Saturday, October 24, 2009

34 weeks and a Potty training update




34 week appointment this past Wednesday. It seems that all of a sudden all of the pregnancy symptoms have kicked into high gear. Backache-check. Exhaustion-check. Pelvic pressure-check. Hemorrhoids-check. Constipation(continued)- check. Heart Burn (so bad I cant sleep)-check. Restless Legs-check. Leg cramps-check. I do feel grateful that I have managed to keep these aches and pains at bay for so long. And they are only intermittent, and all things considered I really feel very good.  


After my Midwife appt. I actually felt relieved having voiced all of my concerns. It was as if what I really needed was for someone to hear my complaints. She offered some helpful suggestions--take Calcium/Magnesium for the RLS and take it easy for everything else.  


The baby was head down when she checked, and wants to wait until my 36 week appointment to confirm positioning. In spite of the evidence that he isn’t supposed to have much room in my uterus--he can still move around plenty and not without notice. Thursday he was hiccupping under my rib cage again. We spoke again about options since it is getting closer to my due date and Elliott came at 38.5 weeks.  


The options presented if he is still breech at 36/37 weeks are to schedule and perform a version (ECV) where they hook me up to an IV, and attempt to manually move him into head down position. I say attempt because occasionally babies don’t move. They can then place a support band around my tummy to 'hold' him in place until I deliver. Neither the ECV nor the band ensure he will not move again. If he moves again, they can perform the procedure again. Or I can wait.  I am most likely going to wait until I go into labor. If I present to L&D and he is still breech I will be having a C-section and if not, I will attempt a VBAC. The midwife seemed fine with this decision as she confirmed that babies can and do move from breech to head down up until labor. 


The potty training is hit or miss. Some days are great with few accidents and dry underwear for most of the day.  Other days (yesterday, for example) are accident after accident, fighting to get him on the potty, and frustration by all parties involved.  The successes are he will use public restrooms, isn’t afraid of the toilet flushing, and his aim is getting better.  He can also hold most of his pee all night long (8pm-6am).  The not so good parts are he is always wet after nap time, wont poop in the potty, and isn’t telling me all that often that he has to go pee. The other positive is that somehow potty training has improved our relationship in an awesome way.  I suspect the amount of one on one time we are spending together is having a positive influence on us both.  Plus, me being down on his level so much more, and all of the extra hugs and kisses and words of praise and encouragement.  Whatever it is—I am grateful for it.  

Thursday, October 8, 2009

Milestones and updates

We have been flying under the radar these days.  Elliott was going through a nap/bedtime refusal period where he wouldn't take a nap 3 out of 4 days.  He would get up repeatedly from his bed and play with his toys, or run around the house.  When I would try and put him back in, he would cry and scream and get out again. We fought like this for 2 weeks or so.  I decided to talk with his daycare provider, who in turn spoke with Elliott. And I spoke with all of my friends with kids.

They all suggested the same thing.  Once its time to go to bed--the child needs to stay there.  No exceptions.  So, we reestablished the rules of staying in bed (with the help of our daycare provider).  Then, if he got out once, I took a stuffed animal away.  If he got out again, I put him in his pack-n-play to sleep.    Needless to say--he hated being confined to the pack-n-play and after a couple of days in there, he was back on schedule.

But, then on top of the nap strike-- he wouldn't go to bed without kicking and screaming, crying and fighting.  He was sleep deprived and was getting up in the mornings around 5 or 5:30am.  Elliott is the classic kid where sleep begets sleep--the more sleep he gets, the happier he is, and the longer he naps and sleeps in.  If his naps get cut short, or we get out of our routine for to many days--he starts to wake early, nap short, and get very cranky.

We moved his bedtime to 8pm, reestablished the naps and the bedtimes solved themselves.  During the sleepless weeks, hubby thought it would be a good time to kick the Pacifier habit as well.  His logic was--as long as none of us were sleeping, we might as well bite the bullet and make the the change.  The last time we tried to get rid of the paci--none of us slept and one of us was traumatized.  This time it was an easy transition, and we haven't looked back.  There was hardly any talk of its absence.  WooT!  Three cheers for something good coming out of 2 weeks of struggle!

While both the hubby and I are careful planners with some things...others things we are more whimsical about.  Deciding that NOW was the time to start potty training/learning was one of those whims for me.  Let me explain--we have been practicing the potty for about 4 months.  Sometimes he would use it while other times he declined.  The challenge was that he would only pee standing up--which was a mess to say the least.  Monday, after I picked him up from daycare I decided that we should start training him the next day.  I put all the diapers away, moved the changing table mat to our bedroom in prep for baby #2, and repacked the diaper bags with pull ups and changes of clothes.

Tuesday morning we told Elliott what to expect, put a pull up on him, and set the timer for 35 minute intervals.  We also went and bought a new potty chair because ours sucked.  I LOVE the new chair because it is easy to clean, sturdy, and he actually will sit on this one.  Elliott seams to like it because he can sit easily on it and not spray pee all over the place and he can empty to bowl into the big potty.  So, we have established a sitting only rule for the potty--and have had great success these last 2 days.  We have handed out many stickers and M and M's, cleaned up a few messes from diaper free time and my back is killing me from leaning over and squatting in the bathroom.  But, today he pooped in the potty for the first time; which I think took him by surprise because he looked totally shocked when he saw what was in the bowl.  And he seemed kinda nervous about what had just happened.  We also have taken him into public restrooms to pee yesterday and today and he seems fine with using public bathrooms.  Although I am still learning the best way to handle his penis spraying pee all of the place...All and all I think we are well on our way.

Nothing new to report on the pregnancy front--32 week appointment was uneventful.  Baby #2 is doing fine, he was head down yesterday as far as she could tell, his heart rate is normal.  In 2 weeks I go back and if the midwife isn't 100% certain of his position--she will do a quick ultrasound to confirm.  I told her that I was certain he can still move around as sometimes he has the hiccups and I can feel them in my ribs and sometimes  I feel them in my pelvis.