Wrote a post that should have been published on Friday…you can read it here.

Ruby is 5 weeks old! I can’t begin to explain the relief that we have that she is finally here. Albeit the relief is now replaced with fear of the unknown with her -AT LEAST we aren’t WAITING anymore. It is a good feeling.

Here is Lindy imitating her baby sister.

Happy that she is here, but we are having a hard time figuring this little one out. She likes to fuss at dusk and continue through the night, inconsolable. She was fussing from about 11pm until 4am and now she has switched it to 6pm until 1am. We don’t know if it is colic, affects of her heart, breastmilk diet, acid reflux, days and nights mixed up or just a fussy 5 week baby. When you have so many variables, we automatically think it is her heart and think the worst. We are trying to relax about it a little bit but it is always top of mind when she is fussy.

Here is Lindy showing her sister halloween costumes.

Below is one of my purchases late one night at Target. I didn’t believe in the sling with Lindy and this time around, I’m throwing out a lot of rules. The sling is a little more complicated than expected. So far it takes 2 people to get her in the right way. I’ve used it about 3 times, it is nice to not have to schlepp her around in her carseat at church or at the library. We are still trying to get the hang of it. Flagged someone down at church today that I knew used one and she gave me a crash course. I WANT to like it, but not quite there yet.

We are on day 3 of Zantax. No substantial changes but it seems her fussy period is not lasting for 6 hours but less now. Tonight she only fussed from 8pm until 12pm. So an improvement but i’m still not sure it is acid reflux.

So, Tuesday we had our weight appointment and she only gained 1oz. We were so upset. Making her 9lbs 2oz. Last Thursday she was 9lbs 1oz. She should have at least gained 5oz. The doctor was great and understood that I really wanted to nurse her. He wasn’t too concerned yet and wanted us to continue nursing until Friday and then we’d do another weight check. If she hadn’t gained anything substantial, we would talk about switching to bottle feeding.

With Ruby’s heart defects, if she doesn’t gain weight and doesn’t thrive, she could potentially have open heart surgery at 3 months, which is NOT ideal or even safe. If we can get her to the 6 month mark, if she would need surgery, it would be just as safe as surgery on a 10 year old.

After a pretty fussy day with Ruby, Tuesday night, Dale and I were pretty upset that she hadn’t gained any weight. Was it because of the heart defects, the act of nursing, the formula we were supplementing with or the breastmilk itself? We decided to switch some variables.

Dale watched the girls and I, through tears, did some therapy shopping at Target. If you would have seen me at Target, I would have been a mess. My instinct really told me I shouldn’t nurse for another 3 days…I needed to switch to bottle feeding to put some weight on her. I bought some new “fussy” formula and made the decision that we would switch to bottles with formula for 3 days to see how she weighed on Friday and to see if her fussiness changed.

I bottle fed her with formula, which was helpful because then I could actually see how much she was eating. Roughly 40ml was easy to get into her, I pushed her to 60ml (2oz).

Thursday, Dale went to our appointment with us and wallah, she gained 6oz in 2 and half days. Double the amount she was supposed to. She was up to 9lbs 8oz. Sweet. That was good news.

So. We know that either she didn’t have enough energy to nurse or I just don’t have enough milk supply yet since we were supplementing. So with doctor’s approval, we are bottle feeding breastmilk now and will have another weight check next Friday. I am trying to pump every 2 hours to get my milk supply back up -still not where I should be on supply. I have a call out to the le leche league to see if they can help me. If her weight is good on Friday and my supply is meeting her demands then we’ll switch to nursing.

So, good news is she is gaining weight. The fussiness hasn’t changed a bit, so at least we know it is not the breastmilk or the formula. We told the doctor about her fussy episodes, arching back and stuff. He thought it was acid reflux. We had researched that already and since she wasn’t spitting up at ALL, we thought it couldn’t possibly be that. He mentioned that it could still be acid reflux and felt completely positive that it was acid reflux and prescribed Zantax. I’m a little skeptical but will try it. The good thing about this doc is that he completely understood how crazy we’ve been trying to determine if it is a heart thing or normal newborn thing with Ruby. He specifically said, “We need to figure this fussiness out before you drive yourselves crazy thinking it is her heart.” He knew exactly what kind of rat race we are on.

is dead.

We are so sad to announce that our beloved, “best cat in the world,” Bentley Zoomeroni is presumed dead.

So, she was intended to be an indoor cat, but clearly wanted to go back to her Feral Barn Cat roots and be outside, so we got her spayed. She would claw at the door to go out. She would greet us anytime we came home and come inside to eat and sleep. So, always coming in and out, very social. Monday morning I woke up to let her inside and she never came. All day, I kept opening the door, calling for her and she never came. I knew that day she was gone.

