To go or not to go

One of the hardest parenting decisions for Margaret and I has been to know when a problem is a big problem and when it is a small problem.  When Josh had his first fever I freaked out and called the pediatrician after hours.  Since then I've calmed down a little bit and don't always panic.  When Josh is sick we call the pediatrician during office hours and talk to a nurse and they tell us if we should be concerned or not.  We've had a few trips to the ER after Josh took particularly big falls, after the pediatrician suggested we should get him checked out.  In both cases he was fine but I know if we didn't go to the ER we would be worrying about it for a while.

A week ago Saturday night Josh got sick.  He woke up several times during the night (rare for him) and was very upset.  Recently if he wakes up at night he just wants his blanket (or "buddy") put back on him but that was not working Saturday night.  Each time he woke up he was very upset and would take a while to calm down.  He finally calmed down and slept a few hours.  Sunday night was even worse. He woke up almost every hour, and was clearly upset. Around 2am his breathing seemed difficult and he was very unhappy.  He finally slept a few hours until early morning but he woke up very dazed and confused.  He would not stop crying or sit still with us, so we decided then it was time to go to the hospital.  Since it was 5am, we did not want to bother the pediatrician since we knew they would just tell us to take him to the hospital. We also knew that there was a nasty virus going around that causes trouble breathing and we wanted to make sure Josh got the care he needed.

In this case going to the hospital was absolutely the right call.  It turns out Josh had RSV (not the enterovirus that is going around) and needed help breathing.  When we first arrived they checked his O2 levels and they were down around 90% (should be 99%). They gave him some oxygen and a drug to help open up his lungs and help him breathe. After a few hours he was feeling much better and running all around the pediatric area at the hospital.  We used a nebulizer at home and it really helped.  Josh has been sleeping normally and his fever went down after a few days.  The medicine he was on made him hyper so he has spent all of last week running around the house at full speed.

Knowing when to take health problems seriously can be difficult.  We don't want to overreact or over treat illnesses that are better left untreated. Sometimes a fever is just a fever, and just takes a few days to recover from....but sometimes it indicates something much more serious. Since we know Josh so well, we base our judgement on when he is acting really abnormal, so we know we should take it seriously.  Thankfully to this point anytime we have not panicked he has been alright and we're glad this time he has recovered so well.

Here is a video from Thursday (hyper Josh!):

Getting some air

Playing at the hospital

Playing Angry Birds at home

Slackers

Sorry for slacking on the blog lately, but I just started a new job Oct 1 (yay!), so we are adjusting to our new schedule which has less blogging time. I'm working 3 days a week, which means I still get to spend 2 days (+the weekend) with Josh :-)  But I'm working longer hours, and all in an office...so it is taking some adjustment. Julian and Josh have dinner together and then I get home just in time to put Josh to bed. It has been a lot of change for all of us, but Josh and Julian have been enjoying some father-son time :-)  Thankfully we have been getting some extra help from all our parents so that we don't fall too far behind.

Josh is learning more and more words every day, it really is amazing. He is starting to put words together into phrases, which is also fun. His coordination has also really improved and he is doing very well eating soups with a spoon, and has gotten very good with a fork. He loves drawing with markers, or crayons and is getting very savvy with an iPhone. Here are some pictures from the last few weeks.

Causing trouble

Working out

Night-night with Jeter

A pro already :-)

Look Who's Talking, More

Josh's communication skills have really increased in the last month or so. Every day Julian and I are just amazed by how much he can do, and what an awesome kid he is becoming. He knows enough words to tell us what he wants most of the time, and he can answer yes and no questions when asked.  His words are not perfect so sometimes it requires a bit of decoding. He can understand much more than he can say himself, but his vocabulary is expanding rapidly. We can't quite have "real" conversations, but I just love knowing what is going on inside his head :-)

We keep a few toys out of his reach, or in another room...just to keep the toy explosion to a minimum. When Josh wants to play with any of those toys (his blocks and train for example), he sits down on the floor points to where they are kept and says "bock" or "tain".  He then happily helps to clean up and put away his toys when he is "all done" with them :)

Josh just moved up to the next class at daycare, where they will be encouraging him do to things more independently. So far, I'm taking the transition harder than he is...because I really liked his last classroom. He loves when we talk about the names of all his friends and family, and is starting to be able to name them. He also likes listening to kids songs in the car, and is excited when he hears words he knows. [Anyone with recommendations for good kids songs please pass them along!!!]  He has started sleeping with a pillow and blanket, and insists on having them before bed. We've also started walking around the block after dinner sometimes with no stroller and Josh has had no trouble with that distance. We've been meeting a lot of the neighbors on these walks, because I think a roaming toddler is more inviting for conversation than a stroller.

We had some tough days and nights sleep wise in the past few weeks...way more than usual. Josh was a bit sick, getting his canines and going through a lot developmentally. The last few nights have been better, so hopefully he has gotten past whatever was causing the sleep problems.

We've been having a lot of fun with our little guy lately, and I'm sure he will keep becoming more and more awesome :-) It is so amazing how much he has grown in such a short time.

Watching Elmo

Ready for the rain!

"Tain!"

Big boy!

Josh has outgrown many of the more "baby" styles of clothing, and has been wearing some toddler/grownup looking clothing. He looks like such a big boy these days!

