Remembering Linus' First Months

As we inch closer to Linus' first birthday, I am compelled everyday to reminisce about the first days after we brought him home from the hospital. They were tough, exhausting, stressful, scary, and wonderful.

He was a big guy at birth, weighing in at 9lbs 7oz. And when we brought him home, he didn't fit most of his newborn clothes and there was no way we could fit him into the newborn swaddlers someone had so graciously bought us. Oh well. He slept his first night (though I am not sure slept is the word to use) in his car seat, as it was the only place he would allow us to put him down where he wouldn't cry. (We would later be made to feel quite bad about the car seat thing by his then doctor. We switched from him quite quickly.)

And, yes, he was swaddled in a hair towel at this point.

He cried a lot those first nights. Cried to the point that Steve and I were crying, too. At night, he would have cluster feedings lasting hours (and because I was nursing, I can tell you it was not necessarily fun). We would have to carry him all over the house trying to calm him. I even found myself pushing him around the house in his stroller trying my mightiest to lull him to sleep. To no avail, that night he was awake from 1 or 2am until 8am. Later on, we would think back and realize...oh yeah, he was colic and we didn't even really know it. Luckily for us, it only lasted about 6 weeks.

Moments of peace...

For the first 4 months he didn't nap. And when I say he didn't nap, he didn't nap. He had maybe a handful of times that he slept. I thought at the time I would never make it through. But, then one day he found his thumb, and sleep found him. He grew like a weed (still does in fact). He smiled, fussed, learned to roll over. And as we approached the holidays, Steve and I became more used to our roles as parents. We got an idea of how to make things work for him and things didn't seem so daunting. The blessing that Linus is became ever more apparent. (Of course, that might also be because he was no longer crying for hours every night.)

We look back on those days fondly. Even though many of them were tough, we would do every bit of it over and over again for Linus. We are so blessed to have him in our lives!!!