Friday, March 18, 2011

10 months old

You heard it right, Finn is 10 months old! He weighs in at 14 lbs and is 26 inches long. I said before that I would try to think of some personality traits or tidbits about Finn. Here they are.

  • He is really perceptive. Whenever we go into a new room or place he observes every part of it, like he's trying to memorize it.
  • He is very active! He's got the army crawl down and can move pretty fast. Sitting still is definitely not his favorite thing to do. I see some people that can sit down with their baby on their lap forever. It lasts about 30 seconds with Finn. Because of this he is not a snugly baby at all.
  • He likes change. Lately, he's been getting very bored being inside the house. He loves going on outings and is ready for winter to be over.
  • If he gets excited and he's on his belly, he'll scrunch up his face and pull his hands and feet off the floor. It's almost as if he is balancing on his belly button. Like the superman pose.
  • Another things that he does when he gets excited is put his mouth into a Cheerio shape, and then he kind of makes a sound like a monkey.
  • Eating is not his favorite pastime. Because he was a late preterm infant, the cards were stacked against him when it came to feeding problems. Late preterm infants get tired easily and a lot of times aren't strong enough feeders to drink enough breastmilk to gain weight. This in turn led to me not making enough milk. He has been doing well with most of the pureed foods, but he will only eat about half of the stage 2 bottles. We tried to give him more solid foods (instead of just pureed) the other day and he hated it. To make matters worse he barfed 7 times that day because of it. I think we'll hold off on trying that again anytime soon.
  • He loves being outside! I think this stems from the hour walks I'd go on with him when he was a newborn. Nothing else I could do at the time would sooth him, nothing. It was very tiring going on 3 walks a day that were each about an hour long, especially right after giving birth. I'm glad we have an outdoor enthusiast though!
  • He likes taking baths and hangin' out in his jumper. His jabbering increases whenever he is doing either of these activities.
  • The most ticklish part on him is his neck. He's a light tickler though. If we ever tickle him too hard he just stares at us blankly like, "what in the world are you doing?"

That's all I can think of for now. I have learned a lot about being a mother in the past 10 months. One of the most important things I have learned though has been to not judge other mothers for how they do things or why they do certain things. What made me learn this so quickly? Breast-feeding. I have always been a super big advocate of breast-feeding. But when things seemed to spiral out of control with feeding Finn I was devastated. I saw multiple lactation specialists, and my doctor. I took blessed thistle, fenugreek, Reglan, and drank Mother's Milk Tea. I used an SNS, and pumped every 2 hours. I had people tell me all sorts of advice and I wanted to punch them in the face!!

I used to be judge mental about the whole breast-feeding thing and thought mothers were doing a disservice to their babies by not doing it. Well, things change pretty quickly when you see the other side. I have had friends whose milk didn't come in at all. Friends whose babies chomped them to death from day one and wouldn't stop. Friends that got so stressed out by it all that they hated it. And other friends that decided before hand that they weren't going to breast-feed at all.

I have since learned that I was wrong to place any sort of judgement on a woman for her decision about breast-feeding, and am truly sorry because of it. Obviously, not judging others is a life long thing that I need to work on. Just a word of advice though, (not like you asked for it, but don't worry it's good) to any soon-to-be mothers or current mothers... DO NOT judge a woman's choices about feeding her child, about wanting to work or having to work, about the cleanliness of her home, or about raising her child. I'm sure every mother is trying her very hardest to be a good mother. She judges herself enough and doesn't need more people judging her. That is all.

10 comments:

mer and mel said...

Our Dylan was born at 36W 4D because he stopped growing and he's had some struggles since as well. I didn't have problems with my milk but had to stop for other medical reasons. He's allergic to milk, and since his whole system was immature, it's rough finding something that works. Now that he's eating solids, we're having some issues too. At least we know that they will grow out of it eventually, right? He's definitely is darling!!!

CMRA LILIAN CORNET said...

Dear Hilary and Dennen, I would like to congratulate for the great message! I was also a Late preterm, and my Mom didn't have breastmilk, so I used for differents womens and Ihad feeding problems, but They gave me every night a ruge milk baby bottle and lot's of love.
Finn is adorable, good boy! I love him. He's so cute and smart!
Love alwaysss...Kssssss...

Dan+Alli said...

He is so dang cute!! Amen to everything you said about judging other moms. I'm HUGE on that. P.S. Next time your in utah county you should call us, we would love to go on a little hike with you guys!

Kim said...

Amen to the breastfeeding thing. I am in your boat 100 percent. I couldn't breastfeed Lincoln and we still have a great relationship :) Luckily it worked second time around for me. 10 months has flown by. You are a really cute mommy and Finn is pretty dang cute too!!!

The Hendricks said...

So true. Not everyone has the same life experiences and we all do different junk. We're all in the same boat and should be cheering each other on! But i think you said it best :) You should bring Finn over and him and Max could scoot around together. might be fun.

Maggie said...

I think about some of the things I said to people before I had Charlotte. I didn't MEAN to be judgmental, but I cringe when I think about them now. Experience sure does teach you a lot of things.

The Kynastons said...

10 months old?!? I can't believe that. He is the cutest little boy ever.

So many things you said about Finn remind me of how Macie was/is. She was NOT cuddly. Like, at all. I used to envy moms that had babies that would snuggle up to them. But just in the last couple of months she has become more cuddly, especially when she is tired. So many that will happen with Finn, too.

And the whole judging thing...yeah, I've totally had to eat my words about a million times since becoming a parent. I used to see things people would do and say, "I will NEVER do that when I have kids!" Ha...famous last words. :)

Linds said...

Congrats on 10 months! Your message is so positive and exactly what every mother needs to hear. Do your best and love your little ones. What else can we do?

Ry and Heather said...

Hi Hilary!

I LOVE this post! If it makes you feel better, Aiden is SO not a cuddler either (unless he's hurt) but he'll randomly come up to me, kiss me on the cheek and say "I love you mommy" ... so cuddly or not, boys seem to love thier moms!

Thank you so much for the last part of your post. I don't know if I was such a young mom or what but I never really passed many judgements on other peoples parenting but I was constantly the "butt end" of peoples judgements! I remember in the hospital after I had Aiden he would NOT latch on for anything and the lactation specialist basically told me it was my fault that he wasn't getting it because EVERY child has the ability to breastfeed. I was DEVESTATED! I also had to go right back to work after he was born due to my life circumstances and really haven't had much of a choice to stop. I hear all the time about the apparent damage daycare does to children. I don't know where these people sent their kids, because Aiden blows me away with all the things he learns at daycare, that I NEVER would have thought about teaching him (I guess when you do your research and get someone with 23+ years experience, they just might teach you something about parenting!) and my house is NEVER clean! I'd rather spend what little time I do have at home hanging out with my son and husband. :) selfish and gross...I know I know haha I really appreciate you pointing those few things out, because those have always been points of judgement I've experienced in my life! The whole point of being a mother is to teach your children and support others around you. It doesn't give you a right to "one up" the moms around you. We can all learn something from every mother around us! I learn stuff all the time from other moms and I appreciate them for being examples to me. In fact, I now get the opportunity to be a stay at home mom when my little Asher gets here...talk about scary! I'll probably be asking for all sorts of advice! :)

Thanks again Hilary! You made me feel better about me!

Heather

Rachel Murray said...

Amen on the judging other moms. Everyone is doing what they feel is best for their baby and their family. We have no idea the circumstances others are going through and just have to realize they are doing what works best for them.