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2006-09-10 - 11.40pm previous entry next entry
About_Matthew
Waaaay too late again for a diary entry, but I'll never get it done otherwise, so here we go! This is the "Matthew" entry that I've been meaning to write for a while. He deserves an entry to himself at least (!), with all the changing and growing that he's doing! Arthur had about a million all of his own by this age, hehe!
Matthew is doing well! He is 12 weeks old, and he'll be three whole months old on this Thursday coming! Wow. Already.
He is losing his hair. He has been for aaages, I just kept forgetting to write about it. He has a bald ring all around his head now, poor thing! And he's a little thin on top. He is more bald on one side than the other, just like Arthur was before it all disappeared and then the new hair grew in. He does have new hair growing, but if I remember rightly from Arthur's time, that won't stay either! I am still eager to see what colour his "real" hair will be! His eyelashes and eyebrows have got a lot darker, but they still aren't as dark as Arthur's were as a newborn even, so I'm sure he'll have fairer hair than Arthur. I am not sure about the red any more though. I'll just have to wait and see! His eyes are bluer than ever though :)
I took Matthew to the baby clinic the day before yesterday to have him weighed, because his weight had been dropping down on the percentile chart - just a tiny bit each time, but still. He was at the 50th percentile at birth and for the next few weeks, and then he went down to the 25th and was juuust below that at the following appt. On Friday he weighed 12lbs 5oz, which puts him at about the 20th percentile. Hmmm. I had them measure his length too and he is 59cm, which also puts him just under the 25th percentile, so it seems he is well in proportion for his weight at least. They told me not to worry, and I know I shouldn't, and even MORE I know not to compare siblings! But it keeps sneaking into my head all the same somehow! Arthur was 14lbs 3oz at the exact same age that Matthew is now!!! He gained sooooo differently to Matthew, and seemed to be a completely different body shape too. We all think Matthew looks long and lean, and the Health Visitor commented that he looked "tall" the moment she saw him, but we were both surprised that he isn't really, being only at the 25th percentile. He's just a littley!
Anyway, she said Matthew looks healthy and happy. She asked about his feeds and his poo and wee, etc, and whether he seemed happy, or hungry a lot. I told her he has plenty of wet and pooey nappies, seems happy except when he's not (if that makes sense!), and seems annoyed at me offering him the breast too often! He seems to like his milk in nice set meals rather than snacks or third helpings, like Arthur did! Arthur would sometimes change sides (breasts, that is) SEVEN times in one feed, hehehe! Lil piggy ;) Matthew rarely wants the second breast, but I offer it to him anyway. He makes a screwed up face and grimaces so that his mouth won't let the nipple in! He is easily satisfied with one breast. I worry that he's not getting enough, especially since he gets what he wants in a matter of a few minutes, but I can't seem to interest him in any more than that. He gets very fussy at the breast if I offer him milk more often than say 3 hourly, but it's almost a relief these last two days to notice that he must be having a growth spurt at LAST, because he's eagerly feeding every couple of hours and I even noticed a rare HUNGER cry from him today when I was changing his nappy! He never cries from being hungry. I have had to stop breastfeeding him in the E.A.S.Y. pattern from the Baby Whisperer, because it specifies that you feed your baby when they wake up. Matthew's naps have been getting a bit rubbish lately. He will only nap for reeeally short periods of time, like 30 minutes, but then he's tired again after an hour or two. So if I feed him that frequently he just gets cross and won't take much of a feed at ANY point. So I've had to stop doing the E.A.S.Y. routine because of that. I need him to take longer naps.
I am working on that though. I finally got soooo frustrated a few days ago, with his short naps. They leave him cranky and unrefreshed, and eventually after a few short naps, he spends the last 2 hours before Neil gets home from work, crying inconsolably and I am finding that so difficult with Arthur at his most hyper/demanding at the same time of day too. And me at my tiredest. Also it never gives me much time with Arthur one-to-one (or to myself) if he only naps for 30 minutes at a time. I am up and downstairs with him like a yo-yo. On the rare, seemingly fluke occasion that he takes a 2-3 hour nap, he is just the HAPPIEST baby in the whole world and the end of the day is peacefully and much easier with him till Neil gets home. So I know he NEEDS those longer naps.
