1 month

I can't believe my baby is already a month old! Time has just flown by!
How did she get so big?
We took her to church for the first time yesterday, and she wore the only girly thing we've bought her so far (the pink diaper, not the dress, that was from her aunt Katherine). While passing her between us at one point, someone sitting behind us exclaimed, "She looks just like Hyrum!"
Friday we went to an outdoor, local American Idol type thing. It was our first real family activity/nursing her while out (Hy said I got a dirty look, but I didn't notice).
She loves sucking on our fingers, and hates pacifiers!Yes, yet another carrier (we have 8, a bit obsessed? maybe, but 3 were free, 2 were used, 2 were 50% off and I don't remember about the last one). This one was good for going on a walk this morning!
Passed out afterward
This is her "I'm pooping" faceA week ago today she started giving us real smiles. I always forget to grab the camera because I'm busy staring at those cute smiles! Here are some from today!She is a such a sweet, easy baby. When we first put her to bed, she sleeps 4-6 hours before waking up the first time. She even put herself to sleep a few nights ago! Usually Hyrum puts her down by letting her suck on his finger, but one night she just turned away from him and fell asleep by herself. I'm not holding my breath though! She loves baths, being snuggled, and staring at her black and white book. She hates getting dressed! Luckily for her it's summer so there is only one layer to force on her protesting little body.

Also, some of you know the extensive nursing problems we have had, but here's a rundown and an update. In the hospital, she had a poor latch and often refused to nurse. By day 5, she had lost 2 pounds and would scream and arch her back every time I tried to breastfeed her. We got an awesome lactation consultant (couldn't have done this without Julie Johnson!), rented a hospital grade pump and Hyrum started finger feeding her (this is when he lets her suck on his finger and inserts a syringe full of milk into the side of her mouth, and then either she sucks it out on her own or he squirts a little in as she sucks). We didn't know what was wrong or why she had a poor suck, or if she would ever nurse.

We continued doing this while continuing to try to get her to latch onto me, or onto a nipple shield. After a few days of this, she started refusing the breast again since she had learned that food comes from fingers, so we stopped the finger feeding, and instead fed her with the syringe using the nipple shield. Our days/nights looked like this- set alarm for every 3 hours, pump, change Claire, feed her with the syringe, put her back to sleep, wake up somewhere between 45 min- 1 1/2 hours later (depending on how long it all took) to start the process again. When she was a week and a half, she latched on and nursed all day, but we realized she was able to actually get hardly anything and this resulted in few wet diapers for her, and plugged ducts for me, so we went back to our routine. We also got an sns and used that occasionally to encourage her to suck better.

When she was almost 2 weeks old, we finally found out the problem- she had a type 4, posterior tongue tie. This meant that her frenulum was too tight and prevented her from lifting her tongue and making the proper motions to get milk. This type was really hard to diagnose (we had to email pictures to an expert in New York) and found out that it was nearly impossible to find someone locally (found tons back east) to snip it in an office procedure with local anesthesia (every ENT or dentist I called did it under GA for a baby). We did finally find an oral surgeon that had some experience, but it took some convincing since the youngest baby he had done was a year. We got in to see him the next day, and after looking at her tongue and reading a article about it that we had brought (written by the expert in NY), he and Hyrum went into another room while I stayed and cried. There was a lot of blood and crying, but both immediately stopped once she nursed. I thought I could tell a difference, but didn't know if it was just wishful thinking.

I started nursing her during the day with the sns (topping off with the syringe if needed), and at night with the syringes/nipple shield. After 5 days of this, I decided to try just breastfeeding and see how it went. That was last wednesday and she seemed fine, but that night went about 8 hours without a wet diaper. The next morning I gave her about 3/4 oz with the syringe after a feeding (and that took a lot of coaxing) and I used the sns again, but she only got about half an ounce throughout the day. Friday I went back to just breastfeeding and have been ever since. She hasn't had a dry spell with the diapers again; I think she just needed to get better at learning to use her tongue since she's spent the last several months with a totally different tongue making different kinds of motions. It's been a crazy ordeal, and was harder than I ever thought possible, but it looks like we are now past her sucking problems and she will continue just nursing! I'm so grateful for the help and support I've had because I couldn't have done this on my own (Hyrum was amazing). I am also so glad that Claire has only had breastmilk, even if not all of it was mine (donor milk from 2 people including my sister). Yay!