Babywise

The first two months of Holden's life was picture perfect. He was born weighting 7'11" right in the 50th percentile. His first doctors appointment he lost 3 oz, and by his three week appointment he weighted 8'3". Completely on picture perfect. My milk even came in promptly on the third day. Holden fell right in to a schedule and picked up nursing so quickly, even sleeping through the night at six weeks. I felt so confidant. For the first two months everything was a breeze. He seemed small, still in newborn clothes and diapers but, I just thought Holden was a small kid.

One night when Holden was 9 weeks old, I wasn't feeling well so my husband feed Holden a bottle. We introduced the bottle to him at 3 weeks and had no problems with nipple confusion. While he was feeding him I pumped. When I was done I realized I only pumped two ounces. I was really confused, I would normally pump about 4 oz each time.

The following week I would nurse, supplementing and pumping. I changed Holden from nursing every three hrs to every two trying to increase my supply. Nothing seemed to be working. Finally at the end of the week I gave Holden a bottle and pumped after to see if my milk was increasing. I pumped 1oz.

I was completely devastated. I finally had to realize that the best thing for Holden was to just switch him to formula. He started eating well and we were able to move him back to eating every three hours. But, for some reason I still felt like something wasn't right but, I just tried to put it off as guilt for my not nursing. After all he was hitting all of his developmental marks.

Then two weeks later Holden suddenly started vomiting. We went to the doctor the next day and found out he weight 9'1", about four pounds underweight. They performed an ultrasound to check for any swelling in his pylorus (the small muscle at the bottom of his stomach), luckily there wasn't any.

We started all over with PDF (parent directed feeding). We treated Holden like he was a new born, just focusing on getting him to eat. He still slept through the night, but we feed him when he cried not letting him go longer than every three hours. It was like over night he started showing signs of improvement. The day he moved into size one diapers I knew he was getting better and gaining weight. By the time we went back to the doctors a week later he gain a pound and a half!

Looking back on it, I can see where things took a turn. I was too confidant after the first month and all but stopped keeping track of his well baby charts. I would mark some of the feeds, pees, and poops, but not all. It would just slip my mind. If I would have been more on track with it I know I would have seen signs of problems with my milk before it got as bad as it did.

Thankfully PDF made it possible for me to get Holden to gain weight. It gave me a base to work with that I know is affective. When I felt panicked and confused it gave me confidence that we could do this. With the feed, wake, sleep guidelines coupled with being able to make an assessment of what my child needed in a situation Holden was able to gain weight and keep on the development track he was already on.