New to the Group

[Loveemom]

Hi.  I am new to the group.  I have a 17 month old girl and an almost 5 month old boy.  I nursed my daughter for about 2 weeks and then just gave up.  I had very little support, knew no one that had ever even tried nursing, and was extremely sleep deprived... under those circumstances I decided to quit.  At least my husband could then help me with the night feedings; yeah right!  I never got the help that I had hoped for and felt soo horrible for giving up.  I think I was unrealistic about how much work a newborn really is.

So then I had my son, 2 weeks after my daughter's 1st Bday.  And things went SO much better.  Yes, still sleep deprived, but I knew what to expect.  I joined a support group at a local hospital and am so glad that I did.  For the first 8 weeks or so, he nursed at least once every hour, if not every half hour, 24 hours a day!  So many times I felt like just giving up..But the group kept me going.  We are no longer welcome at our nursing group, unless medically needed, because of swine flu.

Now he'll be 5 months next week and we're doing pretty good.  He tripled his birth weight already; little chunky monkey!  He nurses every 2- 2.5 hours during the day, goes to bed around 7pm, sleeps until about 2am, is up again about 5am, then up for the day at about 7:30am.  I often wonder if I'm over-nursing him, but I figure he probably knows best.  He is teething now and has bitten me a few times (no teeth yet).  I'm not sure what to do about that.  And it makes me worry about what will happen when he does have teeth.  Any advice would be appreciated.

And I love that we made it this time!  It makes me feel like a very nuturing mom.  He's my cuddle bug  :)