep and it can easily become to exhausting. I used to think eventually Kai would sleep but then I realized he would not sleep more because I had created this sleep association and that there had to be some frustration and crying for him to learn how to sleep.

These books may also make you feel a little guilty if you don't follow attachment parenting. But there is lots of great info in the Sears book.

Also it turned out that Kai is not a fussy baby at all. He is a very easy going baby. He just had a fussy digestive system and reflux.