The Nanny State

Let's be clear, my wife and I are committed believers in breastfeeding - she is breastfeeding our son as we speak.

However, after 48 hours of our son being born at 6lb 6.5oz it was clear he was not getting all the food, and especially liquids, he needed to thrive via the breast only. Having given a fair amount of the vital colostrom, my wife was simply not producing enough milk for the baby and he was not finding feeding easy. At that point my wife made the decision to supplement his feeding with SMA formula and we have done so ever since in conjunction with both breastfeeding and expressing. Three weeks after he was born, my wife is still not producing enough milk for him and we supplement with a bottle.

Today, the Health Visitor declared that he was 8lb 5oz and has put on over 1lb in a week. He is thriving and well fed.

If we had followed the NHS and Government dogma of 'breast alone is best' then our little boy would not be thriving today. A very good friend of ours had six weeks of bullying, haranguing and general put downs by various mid wives who told her that she was a failure because she was not feeding her boy enough. After six weeks of hell and a 'Failure to Thrive' notice on the her son by the Health Visitor, she decided to supplement with formula. He is a fine bouncy boy today and thrived the moment she made that decision.

Our sister-in-law had twins and her milk took six weeks to 'come in' before she could feed adequately on the breast. Thankfully, like my wife, she followed her maternal instinct and used the bottle to supplement - her twins are wonderful specimens today.

I'm not saying that that 'breast is best' is wrong, but the clear over-riding concern is to ensure the health of the baby and that's the mother's responsibility and objective over anyone else's. Who are the Government or the NHS to bully people into believing otherwise?

To stir this debate up, I called at Boots today to buy some SMA in cartons for supplements. Naturally, we have clocked up a great many points on our loyalty card and so I tried to redeem some to buy the products only to be told that was not possible. The Government had decreed that no loyalty points could be accrued on the purchase of formula of any type or points be redeemed to buy any. Such is the rabid dogma of the Government and the total Nanny State attitude that their intelligence and instincts are better than any mothers'.

Delay in milk production or lack of is a common phenomenon, you have only to ask people you know to understand this. If mothers are being bullied into believing they are failures by not producing enough or forcing the feeding of their child when there is simply not enough milk there to feed them, then I think the Government are lining themselves up to potentially cause harm, or worse, to young babies.

It's not about the discount points, it's about life and the health of babies and the mother's instinct to protect. In an ideal world, breast is the only way. But if there is not sufficient milk for the baby to thrive, mothers must make their own decisions to ensure the health of their babies and ditch dictats by the Nanny State for the sake of their babies.

First Night Away

It’s back to work and it all started with a trip to Paris with an overnight stay.

On the one hand, with junior’s sleep patterns meaning little opportunity to rest at night, a stay in a quiet hotel and a comfy bed seemed a great idea. On the other, I have missed my wife and little one a great deal. It has meant that I have had a relatively poor night’s sleep in which I had a lot of quite vivid dreams along with unrefreshing sleep. In reality, I would have far preferred to be at home.

We are still none the wiser on what is causing this nocturnal behaviour of his. It seems on the face of it a problem with wind, particularly in the lower digestive system and bowels as we don’t have too much problem getting raucous burps from the tummy. The baby is pooing like a good ‘un so it does not seem to be constipation and the books only really illustrate the problem of colic which, to our minds, is a much more intense condition – we are not at 3 hours of inconsolable screaming yet but we do get short bursts and very disturbed patterns of sleep so we are on the way.

We have changed the feeding bottles on top up milk. We have thought about whether the SMA formula is causing a reaction – we know he is getting far more of it than he should as my wife has had a lot of problems in her own milk production. The baby still sleeps reasonably well during the day but neither of us have mastered this concept of just sleeping whenever we can we both think we should be doing something in the daytime. Certainly, I have never been one to be able to sleep anywhere but in bed and at night, at that. My wife has borne the brunt of it in the last few days as she has designated that my going back to work is so important that I should have some good sleep in order not to turn up like a zombie. That means I feel really guilty that I am not pulling my weight in all this parenting and probably caused my own poor night’s sleep last night. So it means that both of us are suffering, though she far more than I.

I am back home tonight and I will be putting in a full nightshift as I am working at home for the rest of the week and so I can afford to get up a little later than normal for work and still be at my desk and phone for 8.30am. I shall also be looking at helping my wife get some sleep during the day by taking junior with me downstairs and having him by me while I work. That may not be entirely practical as when I make business calls, having even a moaning baby in the background let alone a crying one does not portray the ideal professional image. This all needs to be worked carefully otherwise my wife will simply be getting up during the day as well as I am locked on the phone.

