Sleep! And jaundice…..

After 2 weeks of thrashing around in his moses basket and grumbling and crying whenever we put him down in it, William is FINALLY settling in his basket!!  For the past 2 nights he’s fallen asleep on one of us after a feed. We’ve then (very gently) swaddled him (just his legs-he likes his arms free), put him down, snuggled up in bed and gone to sleep!!! We’ve elevated one end of the mattress with a towel so he’s on a slant as well-perhaps he didn’t like lying flat?! We’re also using all the tricks to help him differentiate between night and day-a nightlight, talking in low voices and not speaking to him much during his night feed.

So for the last 2 nights I’ve had a good 5-6 hours-interrupted by a feed and breast pumping session, of course!!! Fingers crossed this continues-I can easily cope with nights like this!!!

William is such a contented baby. He only cries when he wants attention, or food. He doesn’t seem to suffer with wind and doesn’t even cry when his nappy is full of poo-he just grumbles! I’m so lucky! Still expressing and feeding via bottle, which is working really well. Tried to latch him on to my boob this morning and I think he managed it-it felt like he did!-but then he was crying and fell off!  Think he much prefers the bottle. I can’t wait til he’s weighed by the health visitor on Thursday-I hope he’s gained heaps. He was 6 lb 14 oz at the last weigh-in. He LOOKS fatter!

The health visitor popped in this morning (by accident-she had her dates confused). She didn’t stay, but she did look at William and say, ‘hmmmm, he still looks a bit jaundiced…..we’ll have to do a blood test on Thursday if he still looks like that.’ Instantly I felt panicky. I think he may still be a little bit jaundiced but it’s nearly all gone-I hope. It really should have by now-he’s 17 days old! Apparently there’s a condition called ‘breastfed jaundice’ where breastfed babies can have jaundice for weeks. No-one really knows why but it’s ironic that something that’s supposed to be amazing in every way for your baby can prolong an illness. There’s also a tiny chance he might have another more serious liver condition but I can’t even think about that.

The health visitor’s advice? ‘Get him out in the sunshine’. Today it is overcast and murky.

I love my boy so much. Pics to follow in my next entry!!

lots of love happycookie and William xxxxxxxxxxxx