Setri at 9 weeks

9 weeks :)

Setri turns '9' tonight. 9 weeks of age, that is. It's kind of freaky, he pretty much literally grows before our eyes. He was 7kg at 7 weeks and is a really *solid* baby. A great one for beginner parents! What I'm enjoying the most about him getting older is his increasing inclination to 'talk' to us. Setri's a chatty little guy- every morning he's full of smiles and conversation. Unfortunately he still cannot consistently poo or fart without some drama, but the situation has definitely improved. I just love how the first thing he does when he opens his eyes in the morning and looks at my face is smile. I suppose that's something the likes of which I would never have got to experience without being a parent. It's pretty special.

7 weeks- been smiling for a couple of weeks at that point, but I never seemed to have a camera handy!

 6 weeks old, getting ready to have a bath.

If possible, he gets cuter by the day. He didn't wind up going bald- his hair grew back almost as quickly as it fell out. Still straight though. I love his spunky little cowlick/swirl at the front of his head- that's still there. He definitely got his great hairline from Gam's side of the family, as mine all have fairly unattractive high foreheads (to hold our big brains, my grandfather used to say!). Unfortunately it looks like he's got my eyebrows, which means, if my dad and brother are anything to go by, Setri will have some serious grooming to do once he hits puberty if he doesn't want to look like John Howard... Let's hope I'm wrong! I think his little arms and legs have straightened out noticeably since 5 weeks- I'm pretty sure one of the fat rolls in his arm has sort of 'unfolded' because the bone is now a bit straighter- there is a strip of skin that even looks a slightly lighter colour, with the fat-roll-crease still visible in the middle.



Communication:

Setri's 'vocabulary' has expanded from 'ack' and little coos at 5 weeks to distinct consonant and vowel sounds. He stunned us one evening last week by clearly replying 'hello' in response to my 'hello'. Total coincidence of babble, of course, but it made us jump out of our skins the same as if one of the cats had said it! We did try and get him to repeat it but he got the hiccups- something that seems to happen almost every time he attempts 'conversation' just lately! He also expounds on his misery when he has gas pains- rather than crying he puts on an anguished expression and 'tells' us his problems. Much, much nicer than crying! Sometimes his babble sounds so close to being real words that I feel like I'm dealing with one of those freaky possessed children so often featured in horror movies. I even got a little bit scared once... Sorry, Setri!

As much as I'd like to stalk Setri with the camera when he is smiley and conversational, I tend to forget about the camera and focus on chatting to him instead. I only vaguely mind that I'm not capturing every second of his existence for posterity.

Setri uses such a wide range of facial expressions nowadays, but the absolute funniest is his 'sad face'. God it's funny. It tends to appear when he's overtired and something happens that he doesn't like (whether we can figure out exactly what that 'something' might be is another matter...). For example, when Gam used a squirt of cold baby shampoo on Setri in the bath one evening. Presto: Sadface!

 7 weeks old, doing his 'sadface'. It breaks my heart and cracks me up at the same time :)

6 weeks old, falling asleep.

Sleep:

He's still pretty good at nights once he actually drops off to sleep. That's the key. Now he has different cries for pretty much everything we are easily able to differentiate between the times when he actually needs something or is having pains, and those times when he is just experiencing pre-sleep grumpiness. Sometimes that pre-sleep grumpiness can go for hours- the boy's got stamina! At those times it makes little difference whether I'm holding him or lying in bed next to him (we're still co-sleeping, much to Gam's chagrin after having paid $500 for an Arm's Reach co-sleeper cot. *cough*) so I feel able to leave him to cry for a while at those times. Once he's out cold he goes down for a solid 6 hours before needing a feed, after which he'll drop off for another 2-3 hours. I have had to do a couple of wee-hours (ho ho!) nappy changes, thankfully those are fairly rare. Setri doesn't cry at night when he is trying to poo or needs his nappy changed (he pretty much never cries at night), but he wriggles. I will try and ignore it, such is my longing for sleep in the early hours of the morning, but he wriggles so much I have to give in, and then we both happily go back to sleep.

6 weeks old

Physical:

Setri might not be particularly advanced mentally- none of that child prodigy stuff, fortunately or unfortunately, but he's still pretty advanced physically for his age. He hasn't yet mastered rolling over from back to front or vice-versa, which puzzles me (he can flip himself over, but that never seems deliberate), but he can stand for considerable periods using only his hands to hold onto ours to balance, and his trunk control is good enough to sit up straight when sitting or being carried. Except when he's asleep or very tired, in which case he turns into a cute, chubby ragdoll.

He can't yet haul himself up into a sitting position, but to be honest I have yet to see him try- I think he probably could if he did try. Just a day or so ago I started playing an age-appropriate 'game' suggested in some of the child development literature handed out to parents. Basically, the baby lies down, you grab their arms and gently pull them into a sitting position, then lower them again. Rinse and repeat until the baby gets sick of it, I presume.

