Sonja is 10 weeks old!

If I could go back in time and tell my poor, unknowing self what motherhood would be like, I am pretty sure I would have had a psychotic break when I got pregnant. It's terrifying, beautiful, exhausting, and draining all at the same time. I love this little girl more than I have loved anything ever. My desire to protect her and keep her happy is greater than my desire to breathe. I would not think twice about giving my life up for her to live. I've never felt this way before.

What can I say to explain to the rest of you what a beautiful child I have? 

Sonja is an amazing baby. She sleeps really well, at least 4 hours straight and sometimes 6 or 8. Sonja is easy to put to bed too. At night, we make sure she's been up for at least 2 or 3 hours and then we feed her and burp her and put her in her bassinet with a binky and it's lights out. Sonja doesn't cry or fuss.. she just sucks on her binky, stares into the dark, and falls asleep. 

We are still having a lot of trouble with the latch. I recently FINALLY got a lactation consultant to actually return my calls for help, and she instantly diagnosed Sonja with a tongue and upper lip tie. We ended up getting her lip tie cut this past Tuesday, and are scheduled to get her lip done on the 27th of March. The hospital wanted to put her under general anesthesia to do her lip, but I found a dentist who will do it with a laser while she is awake. I just am terrified of putting her under so young, and I don't think it's necessary. 

It's been heart breaking for me to deal with so much happening to her. First the vaccines.. I had to leave the room. It was awful. Jeff stayed and held her down and she got 2 shots. She screamed, and then we took her home, she was OK until she woke up... she screamed and screamed. My heart just kept breaking with her screams. I couldn't handle it. She never screamed like that before, and she hasn't screamed like that since. Even the tongue tie clipping (another procedure I had to leave the room for) went better. She cried for about 10 seconds and then started wiggling her tongue around like.. what?? Jeff has been an amazing Daddy sticking around for all of these procedures. He really loves his girl.

Sonja is smiling and making cute little coo noises now. She has the most beautiful smile. She loves it when I poke her nose and face and make robot noises, and she loves when daddy copies her little faces. She smiles when I start singing at her, especially when I sing "I dreamed a dream" from Les Miserables, most disney songs, and any Kenny Chesney song... it's hilarious. She really loves Kenny Chesney at the moment.

Sonja has gotten slightly more fussy as she's been getting older and has more time to be awake and get annoyed with me. She loves her activity mat, and really enjoys looking around my room with the window open and a breeze coming in. She enjoys the cats, and has been officially adopted by Akira. Akira comes running full blast when Sonja starts crying and then will face rubby the back of her head or just sort of dance around her helplessly. It's incredibly cute. 

Again, we're having a lot more trouble with breast feeding than I initially believed. My last post on it, I thought it was getting better, but in fact it has gotten a lot worse. She either forgot or never quite got the latch right, I believe her lip and tongue tie are the culprits, but either way I have been in excruciating pain since she was born. If you could see the damage she has done to my.. erm.. nipples.. you would be horrified. 

I was hoping the tongue release would solve all of our problems, but it has not. I fear she has learned a certain technique and breaking her of that habit is not going to be easy.. it may even be impossible. But I am hoping maybe the lip tie fix will help. I guess we will see. Meanwhile, I have started giving her bottles when the pain becomes unbearable. If I can't get her latch fixed within a few weeks of getting her lip done, I will probably end up exclusively bottle feeding her pumped breast milk, and then only comfort nursing her. It makes me really sad that nursing has turned into such a trying thing for me. I wanted it to be beautiful and bonding, and really, it has been bonding.. but it's also been painful, frustrating, and heart breaking. Nothing has made me cry harder than wanting to feed my baby, but finding the pain so bad I cannot continue feeding her. And I just wish it hadn't gone this way, that our original lactation consultant had actually called me back and helped me, and that someone had caught her lip and tongue tie as a newborn rather than waiting until she's had 10 weeks of bad latching practice. It frustrates me to no end.

Despite all of that, Sonja is growing quite nicely, She's 11 lbs now and really close to 23 inches long. She's officially outgrown all of her newborn clothes and is in the 0-3 month clothing. She will probably outgrow the 3 month sizes within a month. She's really right on target for her age.

I love my child. Life is harder now, the carefree days of utter selfishness are no longer mine to enjoy. It doesn't matter if I want to eat, sleep, pee... it's all dependent on what Sonja will allow. But nothing is more beautiful than when she sleeps in my arms, or smiles up at me. Nothing more rewarding than putting my cheek to her cheek and hearing her little sigh and knowing she's content and happy to be with me. It's all worth it, every worry, every painful moment, because she is my Sonja and I am utterly in love.  

Sonja in her Zebra onesie.. this is her curious face

here she is at 2 months old.. love that face!

My little goofball!