intro and question attachment parenting

Hello Robyn, you had some really good tips here, like only doing one calming
thing at a time to avoid overstimulation. I will keep that in mind. As for
the milk thing, I am allergic to milk myself, so I don't have any dairy at
all in my diet. Including things like whey, casein, butteroil etc. I am
very careful to avoid it. But I will try to keep track of other things that
may be affecting him. I also really appreciate what you said about him
knowing who is nursing and loving him, even if I have to let him cry on his
own now and then. As for the rest: I walk each day for about an hour or
so. I sleep with the baby in the afternoon and sometimes in the morning,
and my hubby does all the chores (bless his heart). We have found that
running the water in the tub works really well to calm him down. We just
sit with him in the bathroom and let him space out while he listens to the
water. He also likes to be carried on his stomach like you mentioned, under
the arm. I just wish that I could put my baby down for a nap without having
him suckling. He always wakes up as soon as I take him off the breast.
Unless we are sleeping together for a nap, or overnight, then he's fine.
But during the day he's always got to be in the Snugli or at my breast. I
guess things are getting better now that I look back on it though because he
used to have to be on my breast all night too, and now he's much more
independent. Yay! So, things are progressing. I'll post again in a week
or two and see how things are going then. Thanks again,
Alicia



"Robin" wrote in message
om...
Alicia,

Your experience rings a lot of bells for me. I didn't label my
baby-handling approach, but I used a lot of AP techniques, including
co-sleeping, for the first few months. But my first baby was colicky
and, like yours, "sucky" -- always wanting the breast or (when he was
able) his hand. And he spent most of his waking hours crying. I looked
at my friends whose babies woke up calm and spent most of their waking
hours with their eyes open and their mouths shut (the opposite of
mine) and could NOT figure out what I was doing wrong, and they
couldn't figure out why I was always so stressed out and couldn't
"manage" my baby. The point was, I wasn't doing anything wrong. In
fact, many of my friends with "easy" first babies had a much "harder"
second baby, whereas I had an "easy" second baby! So it's not the
parent ... some babies are just like that.

You've already gotten some very good advice on this thread: Take care
of yourself (or you won't be able to care for your baby). Get
assistance --remember that AP is built on a model in which parents
didn't do everything alone. And you'll bond just fine -- that baby
knows who's nursing him and loving him, and a little crying alone when
you need a few minutes' sanity break won't damage that bond.

Here are some other tips, in no particular order, that really helped
me.

1. I couldn't use a sling, despite trying several brands. I'm too
busty and short-waisted for any of them to fit, and I couldn't wear my
baby safely or comfortably in one. My salvation was a Baby Bjorn front
carrier, which was better than any other carrier I tried, and is
adaptable for both very young babies and older ones. Since my kids
didn't walk till 17 months, I got a lot of use out of my Bjorn!

2. Some of my baby's colic, it turned out, was allergy to some things
that were coming through my breastmilk. The big one was milk protein.
I'm lactose intolerant and so take in very little dairy, but even the
lactose-free products and the aged cheese I used carried enough milk
protein to trigger my child's crying jags. When I cut out ALL dairy
products from my diet, the crying cut way down. This takes a lot of
label reading -- watch out for breads, margarines, and prepared foods,
and ingredients such as whey or "milk solids." But it was well worth
the trouble, and I wish it hadn't taken me so long to discover this.
It also helped when I eliminated garlic. My lactation consultant says
that some babies love garlic-flavored milk, but mine was apparently
sensitive to it.

3. My son often settled down when I held him on my shoulder -- "right
the way over," as our wonderful NP described it, balancing on his
tummy with his head partway down my back. I remember one night I spent
mopping the kitchen floor one-handed with him over my shoulder,
because in any other position he'd cry, and he also seemed to like it
when I was in motion. Or I held him at my side, under my curled arm,
with his tummy balanced on my wrist and him facing the floor. It looks
really funny, but it worked for us. He also liked when I held him up
in the air, over my head, with my hand on either side of his torso,
but you can't walk around that way ;-)

4. It helped to get outside as much as possible -- walking, strolling,
or just stepping out the front door with the baby for a "porch break."
This helped my frame of mind, too.

5. Sleep when the baby sleeps. When people told me this, I said,
"Yeah, right." But really -- whatever you were planning on doing
during that nap is not so important as falling over. Learning to nurse
lying down was a real help, since my all-day sucker could go for an
hour on a single breast, and I could just doze off with him attached.

6. One of the best tips I got for calming a colicky baby is that
whatever strategy you use -- patting, singing, stroking, humming,
rocking, walking, etc. -- use only one at a time. That is, don't rock
and sing, but do one or the other for a little while, then switch to
something new if that didn't work. Sometimes too many "calming"
activities just overstimulates a sensitive baby.

Good luck, and let us know how you do.

--Robin