We have no doubt that this will all even itself out and a decent pattern of sleep will emerge as junior’s digestive system matures. My sister happily told us that it was a mere 7.5 weeks before her boy slept a full night – that extra 4.5 weeks seems a real mountain to climb right now.
But this is but a minor problem in the face of the joy that this little one has brought us. He is universally loved and he cuddles each of us so lovingly each time we pick him up that you just don’t want a miss a second of his life. I read a poem circulating from a young girl dying of cancer yesterday which was about slowing down so that we do not miss a second of life because it is only when you are in her situation that you realise that time is the precious commodity when you know you have little of it left.

But as a maxim, I think it’s a good one for us all to adopt in this world that runs at a million miles an hour.

Sweet Dreams?

Sleep, as we have known it for the last 15 years of our lives as a married couple, has been abandoned. We are now on the new Scott Edward regime.

For the last two weeks, we have been regimenting ourselves to getting up every couple of hours to feed him. At first both of us saw the night through in the same way, sharing duties. Then we came up with the idea of the 'Night Shift' and one of us would stay on duty the whole night while the other got a night's sleep. We sort of do half and half now with one doing one half of the night, the other taking over the baton halfway through and seeing out the rest of the night. This seemed to be going well, with the 'on duty' parent snatching bites of sleep between feeds and winding. This sort of routine was working and we have not felt too exhausted for the last week of it.

Then something changed. Well amongst all the change a 50 year old bloke confronted with a new born son, this was just another 'curve ball' in reality. The whole process of bringing a baby into the world at my age is all about change in every department. But this one caught us unawares. I realise that even that is a dumb statement - as a new parent at 50, everything has caught me unawares.

Okay, let's get this into perspective - just when we thought we had got the whole sleep -feed - wind - sleep cycle off pat during the nights, another twist occurred to set us off balance. Firstly, he seems fairly nocturnal in that he feeds and sleeps soundly most of the day in regular patterns and his sleep is usually deep and undisturbed. At night, he has always been less regular in feeding intervals and he takes a while to wind and then get back to sleep. In the last few days these irregular feeding patterns have now got an extended period of winding which now includes some real distressful crying which starts almost as soon as you put him back down to sleep in his basket. It means that the cycle is now longer punctuated by periods of sleep in which the 'watcher' can rest but the whole cycle does not have defined start and end points - it's pretty much feed - wind - cry - feed. This means that the watching parent really gets little or no sleep at all, and none of any quality.

Splitting it during the night has helped a little and so at least each gets a few hours in a room without interruption but it does mean that we sleep separately. The first thing we did was to take the advice of a friend and his wife who have been so generous in a 'materials' way but also in imparting their knowledge. They had similar problems with one of their daughters and they found that the feeding bottles they used introduced too much air into the feed causing wind to the extent that the child got 'colic'. By changing the bottles to Dr. Brown's anti-colic special bottles, the problem was quickly alleviated.

First up, we use Tommee Tippee bottles and the steriliser unit which we had found great to date. So we switched yesterday to Dr. Brown and they don't naturally fit in the steriliser to start with but they have a special air reservoir system which makes feeding a lot easier, faster and definitely introduces less air - manifested in very little milk having to be cleaned away from the mouth and neck. Burping is very much easier and that is very noticeable. But we still haven't got rid of the main problem which seems to be trapped wind in junior's fledgling digestive system. This seems to be what is causing the problem.

So we have looked up colic and doctors generally diagnose this based on the 'threes'. i.e. it starts at around three weeks old, they cry inconsolably and loudly for three hour stretches and it happens around three times a week. Colic is likely to occur anything up to three months after being born and seems to be spasmodic pains in the abdomen causing very disturbed sleep. For the parent, it can be excruciating as normal methods of consoling and soothing seem not to work and the screaming can get to a high pitch. After a three hour stretch, many parents at least regret having the child and some consider the possibilities of violence. These are natural responses, allegedly, although if anyone contemplates actual violence they should seek help immediately.

However, the symptoms are much more pronounced than Scott has. Usually colic comes with inconsolable prolonged periods of high pitched crying, bunching of fists, scrunching of knees, red face and they wake from short sleeps with a start and much crying. But it is fair to say, he is beginning to show signs of this. First thing that is encouraging is that it is quite normal, according to Miriam Stoppard in her book on the A-Z of Common Complaints. The second is that she asserts that there is nothing physically wrong with the baby and the parents are generally doing nothing wrong - it's just the way it is in about 20% of babies.

