Baby Update - 19 week update

Age:  19 weeks

Weight: He isn't due to be weighed again for another couple of weeks.

Feeding: He still won't take a bottle but he's starting to feed quicker on the breast because he wants to get back to playing.  He still eats very regularly but I'm not going to start trying to space the feeds out until he's ready because we've had trouble in the past with weight gain.  The GP and I have decided that I should go back onto a fully inclusive diet and hopefully, if he does have any allergies, they'll become more obvious when he's weaning as the food will be getting to him directly.

Sleep: He's had a few longer naps in the day but only when lying on my chest.  At night time he is just about going 3 hours between feeds but has been unsettled in between.  We've bought a white noise toy that works on a sensor and hopefully that will help - I've been using white noise on my phone but I can't leave that on overnight.  It was the first night with the toy last night but he was really congested so he was quite restless.  He goes down quite well now but wakes up a lot.

Routine: I've been waiting for him to get relatively tired in an evening and so far we tend to have a bath between 19:30 and 20:00 then story (if he's not starving), feed and put him down.  This seems to be working even if he has a late nap and means that most nights he gets to see daddy before bed, although he gets very excited when daddy comes home which can make it harder.  Most nights he goes down well but some, like tonight, he ends up being really uncomfortable/sick with his reflux and it's much harder to get him settled.

Likes/dislikes:  He's really starting to enjoy playing with toys and will actively try to get to them if they're not within his reach.  He loves having access to his feet so he can hold them/try to put them in his mouth.  He's started to get very grumpy this week if he's not being entertained and he just makes a loud whining noise to let you know he's bored.

Firsts:  He had his first trip to the playground at the weekend and went on the swings, which he loved!  He's also had his first tiny taste of food - a little bit of gravy on my finger - which seemed to go down well although I'm not sure he even noticed as he loves sucking on a finger anyway.  He had his first really inconsolable meltdown (which you can read about here).  

Milestones: We've put together the pushchair part of his travel system today and he'll be moving into that instead of the carrycot - partly because he likes to be more upright to look around/help his reflux and partly because my car is stuck in the garage and we left the carrycot in the boot!

Things we did: We had a trip to the park, we had a few walks, we went to visit friends at the weekend, we had his usual swimming class and we've been exploring lots more toys and books at home.

Me: I seem to be getting a cold today and I'm absolutely exhausted.  I'm also getting really fed up with cars - ALS has scrapped his because it wasn't economical to repair it and then mine has failed it's MOT and is going to cost around £1100 to repair (including the service/MOT that I'd already paid for), we could have had a nice holiday for that!!  I'm getting sick of how much my hair is falling out, I've posted a picture below and it seems to be getting really thin when I run my hands through it.  Today is a bad day, as you can tell, but I have faith that tomorrow will be better!

18 weeks 2 days - having a little snooze on mummy's boob.

18 weeks 3 days - just got home after a sleep in the car post-meltdown.

18 weeks 5 days - first time riding in the trolley!

18 weeks 5 days - guess who can have dairy now? (The Celebrations are for me, not OJ)

18 weeks 6 days - 1 year apart (6 week scan)

19 weeks - early morning with a congested baby and a sleep deprived mummy called for Hercules (he seemed enthralled).

19 weeks - Hercules didn't last long for OJ, he was ready for a nap by 08:00!

19 weeks - he seems impressed with his new pushchair setup!

19 weeks - finally managed to get his feet in his mouth.

"Get pregnant," they said.  "You'll have lovely thick hair," they said.  Nobody mentioned how horrendous the fallout would be!  This is from one wash and this is just what I managed to salvage whilst I washed it so it didn't clog the drain - I get this much out every day during washing or brushing AND my drain still ends up clogged, along with my hoover!