The past few weeks have been extremely busy – with family visiting and me spending time with them, T and I reorganizing our wardrobes, and me taking out long-lost clothes from boxes a-hidden . . .and now me returning to work in a week . . . . it is har to figure out all that is going on. I just barely got out (most) of our baby announcements. I know, a few months late, right?
But that is the way it goes sometimes. Pretty much like a lot of other stuff. Dear L has been learning new things every day; he is starting to use his hands much more, able to grasp things, push things away a little, somewhat flailing out to reach random objects of interests. And, as predicted he is now OBSESSED with the ceiling fan. Now that it is finally moving briskly, the fan captures his attention at the most dire of moments, relieving T and I from tears. He has started to cry pretty faithfull in the evenings between 7 and 8. I know, he was crying before during those times and it was lasting longer. By this point I think I was truly in denial about the whole colic thing. My expectation was that the cries would be much stronger and heavier and more consistent. Now that he is older his cries have indeed become louder and swooshing him around, swaddling him, moving his legs, putting on the hairdryer, and walking swiftly around the room are the only things that seem to chill him out at that time. But the cries, as I mentioned in my previous post, are just so darn sad. They break my heart.
Break to remove pump.
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Ok, I wrote that piece a few days ago, and suddenly the weekend has gone by and it is time to write again. It’s been, as I mentioned above, a busy time. currently I’m on #3 of 3 pump breaks I have scheduled at work. The nuts and bolts of returning to work don’t seem to truly appear in the La Leche League’s breastfeeding manual, but there are many nuances. I’ve found some useful tips at Babycenter as well as a nice set of tips here (I will add the links once I get home). Pumping is much more manageable than I thought, especially having a private space to pump has helped. I also called home to hear my little L’s voice that made pumping just a little easier today. And only 1.5 hours or so till I get to go home and see my little guy again. Then we get to rejoice and be together for the evening. I think that reutrning to work will suit me. Aside from the blistering heat in the office today, I’m enjoying my return to being a doctor. As I expected, how I approach families already feels like it has changed, though I haven’t had a newborn visit yet to really test it out. I do know that I already had advice to give to some families I met last week – help with breast feeding and similar information. And now I also have to get back to reading medical texts, doing continuing medical education, and reacquainting myself with the day-to-day.
Some things I plan to do within the next week:
(1) Buy extra bottles – I already am going through my bottle supply like gangbusters. I’m planning to toss today’s extra milk into food trays and then to take 1-ounce servings and then distribute among the bottles. I think that this will help conserve my milk better
(2) Get an extra pumping bra – this will help with wash schedules.
(3) Call the daycare center again – need to schedule that intake appointment – we are off to daycare two weeks from now!!
Well I think I’ve hit the end of this pumping session. So I must go and return to work. Time flies when you’re preparing food!