This work week has been trying on everyone. Jayne has to get up earlier than she’s had to in many years of being a stay-at-home mom; Mr. W has given up his 4am gym runs; I’ve had to leave my baby and sit on my hands at work trying to calm myself between pumpings and processing backlogged divorce cases and settlement conferences. For Allie, as much as people say babies are more resilient than adults, it’s been “off” as well.

Monday, she had one shorter nap but over all it was a good day. Ate on time, slept on time, played well. I’d even made it home to nurse her for what would’ve been her third and last bottlefeeding, because she’d slept extra long that afternoon. Tuesday, all her naps got short, but they were still on time as with her 3 bottles. Yesterday was pretty bad. Looking at her sleep/eat chart that Jayne kept up with on the app (so that Mr. W could see it on his sync’ed app on his iPad at work), she took FOUR catnaps instead of 3 long naps, which was rather distressing to me because that would mean she’s not getting restorative sleep when they’re under an hour each, AND it means she’s cat-napping at a time when she ought to be awake, so that throws off her routine and sleep/wake rhythm. I was afraid it’d mess up her night sleep organization, too. If she developed day/night confusion, I would be frantic. Things got weirder when Mr. W observed that in addition to her 4 little naps, she also got a 4th bottlefeeding when she should’ve had 3. She was eating every 2 hours instead of every 3. What was Jayne doing? Was she aware she’s completely gone off Allie’s “norm?”

I was also concerned that Allie wasn’t napping long enough because she kept waking up and being unable to fall back to sleep when she’d roll to her side and then roll to her back. I called a few friends whose babies I know have started rolling over to ask how they handle those naps. The only person I got a hold of was Flip Flop Girl, who called me back and I spoke to her on the drive home. She wasn’t at all concerned about Allie’s extra feeding and “off” naps today, saying babies do go through these adjustment phases and it’s fine (so that made me feel better); she was more concerned about my communicating effectively with Jayne to see why she chose to do the things she did that day. “Just ask her, and find out what was going through her head. If she did something you’d rather her not do, just let her know that you would’ve preferred her to handle it another way, and in the future, to do it the other way. Hear her out. Who knows, you might go, ‘Oh, I see now. Thank you for doing that for Allie.’ ” As for the rolling in the naps, Flip Flop Girl said Allie is just going to learn to go back to sleep after her extra mobility, just as Allie has learned to go back to sleep after waking up to noise (which she’s better at now).

After we got back home, Jayne immediately told us it was a very peculiar day and informed us of the super-short naps, and the extra feeding. She was actually more frazzled about the baby falling off-routine than I was (which made me feel better). Jayne was stressed not knowing what was wrong because Allie was so tired and was rubbing her eyes and fussing and impatient, and Jayne tried everything to distract her, play with her, and nothing worked. I asked what was behind the extra bottle. Jayne said because Allie was actually screaming, on top of giving cues of hunger. Even as Jayne made the extra bottle, she was telling Allie, “You can’t be hungry, you’re completely off the routine today, and now you’re off on the feedings, too.” She was so concerned that we’d worked this hard at establishing a good rhythm and then suddenly it all went out the window. Jayne made a perfect imitation of Allie’s desperate hunger sounds and mouth motions, explaining that even as Jayne tried to be discreet in making the bottle, Allie kept lunging for it and sucked it down as if she were starving. So there was nothing I could tell Jayne that she didn’t already know (which again made me feel better). And she was clearly feeling very bad and concerned about both us and Allie, and she knew Allie well enough already to say this is not Allie’s normal personality. I reassured Jayne as best I could and she went home. I put Allie to bed early and she zonked out easily (all night).

At Flip Flop Girl’s earlier request, I called her back and gave her an update. I had mentioned that given that Allie’s a little over 15 lbs, her daily ounces of milk intake is 1.5 times her weight for 22.5 ounces daily, divided by 5 feedings, so that’d make it 4.5 ounces per feeding. I was concerned she was being overfed yesterday and wouldn’t be hungry for her bedtime feeding. Flip Flop said, “Are you sure it’s not 2.5 ounces per pound of her weight, and not 1.5 ounces?” I was pretty sure and didn’t consider anything beyond that.

Later, Flip Flop Girl texted me. She’d looked it up. The proper formula for what an exclusively liquid-fed (breastmilk or formula) baby is indeed the baby’s weight times *2.5* oz per pound of their weight, divided by the number of feedings a day. Allie was very underfed. So she wasn’t sleeping long because she was hungry and would wake up to ask to eat, and was screaming and cranky because she wanted more food (like a newborn). This wasn’t an issue before because she drank whatever she needed from me directly and I didn’t have a way of measuring what she’s taking out by nursing, so if a bottlefeeding wasn’t enough, in giving her one bottle a day, she’d just make up for the rest of the caloric deficit by getting more out of me in her nursing feedings. However, when I returned to work, she didn’t have 4 other nursings to make up for the insufficient bottle; she had 3 bottles in the middle of the day consecutively. So the caloric deficit had been building until day 3 when she reacted how she did. This explains so much — the fact that she didn’t have enough nutrients to poop since last Friday; the middle-of-the-night feeding she started toward the second half of transition week (when she was bottlefed more); the earlier wake-up times in the mornings. And of course, all of yesterday’s daytime crankiness and sleeplessness. With an extra feeding under her belt, she slept very soundly last night and this morning.

I’d called Jayne last night after Allie went down to check up on her and reassure her that she didn’t do anything wrong; Allie was just going through her own thing. This morning, I was happy to tell her we think we figured out the issue. It may not make everything perfect today because Allie is still going through teething, new caretaker, mommy being gone all day, new developmental milestones in the rolling over, BUT it should resolve one big issue and things will smooth over on their own after that over time. I certainly feel a lot better, and my confidence in Jayne (who read Allie’s signals all correctly yesterday) is much higher.

I must’ve known it was weight x 2.5 oz / number of feedings at one point, but it didn’t stick with me. I looked it up myself after Flip Flop Girl’s text. Typical ounces of intake a day is between weight x 2 on the low end, weigh x 2.5 for the high end, so for Allie, daily intake should be 30-37.5 oz, and all feedings being equal (which I know it’s not given that she still gets her first and last meals in a nursing), that’s 6 – 7.5 oz per feeding. We’d been giving her 4.5 – 5 oz in her bottles. *facepalm*

This is why I was an English Lit major. =P