The parent info literature seems to assume a much lesser degree of head control than Setri has, as it talks about 'letting their head follow' the rest of their body as their neck would tilt back if you pull them up by their arms. Not for Setri! He loved being pulled into a sitting position (neck staying level with the rest of his body every time)- he got a little smile on his face when he realised he could help himself go from a lying position to being that much closer to looking me in the eye. But as soon as he was in a sitting position he instantly began trying to pull himself up using his hands (holding my hands) and push himself up using his fat little thighs... into a standing position. I guess his chubby thighs aren't all fat, because on the second go he succeeded! Previously it was just us lifting him up into a standing position and letting him hold himself upright- turns out he is entirely capable of hauling himself once he is in a sitting position... so as soon as he figures out how to sit up, we're screwed, I reckon.

As for his crawling, he still does his 'army crawl', meaning we can't leave him on the couch unattended, but it hasn't really progressed in terms of technique, only efficiency. He is perfectly capable of doing a full push-up to extend his arms and lift his head right up, but he doesn't seem to have any instinct to bring his back legs up and crawl on his hands and knees. It wouldn't surprise me if he went straight to walking, as he really really seems to want to stand and walk. Sometimes when we're holding him on our laps and he gets bored he will stand up and start straining to head in the direction of something that interests him, like a dog on a leash- it's quite clear at times that he is frustrated by his limited physical abilities!

7 weeks.

Toys:

Setri really only started being at all interested in toys and things other than Gam and I at 6 weeks. Even now at 9 weeks I would say his interest is limited. He seems particularly interested in textures- different kinds of tree leaves, the bristles of a toothbrush, the softness of a cotton wool ball, the rubbery buttons on the remote control and the phone. Some friends, Nick and Liz, gave him a toy consisting of a super-soft stuffed pony's head (with a soft woollen mane) atop a cylindrical cotton-cloth handle encasing a deep-toned squeaker. Setri likes to touch the toy but doesn't appear to like the squeaker- although he hasn't figured out how to make the noise himself, so that will probably change.

Shannon and John, some other friends of ours, gave Setri a large, floppy white toy rabbit of cartoonish proportions, right on 6 weeks; that was the first toy he ever showed an interest in. Not in playing with it himself, but when I made the rabbit 'dance'. He loved it- the weighted limbs (due to miniscule plastic beads in the 4 paws) move in a comical fashion, as do the floppy ears. Once I even managed to get Setri to stop crying by making his rabbit dance... only to have him start crying again when I stopped (and stop crying again when dancing resumed).

Setri's Uncle Richard and Auntie Cil (Priscilla) flew up from Sydney to visit us for the Queen's Birthday long weekend and meet Setri for the first time. Cil brought Setri a rather garish but extremely interactive toy dragon- 'Sneezy the activity dragon'- that has all sorts of bells and whistles: a rattle in one paw, a squeaker in the other, and a bell in the tail; a mirror in one foot, a pull-out daisy hidden in a pocket in the other; 'crinkle fins' and 'crinkle ears' (encasing cellophane for that pleasing 'person sitting behind you in the cinema eating noisy snacks' sound). 'Sneezy' is coloured predominantly bright lime green, with some colourful polka dots on his back and red and yellow stripes on the tummy. Setri seems to enjoy patting and rumpling the 'crinkle ears', gazing at the mirror and batting at the tail to make the bell ring. He's not always particularly accurate with the batting, but he gets a look of real concentration on his face as he fixes to give it a whack... and when he misses he seems to either lose interest or get frustrated very quickly! Patience is definitely not Setri's strong suit.  

Unfortunately Setri is a big fan of the TV. I swear I once even caught him trying to look past me when the TV was off, as if to check if there was anything on! We don[t have a CD player, so I sometimes play CDs through the Xbox and put the colourful 'visualisations' on full screen for him, which he seems to like. He particularly enjoys Fats Waller music, but I would like to get him into some other classics and start broadening his taste. He has always reacted to the mood of the music we play for him, as well as that he hears incidentally. Spooky or dramatic music seems to scare him, while jaunty tunes make him happy. A few weeks ago we were watching an episode of Family Guy while Setri was whinging (probably gas pains, but potentially tiredness, or both), and at the end of the 'special episode' there were a bunch of tunes from other Family Guy episodes. Setri stopped crying and perked up for the duration of each song, before lapsing into whinging again once they finished. There was one exception- a song featuring the old paedophile, Herbert, which made Setri burst into tears again... that was a pretty hilarious, if apt, reaction!

 Post-nappy-change, 6 weeks old. Took him no longer than 5 minutes to wet through that nappy... what goes in, etc. etc...

Medical:

Setri had his first round of immunisations last week. I was about ready to cry when the nurse was prepared to give him the first needle, but he surprised Gam and I AND the nurse by not crying- instead he screwed up his face and kind of went "Hnnnnnh", before relaxing as if nothing had happened. Unable to believe our eyes, we waited for his reaction to the next one, only to receive the same reaction! He didn't exactly shout "Hit me!!", but we were pretty darn impressed. Even crotchety, hard-to-impress Gam (who has been telling Setri since he was about 2 weeks old to 'harden up'!) was impressed. Unfortunately he didn't escape a few adverse side effects of the vaccines and was grizzly and pained for a couple of days, but he escaped relatively lightly.


