Third time's a WHAT?

Whoever made up that saying third time's a charm...lied.

i think it should read something like third time's less of a surprise, or by the third time it's easier to deal with drama. Maybe even third time's more interesting, but I definitely would NOT call it a charm! At least not when you're talking about having 3 children!

I guess I was feelin' a little cocky about this whole baby thing about a month ago. I figured, I'd done the newborn thing relatively successfully twice before. I'd done the whole getting up at night thing, nursing a newborn, and even dealing with a toddler and a newborn before. I figured that the baby would be the EASY part! I thought it would be the other two that would make things harder. Well, I couldn't have been more wrong. Remember baby Clara weighed 7 lbs 12 ounces when she was born. A nice strong, healthy weight! We went to her one week check up and she was down a bit to 7 lbs 1ounce, normal still! She was nursing frequently, but seemingly well. She was peeing, pooing, and sleeping with a little fussiness, but overall, a normal babe. Well, this past Monday we went back to the pediatrician for a check. She was 17 days old and still weighed 7 lbs 1 ounce. The pediatrician said, "not good!" (note to health care workers...do not tell the mother of a child who has cancer "not good" about anything that can be remedied! love ya, Dr.S!) He asked about her nursing to which I said, "ya! She's great! I nursed the other two for a full year, I'm sure it's going well!" He then sent us to the lactation consultant at the hospital for an appointment. They weighed her, I fed her, then they weighed again. Long story short...she wasn't nursing correctly, she has some wierd tongue thing she does and she wasn't even getting half of the milk she should have been getting. I was starving her and didn't even know it! The good news is that she can suck a bottle correctly. So I spent the week worrying, pumping bottles of breast milk, supplementing with formula, and feeding this baby every two hours without delay. Our house is full of "feeding equipment!" Cora put it best yesterday, "Mommy's with tiny baby's are BORING, because all they do is pump bottles and make bottles!" It has seriously consumed me! I'm a huge breast feeding advocate. It's better for the baby, less fuss, and easier. However, I'm an even bigger advocate of sanity and in the words of a very wise man, you've got to know when to hold em, know when to fold em, know when to walk away, know when to run. I'm giving this crazy pumping, nursing, formula concoction one more week and if it doesn't work out more easily, I'm throwing in the pump for a giant supply of enfamil with lipil!

The good news is that the hard work has paid off!!! Today we weighed in on the Dr's scale at a whopping 7 lbs. 8 ounces. Still not up to birth weight, but gaining 7 ounces in 5 days is very good! We have an appointment tomorrow (yes Saturday) morning with an ENT just to be sure baby love's tongue thing isn't an indicator of another issue. She also has this congested nasely gurgling sound when she sleeps. So we'll be sure to let you know how that goes. But today I am sticking by the guy who said, "Two's Company, three's a crowd! " He could teach the "third time's a charm" guy a thing or two! I bet the latter didn't have 3 kids!