The babe has been eating and sleeping a lot, as he should be.
I've been happy with how he's doing, and it's gotten even better lately. It seems like new babies are almost constantly wet -- and continually wetting through their clothes. He hit the "wet" stage in earnest around the middle of last week, which means he's getting plenty of milk.
He had only made it to his (wrong) birthweight earlier in the week when I took him to the new pediatrician. I had to take him to a pediatrician instead of our typical family doc because the family doc stopped offering all the vaccines for infants and his office staff couldn't handle the paperwork.
Not to bash doctors, who have a lot of pressure on them and who have gone through so much training, but it's an irritation when I get Really Bad Advice from them.
This new guy, for example, was full of complete and total misinformation about breastfeeding. That's one area where I generally feel confident in my expertise. I edited a publication on the subject for eight years, working with doctors and lactation consultants and veteran breastfeeding mothers.
These are among the gems this guy told me:
1) Don't let him use you as a pacifier.
Sorry, but pacifiers were actually invented as fake breasts, not the other way around. Frequent nursing establishes a supply, a supply that I will need for the next year (at least).
2) Nurse only 10-15 minutes on a side.
Then what to do you do with a hungry baby? Oh, a pacifier, of course!
I'm not anti-pacifier, although my eldest wasn't willing/able to use one, and I didn't bother trying with the younger kids. But I don't understand the desire to push the use of one, particularly with a semi-slow-gaining infant.
Paul thinks I should find a new pediatrician. He actually laughed out loud when he heard what the doc had said.
I'm not sure it matters. It does create a bit of a moral dilemma for me -- in that I feel bad for not trying to correct some of the misinformation. After all, this guy is dealing with plenty of new moms who don't know he's full of it. At the same time, I'm not sure there would be any point to it.