Social:

Since he started being more communicative, Setri has reacted more to social situations. Now when we have large groups of people around he wears an almost constant worried expression, whereas before it didn't seem to bother him in the slightest. Same when we hand him over for cuddles to a new person (even though he still loves cuddles from pretty much anyone). He did offer up a couple of smiles and chuckles for his Auntie Cil when she was visiting, though, which is a good sign. I don't want him to be a shy kid even if I would like him to stay a mummy's boy! I hope he takes after anyone but me in the shyness department- his daddy and two gregarious uncles will be better role models in that regard.

While Richard and Cil were visiting we all went to the Ron Mueck exhibition currently showing at the Gallery of Modern Art (GoMA). and had great fun photographing Setri with the sculptures- I'll put the rest of those photos in another post.

I have only ventured out twice on my own with Setri- just short walks to the local shops- and have not yet taken him on public transport... while commuting I've how women with babies and prams are treated by some of the despicable bogans on the bus routes around here, and how slack and unprofessional some of the bus drivers have been about dealing with it (I've only seen one model example of a bus driver doing the right thing). If I do use public transport to travel somewhere it will be the train, not the bus.

Taking Setri out in the pram was a bit of a pain, although it was useful to carry home some of the heavier things I bought, partly because I have to get the pram down the front stairs without Setri in it before using it, and partly because he always seems to whinge when he wakes up in the pram- I had to haul him out of it in the Woolworths checkout queue in order to quiet him, which meant there was a bit of juggling to do with the groceries. He was good after that, but the next time I took him in the sling and he slept the entire time. I had feared the sling would be a bit hard on my back for walks, but it was dead easy even though I'm still not particularly fit. I think the difficulties I had walking when I was pregnant must have been entirely due to the problems I experienced with my hips, not the enormous pregnant belly I had attached to the front of me, as the walk to the shops was a cinch, even at a very brisk pace. So the sling isn't great for housework, but is just fine for light shopping and walks. We want to get a backpack-style carrier for bushwalks, though.

Two of our outings as a family have been to Australian Breastfeeding Association classes (for pregnant women) as the 'demo parents and baby' to breastfeed and answer questions about our experiences of the birth and breastfeeding and being new parents. We've been invited back for one more class before Setri turns 3 months and is 'over the hill' in terms of his usefulness as a demo baby. At the first class we didn't share our story of our experience at the RBWH because none of the questions we were asked directly led to it. Probably just as well as I still couldn't talk about it without crying, at that point.

At the last class, when Setri was 7 weeks old, we were asked how long I had to stay in hospital after the birth, which kind of necessitated a lengthy explanation of why I was there for 5 nights despite the birth going well. I felt it was a very relevant tale to share, though, because of the disgraceful lack of breastfeeding support I received when the doctors unnecessarily placed Setri on nil-by-mouth at 2 days of age; I also told them I wished we'd stood up for ourselves sooner and not let them stop us feeding him when we knew he was fine. I said it was important to ask for help in maintaining milk supply if help wasn't offered, as happened to me.

I tried to relate the story in a way that didn't engender a complete mistrust of the doctors at the RBWH, but it would be hard for anyone to hear a story like ours and come away with a good impression of the place. I made sure to emphasise that my experience with the Birth Centre midwifery care was one I would recommend to anyone, and that my impression of the 'ordinary' midwives for the birth suites likely meant that a good birthing experience could be had there too, so hopefully no-one wound up unnecessarily terrified of the place but instead came away with a healthy scepticism of the 'care' that might be offered postpartum.

There haven't been all that many male partners attending the ABA classes that we've been to- only a handful each time, but everyone seems to appreciate Gam's input. It helps that he's fairly knowledgeable about the mechanics of infant feeding thanks to his speech pathology background, but I think the male partners seem to appreciate a guy's perspective on everything. A lot of our experiences with antenatal care, and postpartum, seem to exclude male partners, or at least put them very much on the periphery and make rather negative assumptions about them; I hope Gam's input can remedy that in some way. The ABA co-ordinator for the classes said it's often difficult to get the male half of a 'demo family' to come along and speak at a class; Gam thinks that's partly because the exclusion of male partners creates a kind of self-fulfilling prophecy- exclude them from enough of the pregnancy and birth, undermine them enough and they will eventually stop trying to be involved. I'm sure it doesn't apply to all male partners, but I'm sure Gam isn't the first to feel that way.

Setri has been very well-behaved at the classes (he's well-behaved everywhere when we go out, except Woolworths- he hates Woolies), although at the second class he was uncharacteristically not hungry and didn't have any inclination to demonstrate breastfeeding until a good way into the talk. And of course everyone thought he was terribly cute. I'm dreadfully biased, but they were right ;)