In the home stretch!

Well, I feel like I made it past the final obstacle between now and the baby's first birthday-the goal in the back of my mind this whole time has been that magic 12 month mark. I just got back from a girls only trip with some college friends and with 4 days away I was worried that either the baby would not be interested in nursing when I got back (he is at the stage where he has trouble sitting still long enough to nurse) or it would impact my supply negatively enough that I wouldn't be able to make enough but we both made it through just fine. It was kind of annoying to have to disappear every 2 or 3 hours for 20 min or so while I pumped and everyone else was hanging out and having fun but it wasn't too big of a deal. The worst was the travel day at the beginning of the trip, I had a connecting flight and then a 3 hr drive at the end and I went about 12 hours with only two short pumping sessions in the airport bathroom with a manual pump so I was in pain and leaking like crazy when we got to our destination. On the way back my flights were spaced better and I had lots of time to kill in the airport and was able to pump for longer so it wasn't as bad. I even made it back with about 80 oz of frozen milk, a bonus I was not even expecting! I called the airline a couple of days before I left and they said that as long as it was in my checked bag I could transport breastmilk so I packed a small cooler in my suitcase and froze the milk as I pumped it. So now we have about 3 months left and I have about 350 ounces of frozen milk and I am still getting plenty when I pump so I see no reason why we can't make it to his first birthday without formula! I had to give up so much of my vision of motherhood when I went back to work, and I am so thankful that breastfeeding was not one of them! One of the reasons I have kept going so long is that I felt like breastfeeding was even more important because I was working since it would give us a way to continue the bond that was started when I was home on maternity leave and it would also be something that I could give him that his childcare provider couldn't. Sometimes at night when the baby is so sleepy and full of milk and I am rocking him before I put him down I am so full of thanksgiving that I pour my heart out to God, thanking him for the miracle of parenthood.

On a humorous note, we had his 9 month check up a couple of weeks ago and the pediatrician was concerned at the size of his head (99% percentile) and that his soft spot was still pretty open, after checking his soft spot she turned to us and asked if we had larger than average heads. We both said that we thought we did, since we have trouble finding hats that fit, so she measured our heads and apparently my head size is off the chart and my husband is in the high 90s. So she stopped acting concerned and said she was just making a note for the dr to check his softspot at his 12 month appointment. This explains why even 18 month shirts are too small to pull over his head sometimes!