Is Breast milk REALLY Best?

**NOTE**
I LOVE breastfeeding. I hope to nurse Tori until at least her first birthday. Just thought you should know that before reading this.

I hear that all the time. "Breast milk is best." Yeah, well, what if it makes your baby scream and cry and puke all day? Is it still best? I nursed Tori for 3 1/2 months exclusively. She fussed/cried/screamed and spit up all day every day. I tried changing my diet. No dairy. No chocolate. No caffeine. No vitamin C. No onions. No garlic. No difference. The doctor says "clearly, it's reflux. Let's medicate her." I try the horribly expensive medicine and it seems to help. Turns out, it was mostly just wishful thinking on my part. It seemed to help for a week or two, then we were back to non-stop screaming and barfing. After nearly 4 months of doing everything in my power to make my baby happy, I give up. I put her on formula. TA DA! It's like she's a brand new baby! I can put her down and let her play with toys. I can sit down while I hold her. I can have a phone conversation now that doesn't involve me putting her in her room and shutting the door so I can hear. I'm bitter. Formula is stupidly expensive and I make A TON of breast milk!! I have a minor breakdown in the pediatrician's office for her 4 month check up. She has been on formula for a whole week at this point and I am starting to like being her mother. He tells me to keep nursing. Breast milk is ALWAYS best. She's gaining weight and thriving, so I should keep nursing her. Eventually, she SHOULD stop crying. Sorry, Doc, not gonna happen. I'm going to pump to keep my milk production up and donate it to sick babies who need it. I'll give Tori formula for a month, then try nursing her again. If she starts in with the screaming and puking again, I'll pump for another month and try it again when she's 6 months old. After that, I'll probably give up. Pumping is a pain and right now I'm spending twice the amount of time because I have to pump and give bottles several times a day. I feel good about donating my milk to sick babies, so that cuts down on the "bitterness factor" a little. To put Tori to sleep tonight, I pumped myself empty and let her nurse herself to sleep. It was sad because I knew I was just a pacifier instead of the person providing the greatest nutrition she could get. This whole thing sucks. If anyone has any great advice, I could really use it because I've done everything I can think of. In the meantime, thank goodness for Enfamil. It sure is making my life better these days.

Family Reunion

We just spent a few days in Lincoln City, OR with Ben's family for a mini-family reunion. We had a nice time (though some would say the weather wasn't great) and Jim got some GREAT pictures. There were too many to just list here, so I made a slide show. I love getting new pictures of my kids! It took a lot of work to get pictures of Tori smiling, but we managed to get a few good ones. :-)

Good Times with Old Friends

We had the privilege of spending a few hours with some of our old friends from BYU on Saturday. The Carters live in California, but they were up here on a road trip. It works out well because our kids are the same gender and about the same ages! The menfolk played paintball for a few hours while the kids played and Nancy and I talked about babies and the joys of motherhood. :-) When the guys were sufficiently covered in splattered paint, we went to the park and had pizza and let the kids run around like crazy people. Tyler and Benjamin had a blast. Two days later he's still talking about his friend who likes all the same things that he likes. The girls played dress up and watched Cinderella. Tori was sort of a pain, but that's what she likes to do best. After seeing their angelic little baby, I got a little jealous (she actually lets her mom put her down without screaming!) but I love my little girl and wouldn't trade her for anything in the world. I just hope she grows out of this crying thing soon (of course if she grows much more, I won't be able to hold her!). Here's a couple of pictures of our fun at the park.


I'm always amazed at the upper body strength that kids have! Just hanging like that for a few seconds and my arms hurt!

Steven took a picture of himself and I thought it was funny.

Here's a few other pictures from the park. Check out Tori's cheeks. I am a little afraid she's going to get stretch marks if they don't stop growing soon!

My New Hobby

I have a new hobby! DIGITAL SCRAPBOOKING!! I realize I'm a little late on the scrapbooking train, but paper scrapbooking makes such a mess and it's so expensive and it just takes too much effort!! So, I've started using a free program called paint.net and getting stuff from free digital scrapbooking sites online. It's so much easier! Anyway, I thought I'd share some of my work with y'all.