At the end of the week one day, he got up at 7.30am, napped at 10am for a grand total of 15 minutes and woke up VERY cross. I managed to get him back to sleep after an HOUR, but he only slept 30 minutes before waking again all cross and grumpy. I was so fed up and tired and irritable that I admit I kind of stormed up the stairs to his cotbed, thinking, "You are GOING back to sleep!" I picked him up and breastfed him, burped him, double-checked his nappy, made sure his clothes were comfy, and then put him back down in the cot on his tummy. He cried big time, but I didn't leave him. I stayed and whomped him on the bum with my hand so that he wobbled slightly with each pat. That used to work when he was very new, but it stopped working after a while. So anyway, I just told him it was sleepy time and that Mummy was still here, but kept patting even though he kept crying. I guess I was in the kind of mood where I was determined to see it through because I didn't stop. He cried for maybe 10 minutes with me patting him like that and occasionally telling him it was sleepy time. I figured after 10 minutes I should pick him up and try to comfort him and then put him back down again. But he started to put his cheek on the mattress and seemed sleepy with his crying, and after a while I stopped patting and he went back to sleep. He woke 2 minutes later and cried, and I patted again, and he dozed off. He woke again after another 3 minutes and I did the same thing, and he was back to sleep again quickly.
I felt really relieved about it, though I can't believe I actually did something with one of my babies' sleep that meant them crying! You know how totally against that idea I was when Arthur was tiny! I can't tell you how much it CHANGES when you have two children to juggle and you just get to the point where you know you have to do something to keep the family routine from falling apart! It's so much more important when there's more than one child in the equation. Plus, my sanity.... When his naps got shorter and shorter, I felt sort of gripped by a weird panic (!!) because I remember Arthur's naps being short and random and how things NEVER GOT BETTER, and how awfully hard that has been over these last couple of years. I suddenly felt resolved to make sure that didn't happen again with this little one, because I KNOW I just can't go through that again. And I also know from experience that it gets harder to get things "fixed" the older the baby gets. So there you go.
Anyway. Matthew then napped for the next 3.5 HOURS without stirring!!!!! Yikes! I lost track of the time - Arthur and I were doing playdough and drawing and Duplo and loooads of stuff, and before I knew it, it was nearly Arthur's tea time and I hadn't woken Matthew yet! He was the smiliest, chattiest boy in the world for the next hour and a half and still went to bed beautifully at his normal bedtime. So I have been trying to lengthen his naps using that method since then. He does cry a lot and I haven't got the same strength of determination this weekend that I did during the week. I just can't bear him crying for too long, even though I'm there patting him and saying soothing stuff. But when I HAVE stuck it out, he has gone back to sleep and slept soundly for at least an hour, sometimes an hour and a half, so that's great. He really needs that sleep.
His night sleep is going well! I haven't been turning him onto his back after I go to bed, which makes me mighty nervous so I lay my hands on him and pray over him before I get in bed to go to sleep. He goes to sleep for the night between 6.30pm and 7.30pm at the moment, depending on when his last nap was (and thus how tired he is by 6 or 7pm). Two nights ago when I left him on his tummy, he woke up for the FIRST time at nearly 4am!!!! He had a huge feed and then woke again at 6.45am for the day. Last night the same thing happened and he woke at 4.30am and then 6.15 for the day. I'd be despairing over the 6am wakings if it weren't for the fact that Arthur also wakes before 7am and Neil is already up with him, so I just feed Matthew in bed and take him downstairs to Neil, and then retreat back to bed till 8am when Neil goes to work! I am sooooooooo grateful for that!
So the nights are getting better :) I keep on going to bed too late though, which is really silly because I'm so tired and Matthew is letting me get a bit more sleep if only I'd take hold of the opportunity. Tsk.
Let's see, what else? Matthew is stirring - uh oh... Of course he'll wake now (at 11.40pm), because I've just said that he doesn't wake till 4am, haha. Oh my gosh, he really IS waking! Well I never. Okay I'll have to finish this another time. I have photos and more about what Matthew has been doing lately! Back tomorrow, maybe?
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