astrid83

We might have to find a new home for our two long-haired Norwegian forest cats as my son has developed asthma which seems to be triggered by cat fur... Don't really want to put them in to an adoption centre but unsure on how to go about finding them a new home. Has anyone here had to do something similar?

That sounds exhausting! I hope you find a solution soon. This is a very interesting article about children and night time anxiety: http://m.psychologytoday.com/blog/freedom-learn/201110/why-young-children-protest-bedtime-evolutionary-mismatch

Yes it happens at King's. They came in to me on the day my son was born, handed over a bag of stuff and asked for my details. They did not introduce themselves so I just assumed they were hospital staff (I was kind of out of it!)....

Thanks for all your input and support! Did anyone of you find it harder to feed whilst out? My son seems so easily distracted and at most snacks on like 20 ml of milk if we are out. I feed him a combination of expressed breastmilk and formula. I express three times per day which is exhausting, but want to continue for a little bit longer if aptamil is making his reflux worse (possible cow milk intolerance?). I will try to eliminate dairy out of diet...but I find it hard to be picky about food when U hardly get a minute to sit down and eat!

Thank you midivydale! My son has been diagnosed with silent reflux. The weird thing is that he was absolutely fine for the first four weeks. I breastfed him with no issues at all. Then he started getting very upset about 20-30 seconds in to each feed. He would splutter, cough and get very very upset I went to a breastfeeding cafe and they only told me that he wasn't latching on properly and asked me to come back the following week. Things did not improve, I thought that the milk was coming too fast and moved on to express milk and give him in bottles. This was fine for a few weeks, until he started having the same reaction to the bottle. He would start sucking, and after 20 seconds cry and scream and be inconsolable. I was told that it was colic. Well, last week my friend midivydale saw him feed and instantly recognized the 'gulping' sound when he was feeding and gave me some of her infant gaviscon to try. It worked, so we went to the doctor and got it on prescription and it was amazing for a few days until things started to get difficult again. He is very difficult to feed, some times I only manage to do it when he is asleep and now he has even started to cry as soon as he see the bottle. I have to rock him to sleep and then feed him which is just exhausting. Night feeds are never a problem though, I guess because he is sleepy and more more relaxed? We have an appoinment with a consultant at King's next week, but until then is there anything I can do about this bottle aversion that seems to be caused by the reflux?

Love Homemade, been going there since they opened and love their coffee, food and cake! The staff are so friendly, I do hope they relocate but understand its not easy with the rents in London. I asked today why they are closing and apparently their landlord (owner if shop next door) wants to use the space for a bakery. Gutted!

Lou, I'll be up for power pramming too. I'm in Sweden until Monday but can do the following monday. Would like to try post natal pilates too!

I'm in Sweden until next week but would love to meet up when we are back... Lou, how was powerpramming? Did you go?

Hi, I'm sorry that I didn't make it in the end? Sleep deprived and have just had one of those days...aiming to try power pramming next week!

Lou - I was thinking the same, power pramming. I will aim to be there! And come for a coffee before too. We have not slept much during the weekend, I am exhausted.... See you there.

Monday works for me too

Someone said that power pramming is really good. Its sounds a bit silly but I think I am going to give it a go as I really miss exercising. Looks like the weather is going to be a bit rubbish tomorrow so shall we meet at the clockhouse instead?

Oh poor you Ginny. Are you back on the post natal ward? Hope you get to go home soon! xx

And thank you from me, and have to give credits to you too, I'm a new mum but have also worked in childcare for many years and know how stressful it is to look after someone else's children, so it sounds like you have done very well this week!

Monday works for me as well! Can't believe that we are nearly in to August now...

I have successfully managed to blockfeed my son today, and I persisted even though he first refused the breast, cried, gagged and coughed. Felt like a bad mum to not offer him a bottle instead, but finally we managed to get a calm and quite long breastfeeding time together. We both got covered with milk again and the spraying did not stop until approximate 20 min in. I think he gets very windy and slightly colicky because of all the foremilk, we've tried infacol but not sure if it makes that much difference. Gave him gripe water yesterday but he hated it. Will keep trying the breastfeeding as I'm worried I won't be able to keep up with expressing. Although, have to say, U use a manual Medela pump and its really quick and easy, might not stay that way though. Thanks for your suggestions and help everyone, and specially Pickle, thank you for your very kind words.

Huge congratulations Ginny and Philippa! Birth plans hey, mine did not go according to plan either...Oscar had pooed in the water so had to be induced and he was delivered 24 hours later with forceps, after a failed ventouse attempt. Hope you get to go home today Ginny, I could not wait to get out of the post natal ward! Looking forward to meet the new arrivals when you are ready!

I've tried feeding him on my back and it's still a struggle. He gags and almost chokes on the milk and gets so upset by it all, which I can understand. It's also very difficult when we are out and about as the milk goes everywhere and we both get soaked. I will try one of the BF cafes and see if they can help. If I do choose to express breastmilk and bottle feed him, does anyone of you know of anyone who does this exclusively? How do people manage when they are out and about? I've seen that there are special cooling bags you can buy...

Hi, I have a one month old baby boy and we have been very lucky with no problems with breast feeding, until now. It might seem like not a problem at all, but we are struggling with very forceful letdown of the milk. It's great that I have more than enough milk to feed my baby, but the milk comes so fast so it sprays all over his face and he gags on it and gets very upset. I have tried all various things to make it easier, different feeding positions, expressing a little milk before offering the breast, hand expressing in to a muslin, nipple shield and nothing seems to help. He also gets terrible wind as he swallows a lot of air when breast fed. We've now starting to feed him with expressed milk from bottles when we are at home to make feeding times less painful. The problem we now have is that he has started to refuse the breast. I don't know if he does that because of the fast let down or that he has just started to prefer the bottle. Which would be understandable as he gets milk all over his face when I BF him and can't keep up with the flow. However, I feel so guilty about it. I'm starting to think that I might have to keep expressing and give him breast milk in bottles when we are at home, and feed him formula when we are out. Before he was born I kept saying that I would not feel guilty about feeding him with formula if BF did not work. And now I feel guilty about feeding him from a bottle with breast milk. How ridiculous isn't that? I don't know if I am writing this with hope for a solution or just pure reassurance that I'm not a bad mother!

I have also discovered that Cafe Nero on Lordship Lane is nice and cool!

Huge congratulations Claire! Hope you are recovering well. And Ginny, hope something will happen soon, cant be fun in this heat... How are all your babies coping in the heat btw? Oscar gets really hot in the buggy so I hardly get out, need to go to lordship lane today to get his passport photo, think I might take the bus instead of walking, hoping it might be cooler...

Thank you all for your input, I shall do my best to listen to you instead of these 'professionals'... And joshR, the exact same thing happened to me on the post natal ward at Kings, when my son was one day old I was told to put him down in his cot when I wasn't feeding him as 'he will be used to being hold'. SO HE SHOULD BE, in my opinion!!

I'm stressing about a similar thing at the moment... My son is almost 4 weeks old and wont fall asleep anywhere else but on my chest at the moment. And if I put him down to quickly in his buggy or moses basket he starts having hiccups, wakes up and gets really upset again. So the best way to get him to sleep is to let him stay on me for a good while, and then put him down. We had a health professional visiting us yesterday who said I might be creating bad habits, so now I am stressed about doing the right thing!

I will come along tomorrow as well! See you then x

Huge congrats Caroline! I am up for meeting next week, Wednesday suits us best as we have our midwife coming during the day on thursday x