So big!

Waiting patiently for the trash truck

Decorating a onesie :-)

Weaned

It has been about three months since Josh was fully weaned, and I thought it was time to blog about it. Josh nursed for close to 17 months before we had what I think was a very mutual decision to wean at the beginning of June.

I managed to keep my supply up long enough to make it to 1 year of breastfeeding without needing to supplement with formula. I was a bit nervous towards the end, because my supply dropped a lot with the stress from finishing my thesis and defending. After Josh turned one, we started giving him one bottle a day of whole milk because I could not pump enough. Josh seemed to notice a difference at first, but was just as happy to drink the whole milk. When we got the allergy results back for Josh saying that he was allergic to peanuts, we decided to wait to start the weaning process. There is lots of research suggesting that exposure to allergens in breast milk can help with allergies, so I wanted to make sure that Josh would get any possible benefit from breast feeding. We also talked to the allergist about me eating some of the foods we thought that Josh was not allergic to so that he would get exposure to peanut like foods. Ultimately I was too afraid to introduce peanuts back into my diet and expose Josh, but I did eat other nuts and legumes.

I never expected (or planned) to be someone who breast fed my child past one year, but I actually ended up really enjoying it. After learning of his allergies, I really wanted to keep my baby safe and I think breastfeeding gave me a sense of that. Also, as Josh got more and more mobile, he was much less snuggly so breastfeeding became one of the few ways that we could just hang out together.

My supply continued to drop, so we basically replaced one bottle/feeding with a bottle of whole milk per month. By the end of March I stopped pumping during the day, and I just fed Josh in the morning when he woke up and at night before bed. This had been a big goal of mine, because honestly I had gotten very tired of pumping. This worked out well for a few weeks, but my supply continued to drop. I couldn't decide which feeding to drop next, the evening one or the morning one. So even though I sort of knew we were ready to drop another feeding, I wasn't sure what to do. This is where I think that KellyMom.com (a breastfeeding website), really drops the ball. If you go to their website to look for information about weaning, they are pretty negative about weaning before 2 years (!!!!). I certainly know that there is very little support for Mom's that choose to breastfeed past 1 year, and even some negativity--but I did not appreciate negativity towards gentle weaning at 16 months!

One night when feeding Josh before bed, he finished nursing and then signed "more" and "milk". It was very cute, and was a very clear sign that I did not have enough milk for him. I texted Julian and he brought up a bottle for Josh, and Josh happily finished the milk in the bottle and went to bed. This happened again the next few nights. I would always nurse first, and then give him a bottle if he still seemed hungry. However when Julian went away to Jordan, I had to get the bottle ready before nursing Josh and he would get so excited about a bottle that he would want it right away. The first few days he was happy to nurse when it was offered, but then he refused and only wanted the bottle. I decided this was a sign that developmentally he did not need the comfort associated with nursing before bed and let him take the lead. He happily nursed the next morning, but I decided that this was a good way to drop down to one feeding. Honestly, it was much easier to get him ready for bed with a bottle because he would sit still and drink while getting him dressed so I did not mind much that he was no longer nursing. This also gave me the freedom to have Julian put Josh to bed (once he got home), which was also really nice :-)

I continued with just the morning feeding for the rest of May, but at the end of May Josh caught his first bought of hand foot and mouth.  It was horrible, and Josh refused to nurse or eat/drink much of anything. He had been getting a bit frustrated by my lower supply anyway, so we had already been thinking that it was time to finish weaning. After skipping a day of nursing, Josh was feeling better and was willing to nurse the next morning. I was glad that I knew this would be our last time nursing, and was able to take the time to enjoy my time with him. After he finished I took sudafed to keep my body from producing milk. I ended up having no discomfort or anything from weaning, so I was pretty happy with how it went.

The next morning after Josh woke up, he went running into our room as usual and got into bed expecting to nurse. He started crying when I didn't get into bed with him, and instead took him downstairs to have a sippy cup of milk. This was definitely the hardest part of weaning, but at least I felt like Josh enjoyed nursing which made me feel special. He did this for the next few days, but then quickly adjusted to the new routine of going downstairs for milk. I made sure to sit with him on the couch so that he could still get some Mommy and Josh bonding time. Now we always read books when he has his milk in the morning, and it is very sweet.

After about 2 months of a really really difficult time getting breastfeeding to work out, I could not be happier with how the next 15 months went. Many people asked me how long I planned to breast feed, and I never really had an answer. I never really set a goal, but I would be lying if I didn't admit that my goal was to have the first two months of pain be worth the effort. I'm so glad I stuck it out, because it really was all worth it in the end :-)

Watching some Animal Planet

Family selfie :-)

Mon-ney!

Josh has been chatting up a storm lately! He has learned so many new words :-) Here is a cute video of some of his new skills.

Nose Goes

Last weekend we hit an extremely important milestone.  We had been waiting for it for several months but then suddenly Josh could do it - he can now blow his nose!

You don't realize how important blowing your nose is until your toddler has a nose that is constantly pouring out snot.  Well now we can just tell Josh to blow and he will blow his nose (holding a tissue in front of his nose helps).

We didn't do any videos or pictures of this so here are some other recent Josh pictures

Fun at grandma's pool

Having some milkshake