Bizarre Rejection

As the gnome gets older it becomes more and more obvious she is a perfect female miniature of her father. I call her his mini-me. It's all good and cute, until someone gets hurt... This morning my husbands grandparents emailed me. He hates his grandfather, so they won't email HIM, but anyways, they mentioned that the gnome looks just like my husband did as a baby. It's one thing to know it and tell yourself something, but to have others say it... Well, it's a bizarre sort of rejection I'm not sure I know how to deal with yet. You see, I spent my entire life being told I look nothing like my own mother and exactly like my dad. Maybe if my mom hadn't died I wouldn't be so upset by this, but by virtue of the fact that she did, it really hurts my feelings to be told I look "nothing like" her or even just to be told I look like my dad and glaringly omitting any mention of my mother.

The thing is with the gnome, it's not like i consider myself any great beauty, but I think every parent, no matter how ugly, wants to see a little of him or herself in their child. Sometimes I think I see it in the gnome, but I can't be sure. I guess only time will tell. I think she has my stern eyebrows and maybe my lips. I notice she looks more like me when she's brooding (which I also do quite frequently). It's just weird, this whole thing. I've gone from not looking like my mom to not looking like my daughter. For the record, I do think I look like my mom- our faces are shaped the same and I have her mouth and cheekbones. It may not be as obvious as the eyes, but it's there for those who care to look. Problem is, nobody ever does.

In other news, things are going well with the gnome. She hasn't had any issues since "the incident" and seems perfectly happy. I do have some more parenting issues I have to confess to, though. First, I have to admit to being far too reliant on a pacifier. The nurse gave her one in the hospital and she's been in love ever since. Granted not with the same one, since the younger of my two dogs scoops them off the floor as fast as the gnome can throw them and then destroys them, but there's this one style from Nuby called "paci-pals" that she likes. The problem is, I read in 'what to expect' that pacifiers aren't necessarily the best habit to start, but then I've read that giving them at bedtime can help reduce SIDS. I have resolved to only give it to her when she is having a major meltdown. For now I'm trying to let her rely on her fingers and not take the "easy way" out and just plug in a paci every time the tears start. I anticipate an increase in headaches...

The other thing I've been doing makes me feel even more guilty. I haven't been breastfeeding her. I have been feeding her breast milk, but I've been pumping it almost exclusively since the day we left the hospital. She wasn't getting a great latch, and then she'd have a meltdown and get frantic because she couldn't get enough milk, so I just decided that pumping and feeding her a bottle would be easier. I'm half-assing my child's nutrition. Aren't I great? Well no more! You see, a week or two ago I decided to just try breastfeeding and she got it very easily- it literally took three seconds to get a latch and she stayed on for nearly 20 minutes. This was between meals, though, so she wasn't too hungry anyways. But last night, my guilt got the better of me, and i decided to do a little experiment. I decided to nurse exclusively throughout the night, and just see what happened. I have about 8 ounces of pumped milk in the fridge, so if worse came to worst, I could just heat up a bottle for her, but luckily it wasn't needed. She nursed at 8, 12, 3, and then 8 am (she slept that long and woke me- I was not awake to not feed her)- all successfully, with no fussing or latching issues. Maybe her mouth has just gotten bigger? I don't know. They say that bottle feeding causes nipple confusion, but in my case it seems to have actually helped to teach her the right way to latch. I feel pretty good about trying exclusive breastfeeding from now on, but I'm saving that pumped milk in the freezer just in case...

Oh! And I finally figured out how to get that boppy pillow to work, too! Before she'd just slide right off it, but this morning it worked perfectly, and my back didn't have to get all weird and contorted to feed her. No more half-ass parenting for me!