Tuesday, August 17, 2010

I am still alive and almost well again

I know I have been MIA for a week.  Darren has been doing an excellent job of keeping updates while I recover and deal with various issues that have cropped up (breastfeeding!!).  I will discuss these other issues in detail, but for this post I want to just say how blessed I am to have such a beautiful, perfect daughter and the most wonderful husband ever!

Natali is an absolute doll!  She is pretty perfect in my opinion.  She is an extremely content baby.  She has long sleep periods, midnight to 5am last night (yay for me!), and really long awake periods where she just hangs out and takes in the world.  She cries only rarely, mostly when she has gas or is upset about a dirty diaper, which are both perfectly valid reasons to cry. :)  I am still recovering from the c-section, but it's definitely easier to recover when your baby is so good, and when your mom and husband are so helpful all the time.

Darren has been the most perfect father.  I always thought he'd come through in the end, but with all his talk you just never know.  I could never have guessed how wonderful he would be with his daughter.  He is so in love with her it's crazy!  He really is a baby hog and never wants to put her down when he is home, which is absolutely fine with me.  She needs her daddy.  He makes bottles and feeds her, and changes diapers really well!  That is the most amazing part of it all.  I never thought he would be so good at diaper changes.  He changed a poopy diaper from the very first night.  His only squeamish moment came when Natali decided to continue pooping after he had already taken the dirty diaper off.  I had to jump in and rescue him on that one, but otherwise he has been great.  We definitely make a good parenting team, and with all we have been through in the last few years, and this past week, it makes me love him even more.

My mom has been in town since we went into the hospital, and she has been absolutely great to have around.  Darren and I have been doing our best, but we are totally clueless about babies.  Mom has been a great source of information on what to do in any situation.  She had 4 kids of her own, so we listen to her for the most part.  She definitely knows what she's talking about.  She has been very helpful feeding and changing, etc. too, and she has been doing laundry and organizing Natali's things in her room as well.  She drives me around to my appointments or quick errands too.  Darren has been working still, so I couldn't do much without her.  She leaves tomorrow morning and then I will have Wednesday and Thursday when Darren works and I will be on my own.  I think I'm well enough to handle it.  Darren is off Friday, and then we leave sometime on Saturday for our big trip and I will have lots of family around very willing to help out. :)  I'm looking forward to it!

I think the hardest adjustment has been for the dogs.  They have all been very good for the most part, but they are in the way sometimes.  The poor things have been sent to their beds more often than they are used to.  I think once Natali has been around a while and we have a routine down they will settle down around her.  Doogie is the worst offender.  He just wants to be near Natali and lick her, but he doesn't really know how to be gentle enough.  We are constantly pushing him away, and he likes to jump up when we are standing and holding her.  I think he too will settle down, but it will take some time and patience with him.  I was concerned that Darren would totally lose any patience he used to have with them once Natali was around, but he really hasn't.  The dogs aren't going anywhere, so we really need to make an effort to integrate them in our new schedule.  I'm confident it will all work out though.

I will update on other things in another post.  It has been an emotional week and while everything is great, there have been issues with breastfeeding and jaundice and recovery that have been rough on me.

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