Hope wrote in message . ..
On 11 Aug 2003 21:47:13 -0700, (Vijay) wrote:

I am having a really rough time with my almost 3-month-old daughter
Charlotte.

Hi, just wanted to say that it will get better. My little frog was
pretty much as you describe for her first 4 months. I survived by
wearing her in her sling pretty much all the time, letting her sleep
with my nipple in her mouth (in my lap, or in the sling and we do
co-sleep), nursing more or less all the time...at 7.5 months she is a
happy, active almost-crawler who will play on the floor for long
stretches. She just grew into it gradually. Hang in there!!

Hope

Thanks everyone for your responses. I tried to make my original post
as detailed as possible, to save people the trouble of suggesting
things that I've already tried. But of course I didn't want people to
have to read a really REALLY long message. I have seen a lactation
consultant, and for two weeks before that I tried co-sleeping with her
(only works if she sleeps ON my chest, which resulted in a blocked
duct and a really stiff neck).

Her weight gain was slow because she was a drowsy nurser with poor
muscle tone in her mouth. Because she wasn't nursing properly, my
supply went down and her weight gain slowed and we went into a spiral.
She lost weight the first two weeks after birth, going from 7lbs 4oz
to 6lbs 14oz the first week and down to 6lbs 11oz the second week. We
weren't getting a good latch and she kept falling asleep. Finally the
third week we got better at it and she started gaining. By her 4th
week she was back up to 7lbs 6oz. By her 6th week she had only gained
5oz and by her 8th week she had only gained another 2oz.

It was then that I decided to see the lactation consultant because I
was getting tired of my pediatrician's "wait and see" attitude. She
kept saying that Charlotte was "just small" which makes no sense
because I am 5'7" and 185lbs and my husband is 5'10" and 250lbs. She
started out in the 50th percentile and by 6 weeks was down to the 5th
percentile.

During the two weeks that I was doing nothing but sleeping with her on
the couch and letting her nurse as long as she wanted whenever she
wanted, my supply was going down to almost nothing because her suck
was getting weaker and weaker. I didn't realize this was happening. I
thought dedicating myself to nursing her around the clock was the best
thing to do but it didn't work out.

I've been using a rented electric pump to get my supply back up. The
lactation consultant gave me an SNS and had me come to a special
support group for supplementing moms. So we've been on a special
program where I nurse Charlotte first, then use the SNS, and then DH
gives her a bottle sometimes so I can pump. I've been told to aim for
an 8oz gain per week until she gets caught up. She is somewhere around
10.5-11lbs now (haven't had her weighed since a week ago today) at 12
weeks. She would have to go up to 14lbs by 16 weeks to get back into
the 50th percentile.

I will think about the chiropractor idea. Does anyone know how to go
about finding one that knows about infants? I've worked in
chiropractic offices before and I don't think some of the doctors I've
worked for would know what to do with a baby.

She sleeps just fine in the cradle at night (one 3-4 hour nap and then
another 2-3 hours) so I'll try co-sleeping during the day for naps.
Because I only get to spend time with DH at night, I can't always
sleep when she sleeps. Plus she gets REALLY fussy if she doesn't nap
during the day but it's so hard to get her to stay asleep. I'll crank
up the AC and try the sling and co-sleeping. And I'll cling to the
idea that she'll get better over the next month or two.

Thanks again for your helpful responses.

-V.