Baby Blog

My baby went to bed early today and I was hoping that meant a nice quiet evening. He woke up two hours ago throwing up. He had vomited his dinner all over his crib and well, the smell and the tears and the whole thing was a bit overwhelming. My little breast fed baby doesn’t get sick really. Now that he’s smiling and trying to get out of going back to bed I have a few minutes to assess the situation.

It’s hard when your baby is ill. I remember back when Nik was just a few weeks old and he got a really odd viral rash covering his whole body. The doctor said it was his immune system kicking in but it was scary as there was nothing I could do about it. Since then we had a few days of the sniffles which was probably teething and that’s been it.

Until tonight. Seeing baby Nik in such distress distressed me but I had to calm down think straight and go through the motions of figuring out what the problem was. And I’m thinking perhaps it has something to do with the whole milk thing.

I am allergic to dairy and I breastfed Nik for just over a year. During that time I drank lactaid milk which is like regular milk without the vomit factor. Nik has obviously been enjoying this milk through my milk for a year. We started him on whole milk about two weeks ago.

Because it has taken two weeks for there to be a definite reaction my husband thinks it must be something else. He could be right but I think all signs point to milk. As a non dairy person myself I know you can have a little and be okay. Nik has had milk and yoghurt in small doses. The last two days we doubled up on the dairy to compensate for buying too much and I think it caught up on the baby.

There’s not really too much I can do about him being sick. He drank some water and had some gas medicine and finally, has fallen asleep on his nice clean vomit free sheets. I on the other hand am doing laundry at 11 o clock at night and realizing that with parenthood it’s always something. Maybe my baby has dairy issues, maybe he has food poisoning maybe he has a 24 hour bug.

Maybe I’ll sleep sometime next week.

Sick babies are no fun, as is no sleep, infants that can’t tell you what’s wrong, digging for the thermometer that works in the back of the car during a snowstorm in the middle of the night or scrubbing spoiled milk out of the carpet. But at these times I have to remember the reason I’m a mom: to be there for my baby.

Snuggled up with a slight smile on his face and his favorite toys around him, I think baby Nik is going to be okay. And of course so will I now I’ve blogged my whining and worry away. Being a mom isn’t always glamorous; in fact most of the time its just plain old hard work and sick children I have now learned make it ever harder.

But I wouldn’t change for the world. And I don’t think you would either.