There are various methods prescribed to help - lots of cuddling is one and this argues soundly against the regimented routine that the likes of Gina Ford put forward. Research has shown that responding to a baby's cry with cuddles and holding is not connected to any future dependency on such response - if anything, it promotes a much closer relationship with parents in later life. Rhythmical rocking or walking, swaying is often helpful, firm holds which have contact with the abdomen are also recommended which help the passage of wind. Stoppard promotes much swaddling in sheets and blankets and then put them down (this has worked a it for us in very short bursts) helps. Stoppard recommends a dummy though another book we have argues strongly against dummies as they become a rod for your own back for the future. Finally, various ways of laying the baby on their tummy or your shoulder helps produce a small pressure on the lower regions and a warm bath is also helpful.

It seems that in our case it is trapped wind in the new digestive system. He will cry out very loudly, contort, stretch, bunch up and eventually out will pop some wind from the rear exit. This almost spectacularly covered me in a jet of poo yesterday which thankfully fell short of me as I reached for a pampers wet wipe.

As I write, there seems no sign of all this now that the sun is up, he has a full tummy and he is relaxing in his vibrating chair - he is sleeping the sleep of a very contented baby. As soon as I stop typing, I shall stretch out on the couch and catch up a few z'ds I missed out on last night.

Ah, no I won't - the dogs are ready for a long walk. Parenting and dog owning mean that you have a very full day indeed.

On a final note, tomorrow I go back to work. Two days in Paris and then back home will leave my wife alone with junior for a night for the first time and this contract will probably mean plenty of those. We feel we have not quite got the whole regime sorted and this new cycle is a threat to our sanity unless we can break the cycle. The next few days may be very long ones.

So I ask myself again - do I feel this more because I am 50? If I were 20 or 30 would I be finding lack of sleep challenging? Well the odd thing is that I am one of those people who has risen early every day and love to do so. Short hours of sleep are quite usual for me so that is not the challenge - it is the intermittent nature of the sleep and the fact none of it is very deep. I am sure my age makes it worse but realistically if I were 20 or 30 years younger I would still feel much the same way.

20 or 30 years ago, I would not have had the facility to write this and tell everyone.

In Praise of Paternity Leave

It's not often, as an employer, that I praise Nanny State initiatives which are funded by private sector companies at a hefty cost, particularly if your business is a small one, but I find myself heartily behind the concept of Paternity Leave.

In my case, as I employ myself alone and therefore every hour I am not doing what I do I simply do not earn, Paternity Leave is funded 100% by myself as a lost opportunity to bill clients. However, I think it's worth its weight in gold as I am already not looking forward to going back to work on Monday and leaving my new son. This early time with him has been precious and I recommend it to all new fathers.

It's been a while since I last wrote so there is a lot to catch up on. Has age played a downside side so far as a Geriatric Dad of 50? In some ways it has taken a few years off me, believe me. It is always on my mind, in point of fact. Already, I am thinking what I will miss when my son is 18. I will be 68 then and likely not able to bowl at him in the cricket nets, play fathers vs sons at the school soccer match or be his doubles partner in tennis or even his Sunday League buddy in golf. But it has its upside for him - at least he will not have to wait so long for any inheritance as the rest of his friends. It's macabre, but these thoughts go through your mind. I also have been conscious of the older looking parents when I was a kid at school and when I have picked up my nephews. People do notice and we are going to have to deal with that when it arrives - and even though I am a young looking and behaving 50, I still look older than most parents.

Yesterday was an interesting test of my manhood. My wife was visiting an elderly friend who had suffered a bereavement and I was entrusted with junior, who took for his first walk in our Mamas & Papas Pliko Switch Pramette. After struggling to work out how to build and deploy the swish looking lining we had bought, I managed to have it all ready in time. It was a beautiful day and we walked along the rutted path - you get to feel every bump left by the zillions of cable companies these days on your aluminium frames - how the boy slept through that, I don't know. As we walked, I got a call from my wife's best friend who lived near by and had a friend and her mum in from New York - they wanted to see the boy if I could stand three clucking women. I steeled myself and walked there.

