Rough Initiation

Luke is nearly two months old and since his birth we have experienced so many joys... But we've also many trials. This motherhood thing, while so so worth it, is so hard! I really thought things would start to normalize by now but that just isn't so. Is it really this hard every time or have I just had a particularly rough go? I really want to enjoy this stage because he's so sweet and cuddly and cute and I just can't stop kissing his hairy head but there have been so many trials. I've definitely had quite a few break downs. I'm a person who really hates drama but it seems that is my whole life right now. I don't want my blog to start to be some negative thing but some days a mother has to vent. If I write them all down maybe it will be like getting them off my chest and I'll be able to move on and endure well these trials. So, in attempted chronological order, here they are:

-Bilirubin
-Postpartum Depression
-Breastfeeding Pain
-Luke refusing to sleep anywhere longer than 30 minutes but in our bed or in our arms
-Luke spitting up blood
-Finding out the reason for the blood is that I've been cracking
-Going back and forth from breastfeeding to pumping three times
-Finding out the reason for the cracking is a stubborn case of thrush that has been hanging on for dear life
-Taking diflucan, probiotics and applying lanolin and them not working
-Realizing that lanolin has actually been worsening the situation, not helping
-Gentian violet and APNO not working as quickly as I'd hoped
-Luke getting super congested and disrupting his very tolerable sleep schedule
-Bryan and I getting severe colds...
-...followed immediately by food poisoning
-Luke crying while nursing during several feedings and realizing he is already teething (so young, I know, but there is an unmistakeable white nub starting to show more and more on his bottom back gums)

Okay, I sure hope I've gotten all my complaining out of my system and that things will gradually start to get better. Just to even things out and realize life isn't so bad, I'll list out some of the things I'm grateful for:

-A pretty easy pregnancy with almost no nausea
-A delivery without complication
-Luke being perfectly healthy when he was born
-A speedy physical recovery for me
-A generally mellow baby
-Already being back to my pre-pregnancy weight
-Bilirubin healing
-Help from parents and Bryan
-Going on Zoloft
-Luke not having too much pain from his circumcision
-A baby that doesn't have day/night confusion
-Having a barium test on Luke to confirm that the blood didn't come from him
-Breastfeeding pain getting slowly better from use of gentian violet and APNO
-Such helpful friends in my ward who are always thinking of me
-Advice from a friend to get teething tablets
-Luke starting to smile
-Luke starting to giggle
-Dancing around the house with my boy singing primary and Disney songs
-Having a good husband who really loves his son
-A husband that makes me laugh
-Support from Facebook
-An amazing and loving lactation consultant who told me my latch was good and not the problem!
-A visit from Grandma Sandi, Aunt Shelley and Luke's cousins on the Whitney side
-Having my sister, Lindsay, to call or video chat whenever I need a shoulder to cry on
-Skype chats with sister Natalie in the middle of the night when Luke won't sleep
-Texting with sister Hailey who also just had a baby and can totally relate
-Calling mom
-Being told things get better
-Luke's sweet and handsome face and the love I have for him

And now I realize, of course, that the second list is much longer than the first and that I have a lot to be grateful for. I need to stop focusing on the bad. All I can do is pray for strength to get through these things and hopefully I'll be a better person because of them.

Christmas 2013

A late Merry Christmas to all! We have been a little preoccupied this year and didn't send Christmas cards out. Most Christmases we travel to see family but, since Luke is so brand new, we spent our first Christmas in our new home actually at home! No family was able to come so it was just us three-- our own little family. It was a nice and simple day. We woke up and fed Luke and then we Skyped with my sister and her family, who live overseas in Qatar. My parents were there for Christmas so we got to talk to them as well. Then we opened presents!

Here are a couple of pictures of Luke with one of his few Christmas presents. I figured since I just gave him life and a nursery full of things to go with it that we'd be pretty simple. We got him a couple of board books and he got a few things from other family as well. We had all kinds of Christmas outfits for him-- here he is in his jammies! His feet are little Santas.

One of my presents was this beautiful Anthropologie apron! I have a closet full of aprons-- I love them! I also got some beautiful new cookware.

Bryan got this Zelda game, which he spent pretty much the rest of the day playing while Luke and I napped on the recliner next to him.

One of Bryan's gifts to me was this Downtown Abbey cookbook! Awesome!

We also got a family copy of The Book of Mormon, which is really neat. We got a lot of other really nice things from family as well! Thank you so much, everyone! We loved eveeything!

In the Whitney family it is tradition to have Eggs Benedict for Christmas breakfas. Bryan did it all and he did such a great job!

Luke and I in front of the Christmas tree. Yes, that's a little reindeer on his bottom. :)

We barely even celebrated New Year's. We went to bed at 9:30! I'm sure we'll be more adventurous when the newborn stage is over and we get into a good routine.

Luke is doing well and actually sleeps really well at night! We feed him around 10 and then he wakes up at 2 and 6 to eat but otherwise sleeps (and lets us sleep). We are blessed that he doesn't suffer from day/night confusion. We are having some issues with nursing that have been pretty stressful but that is a story for another blog post.

We hope everyone had a great holiday and we promise to send out Christmas cards next year.