We took walks around the block to find her, called her, shook her treats, talked to all our neighbors (minus one who wasn’t home), the mailman, posted on craigslist, called animal shelters. No one had seen her.

THEN, the neighbor next door was finally home and she let us in on the bad news.

Early Monday morning, 4am, she was walking her dog and saw what she thought was Bentley in the gutter, clearly dead. She went back later without the dog and she was gone.

We are so bummed and sad that she is not around. Every time I open the door, I expect to see her.

My therapist has mentioned before that I don’t “allow myself to have joy” in my life. That I just expect things to go wrong or hard or different or not the “norm.” Yes, yes, I probably do.

I know this is “life” and how things go…but being honest…I’m having a hard time understanding God’s working (or lack there of) in my life. I know it was just a cat. But lets just add it to the crap load of stuff that is going on in my head.

Well, we had 2 appointments today, one with the regular pediatrician and then this afternoon we met with our pediatric cardiologist. Good news is that Ruby IS gaining weight, she was up to 9lbs 1oz from 8lbs 12oz last week. BUT it is not a fast weight gain and she is on the lower end of gaining weight. Not a dangerous spot yet but not a glowing review.

borrowed from M&J Trimming.

We met with the cardiologist this afternoon and to make it short, nothing has changed with her heart, no improvements and nothing for the worse. She also did confirm that Ruby does have a little Tachypnea (fast breathing). So, we are NOT crazy in thinking she has fast breathing (or rather Dale is not paranoid).

I just started exclusively nursing Ruby again instead of fortifying my milk with formula and bottle-feeding…just starting to get into a routine and working through the confusion of bottle and breast…which is frustrating. The cardiologist heard us say Ruby was still trying to figure it out and she told us to stop nursing Ruby and just bottle feed. She doesn’t want Ruby getting frustrated (no impact on the heart) or not getting milk the way she wants it (quickly). She was really rude about it and didn’t care about my thoughts on it. I really didn’t feel we could talk about options. I might be a little sensitive about it…maybe just a little.

Not what I wanted to hear. I don’t agree with the doctor but I obviously don’t want to hinder Ruby from gaining weight. The problem is, if Ruby’s heart is not getting any better, she will not gain weight. If I don’t nurse her well, she will not gain weight…so there are two variables and I think the cardiologist wants to get rid of one.

I just think Ruby and I are trying to figure it out…we’ve done MAYBE 3 full days of nursing and it is frustrating. She doesn’t want to stay latched on and obviously wants to sleep through most of it. Typical for newborns and the cardiologist is freaking me out and giving me more reasons to stress.

I’m not going to put the health of my baby above my want to nurse…but I think we need a few more days. She’ll get weighed again on Tuesday…that will help us decide. I can always continue pumping and bottle feed, but I don’t want to give up yet. It doesn’t help that the “mister” is completely paranoid and willing to feed her Cheetos and mountain dew to fatten her up.

Ruby likes to be up from 11pm until about 4am…screaming. Not quite sure why yet. LOVE that she has those lungs working, but man it is brutal at night. Nothing seems to console her.

The stress in this house is thick.

Ruby is 3 weeks old today! We are settling in, taking one day at a time, trying to figure this little girl out. We have been getting out of the house for at LEAST one thing a day, started easy and went to the library the first time out just the three of us.

Big sister Lindy is the IDEAL big sister. She has taken everything in stride and we haven’t had any minor or even severe attitude changes because of new baby sister. Lindy is so patient and understanding that little sister’s needs have to be met first. She LOVES her baby sister.

Wish I could say that nursing was all I wanted it to be this go round but it is not, yet again. Since the NICU, we have been using fortified breastmilk, so about 1 tsp of formula for 30ml of breastmilk (tiny tiny bit) and that seems to be keeping her blood glucose levels up until the next time she eats. Yesterday, we switched to just nursing and I tested her after each time and she had tanked again. Glucose levels in the 40s. She seems to be draining me while she is eating, so it is not lack of milk…I am very discouraged that the one thing that SHOULD be amazingly good for her, is not working out. I hate having a relationship with my pump but at LEAST she is getting breastmilk. I am not going to give up. Any other IDM mom’s have these hypoglycemia issues? Our doctors told us to NOT test Ruby’s blood sugars, but having done it for 2 weeks, 8 times a day, how could I not?

We meet with her pediatrician again this week on Thursday and then the cardiologist in the afternoon. We should have some sort of answer either way as to how her heart is doing.

Dale starts school in 2 weeks, so getting a tad bit nervous about never seeing him again but at least we will have had a month with this little girl to get some sort of normalcy.