I skillfully negotiated the step in with the pram and took out the baby. Passing him around was easy and everyone was delighted to get a while with the baby. The inevitable happened - the baby woke up and he was hungry. The big test was on as all six eyes drilled down on me. How was I going to handle this amongst highly experienced mums. I reached for the Pod bag, removed a feed I had prepared, took out the muslin and put the boy in the crook of my arm and calmly fed him the bottle. Half way through, I put the bottle down and without missing a beat, I sat him up and, with no mean skill, deftly yet authoritatively, winded him, eliciting several load burps for the audience who applauded him warmly. I repeated the procedure before putting him over my shoulder and getting the last of the wind, then setting him to sleep to be passed around again. Hardly a peep out of the baby and a duly impressed audience. I was as nervous as a kitten to start but those who say you should never work with animals and kids in a show are wrong. I felt at the end as if I had passed an initiation test and had joined a sororiety as we all talked of 'cannonball breast syndrome' when the milk builds up and the merits of breast over bottle as if I was one of them. It was a curious feeling of being part of a 'coffee afternoon' and I felt as if I should watch 'Loose Women' as my next learning step, so much a part of the team I felt.

People always ask about nappy changing and how I coped to start with. To be frank, I found there was not much to it. Once you learn that you need to stop the squirming with a good grip on the feet to move the lower half and clean it, you are on the winning track. Modern day cleaning tools like cotton balls and warm water are great but when drying with cottonwool it leaves furry pieces in the cracks, literally. That can't be comfy so Pampers Sensitive wipes are an essential as they clean efficiently and leave a nice rubbery feeling to baby's bum after, ready for a nice new nappy. While we are into saving the earth, disposables are the practical way and it will all decompose nicely somewhere I am sure to become part of the cycle of life.

And there is the poo. Yep, you can have your own university course on the changes you will encounter. First couple of days it was the tarry meconium of the first born which needed soaking and a chisel to remove from baby's skin. Then you get some yellowy stuff which is best described as someone taking an open peanut butter sandwich and slapping it heartily onto baby's bum. Now we are at the roughly chopped, boiled and buttered spinach phase which is a little more gruesome to deal with. The volume is growing and so the 'spread' is getting larger while the smell is getting a little more toxic. You have to remember to look in all the nooks and crannies when cleaning and bathing but realistically, it is not that tough to deal with. Just wait until 'solids' kick in and the real pongs start, allegedly.

On the way home last night, after a day visiting, we decided to call in at L'Italiana Restaurant in French Row in St Albans - a favourite of ours and comes with our highest recommendation. Like all family run Italian businesses they love kids and they greeted us warmly and cooed over the baby. Such is the incredible generosity and warmth we have received from everyone, after we dined well and junior slept throughout, we walked out with a free drink each and a bottle of wine from the owners and the well wishes of the lovely staff including the prettiest of waitresses. Everywhere we go, we just find a warmness from everyone and that has been one of the most remarkable observations I can give. Except from the swine of a traffic warden who had given us a parking ticket. St Albans is an absolute nightmare when it comes to parking and enforcement - after 6.30pm you have crowded, impassable roads as people park everywhere while wardens still patrol 'soft areas' to hand out tickets causing traffic chaos. It really is the classic 'commission based' parking enforcement gone wrong - the council ought to be ashamed but they aren't as they they love the easy money it brings in.

And yes, fellahs, babies are babe-magnets. Young and old, women throw themselves at you. Well not you, the baby. Get with the program, they may smile and tell you nice things but they really just want to coo at and hold the baby - you are merely the object they have to sweet-talk to get what they want. But the attention is great - a bit like when the dogs were puppies. Like the dogs, make the most of it as when they get more mature, the girls no longer want to know.

Today we have the first visit from the Health Visitor, having been signed off by the mid-wife yesterday after Scott had put on nearly a pound in weight in the first 12 days and there is no longer any sign of jaundice - shame as that mid-wife was really nice. It's the next hurdle in what has been a real voyage of discovery.

And the sleep? Yes, there is lots of intermittent feeding during the night and so sleep is still an issue. The real 'Parent Fatigue' wears off and you get a routine, but yesterday I did a full night shift and let my wife sleep through - that's an advantage of mixing bottle and breast that the NHS dogma on 'breast is best' does not promote. Last night she returned the favour and, refreshed, I took over at 7.00am feeling like new. I am concerned for next week when I return to work duties as I will be travelling a lot in Europe and mum will have to cope without me for at least two nights a week. We have worked so much as a team on this that I do feel as if I am letting her down but I hope that we can get the routine just right so that she does not get too exhausted initially.

That's pretty much up to date. So far, age has not been too much of an issue but I can feel those old bones creaking a little. But there is nothing like a little baby in your arms to renew your vigour for life and peel back those years.

I feel very much younger every time I pick him up and that's a really good feeling for an old fart to have.