Got Milk?

Got Milk?, originally uploaded by Ava's Antics.

Doni and I have swallowed our pride and decided to go ahead and supplement Ava's feedings with formula. Doni pumps all of her milk and then we add 1/2 oz of formula to the bottle before feeding it to Ava. If she is hungry again before Doni's body has had a chance to "top off the tanks", then we will give her about 1 1/2 oz of formula to tide her over until Doni can pump some more. Ava is still getting all of the breastmilk that Doni is producing, but she gets formula to squelch her hunger where solely breastmilk is lacking. We'd rather have a well nourished baby than let our pride make us think that all she needs is what we can provide. I've noticed that she seems to be a little less fussy than she was before (although she was never than fussy to begin with). Bottle feeding has one significant difference from breast feeding from Ava's perspective.... she has burps that rival her daddy's!

Last night Ava had some bowel movements that I will refer to as "blitzkrieg". First she pooped... we changed her diaper. Shortly thereafter she pooped so I went to change her diaper again. Just when I had gotten her bottom all cleaned up, she decided that she had to empty her bladder. I hurriedly tried to get a diaper under her to catch the overwhelming flood. So now there is a line composed of Ava, Ava's urine-soaked diaper, and Ava's feces-loaded diaper. At this point Ava must have been thinking "Watch this dad. I'll make you proud." With a grunt, she shot a stream of creamy brown nastiness a full 8 inches before it dropped to lie across both diapers. By this time I was clearly over my head and called for backup. With Doni's help, we changed Ava's pajamas (which had sopped up the urine the second diaper missed), wiped her clean (again), placed the hazardous waste that was her diapers in a bag for disposal, and cleaned off the changing pad (which was thankfully plastic and not cloth). I tell you what.... this baby girl is going to have abs of steel if she can maintain that kind of muscle control.