Quick updates:
Thomas was born at 9 lb.s 5 oz. and left the hospital at 8 lbs. 12 oz. He regained all of that weight by his first pediatrician visit 4 days later. :) The doctor was so impressed and said TJ was "thriving." The first weekend home also happened to be the weekend my brother John graduated from DePaul with his MBA. Consequently, my grandparents from Iowa were in town for John's graduation and also to meet TJ. Jim's parents were also staying with us so we had a house full! It was wonderful to have so many people enjoying our little guy's first week.
On his one week birthday TJ rolled over! He was on his tummy and somehow managed to just flip himself over. He did this two more times but that was it - so just a fluke. After the first night (Jim and I were up all night) we slowly got settled into a night routine. The first month or so TJ was waking up every 2-3 hours during the night to eat. Luckily, he did go back to sleep fairly quickly so it wasn't too bad.
Breastfeeding. Wow, what a wonderful yet challenging thing! TJ was (is) very eager to eat. All the time. We got off to a pretty good start in the hospital, unfortunately being so large, TJ had a much bigger appetite than I could provide for before my milk came in so he was supplemented for 2 days in the hospital with formula. Luckily, by the time we got home my milk came in and I could fill his belly. The first week was very painful for me. It was challenging to juggle things while trying to get him to latch on and TJ didn't quite "get" how to open his mouth wide enough. That resulted in a visit to the lactation consultant and some very sensitive and bloody nipples. The lactation consultants are incredibly helpful and I recommend anyone just starting to breastfeed see one, no matter how well you think you are doing. Breastfeeding consumed about 75% of my time that first month. TJ would spend about 30-45 minutes feeding, snooze for a bit then wake up and repeat. We had a pretty large hiccup when I landed back in the hospital and I'm sure a lot of women would have just stopped. I'm determined to breastfeed for at least a year if not longer so with the nurses help I pumped every 3 hours throughout my stay. We didn't have any milk stored previously so TJ did have about a day of formula until I was able to send milk home with Jim. It was a nice chance for my nipples to heal though!
TJ's first trip out of the house was at 5 days old when we went to Mandy's birthday party.
He was a good little trooper and slept the whole way in the car. After that, we've found him to be a good rider, almost always sleeping in the car. We had another trip down to the lake house over my 28th birthday through the 4th of July.
TJ also had his first boat ride!
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