Reunited and it feels so good!

Well, we survived! This past weekend was our weekend away for the office Christmas party. It's always a lot of fun, but this year it meant leaving my baby for the first real time, which made it slightly less relaxing. However, it was also the first year I haven't come back to exams, so I guess that was nice! Anyway, as mentioned before, my parents came up to watch him while we were gone, and everything went wonderfully. They kept him on schedule (thanks Mom & Dad!), he was his adorable baby self, and I made it through with minimal tears and only two calls to check in.

Since I've had such issues with supply, I was unable to pump anything of substance for my absence, so Ethan was an all-formula baby for a day, which he seemed to tolerate fine. Unfortunately, he's been fighting me at the breast most feedings since we got home, so I'm worried he's become too used to bottles. Speaking of supply, I of course was pumping during every feeding in order to maintain it, and I ended up with 8 ounces to take home. I was thrilled to get 2 oz. the first pumping session since previously I'd only ever gotten about 1/3 oz. However, with the exception of the following morning, I held steady at about 1 oz. a session every other time, which was disappointing. I know Ethan is able to extract more than the pump, but I think that definitely shows my issue is a low supply, which refuses to be corrected no matter what steps I take. It makes sense, after all, though. My body didn't want to conceive Ethan without medical assistance, my body may not have carried Ethan without medical assistance, so it follows that my body won't feed Ethan without medical/technological assistance, and I just need to be grateful for all we have. I feel my dedication to breastfeeding was pretty evident, though, considering I had the joy of leaving the party for 25 minutes while I sat out in the car in sub-freezing temperatures to pump, all the while paranoid someone would come out to investigate. Needless to say, I got less than an ounce that session!

Meanwhile, my parents dressed Ethan up in a Christmas outfit from my grandmother and proceeded to take dozens of pictures of him under the tree for their Christmas card photo. He was obviously happy to play with his grandparents:


I'm still sad about one thing from the absence. It just so happened that the weather chose this weekend for Ethan's first snow, something I had (admittedly inexplicably) looked forward to since before he was born. Yes, I know he has no clue what's going on, but it's something I'd been waiting for, and we missed it. Thankfully, there was still plenty of snow on the ground when we returned, but I missed him seeing it fall. My parents said he was enraptured with it and kept staring at the snow-covered trees. ::sigh:: After we got home on Sunday morning, I bundled him up for some exploration, and my dad got a few pictures:



So now things are basically back to normal. After having slept 9 hour stretches the three nights before we left, he only went 5 hours while we were away but was back up to 7 hours last night so maybe that won't last. Hopefully the fighting at the breast is just temporary, and I won't have to keep forcing him to nurse during those feedings when he's being difficult. I had about a foot of hair chopped off at the Pinehurst spa, which is making it more difficult for him to grab ahold of, so that's a welcome change for me. While the weekend was enjoyable, I'm very happy to be back with my baby boy!