Crazy days!

Life has been crazy around the Lloyd house hold as of lately. I haven't really had time nor inclination to update. In my spare time I've been reading Twilight fan-fiction because I am obsessed lol! I might need an intervention soon :P Anyway..

Maddox- is 3 months today! I cannot believe it! My little guy is getting so big! It amazes me how fast he grows and all the new things he is doing each & every day. Maddox is a talker! He just wants to talk so badly, it really cracks everyone up. He coos aka "talks" all day long it seems. :) He is still sleeping in his crib every night and it's going fairly well for the most part. He has good and bad nights. Most of them are so-so. He normally sleeps a 4-5 hour stretch, then a 3 hour, then a 1.5-2 hour stretch. He getting plenty of sleep but since I got don't go to bed until 2-2.5 hours after he does, it's not enough for me lol I need to start going to sleep when he does. Maddox had a stomach bug that lasted 15 days! It has been over about a week now, and I am so thankful. It was so awful. His bottom was so raw from having diarrhea 10+ times a day. I felt so awful for him. But, we made it through our first bout of sickness and we are all just fine now!

Eric- has been gone for a month now. Time is going by so slow! I can hardly wait for August to get here. I just want to see my hubby. He may actually get to come home a couple days inbetween basic and OCS which is great. I really hope they allow him to come home for those 2 days. I've gotten to talk to him on the phone about once every 1.5 weeks or so and it really helps. He writes me about every other day, so I always have a few letters to look forward to each week. I try to keep myself busy and when I'm down I focus on the fact that we are one more day closer to being together as a family again.

Me- I'm doing okay. Tired as usual, but I'm making it! I am on my second period of this month! I think it's really wearing me down losing so much blood. I've NEVER had 2 periods in one month. My first PP period was June 2. It lasted about 8 days and then I got my second PP period 3 days ago! It's just nuts. Both of these periods have been so much more heavy than any of my pre-baby cycles.. it's just not fun at all. I also have an appt with an ENT on July 9th. I will most likely be needing my tonsils out. I'm not looking forward to the recovery of a tonsilectomy but I am looking forward to not feeling as though I'm swallowing my tonsils each time I swallow. My mom and my grandmother will help out with Maddox while I am recovering, so that is good news for me. I can't imagine trying to recover with noone to help me. I am starting back to school part-time in August and I am really looking forward to it. I don't feel good about myself just sitting at home everyday and doing nothing to better myself. Don't get me wrong, I LOVE spending the days with my son, but I need some adult interaction and I also NEED to feel like I'm accomplishing something aside from diaper duty and naptime each day. It's only going to be 2 days a week, so I'll still be with Maddox a lot.

Other- We are leaving for Florida Friday morning at 3-4am. I am really excited to take Maddox to the beach for the first time. I do worry he will be very fussy being out of his element, but hopefully once we get there and get settled, he will do just fine. My grandmother is also going with us and everyone is going to take turns sitting with Maddox during the day. I know he'll probably only be able to go to the ocean/pool for an hour or two a day. He really hates the sun in his face and his skin is so sensitive. I worry about him getting burned even with sunscreen & a hat. It will be nice to get away with my family and enjoy nature! I love love love the beach/ocean! I will most definitely post photos when we return. I also plan to schedule Maddox's 3 month pictures fairly soon as well (after vacation). I will try to get back to posting more than just my boring life updates, lol. I hope everyone is doing well!

Until next time,
Ashley

Night two!

So, the method my mom used worked fairly well for us! Granted, he isn't sleeping through the night but he is NOT moving (in the swing) and he is in his own room sleeping pretty well! With my mom, he was down around 11:30 and up around 3:30, then back to sleep at 4:30 and up around 8 :) Go Maddox! Last night was the first night I did it and he didn't even CRY at all. He actually fell asleep in his swing at 10 and slept there till 12:30 when I woke him up cause it was actually time for him to eat at 12. He was definitely a tired little boy! I had the music already playing in his room when I took him upstairs. I fed him in the dark with the music softly playing and he didn't even finish half his bottle he was so sleepy LOL. I kept trying to get him to eat, but he finally just clamped down on the nipple (guess he wasn't that hungry), so I put him down in his crib and he turned his head to the other side and was out like a light. This was about 1:15 and he woke up around 5:15! Yeah-yuh! Four hours may sound like nothing to some mamas but it is amazing for me! He has slept one 7 hour stretch in his swing but other than that 4-5 hours is the longest he has ever gone. I fed him when he woke up at 5:15 and he was back down a little before six and slept till a little before nine! Awesome! Now, he is in his swing just a swinging and is back to sleep LOL. After day light I don't mind if he is in his swing sleeping, but during the actual night time, I want him to be in his bed. Soon enough he will probably start skipping that middle of the night feeding an sleeping through. Anyway, I am so proud of my little guy and I am praying tonight is as good as last night LOL!

Until next time..

Love, Ashley

Mommy hurts when baby hurts..

Maddox has been a fairly horrible sleeper since the newborn sleepiness wore off around 2 weeks of age. ONE time after we were at my husband's going away party for 6-7+ hours he slept through the night in his swing. He slept from 12am-7am, but that was obviously a fluke because that was the first and last time that has happened. Anyway, he will sleep 4 hour stretches (just one) if he is in his swing and then eat and then sleep another couple 2-3 hour stretches. He does the same thing if he is being held all night. I KNOW this is not good for him. He needs to learn to sleep in a bed (whether his pack 'n play or his crib) by himself. I know I am not doing him any favors in the long run by keeping him moving (like when he is in his swing) or holding him. Last night he ate his bedtime bottle around 10:30pm and then he had his bath at 11pm. After he bath I got him lotioned up and dressed and then layed him in his crib in his room with baby lullabies playing softly as the lights were dim and patted his bottom till he peacefully fell asleep. I was thinking to myself "this is great, he actually went to sleep in his crib!" Yes, since I was patting his bottom that means he was on his tummy. My son will sleep no other way. He has fabulous head control, so I am not going to force him to lie on his back when he is clearly uncomfortable. Back to my story, after he was asleep, I took my shower and went to bed myself. He was asleep by about 11:45pm (I didn't look at the clock so it's approximate) and I was in bed by around 12:45am. At 2:30am I woke up to my son screaming. I went and put his paci in his mouth and he went back to sleep. I went back to bed as well and not even 10 minutes later, he was screaming again. This went on every 10 minutes till about 3:30 when I realized he was not going to go back to sleep fully. I got him up and changed/fed him. I was so tired I layed him in bed with me and he still slept horribly as did I. I layed in a very uncomfortable position trying to calm him, but even still till 8am the next morning neither of us slept very well. At 8am I fed him and came downstairs. I put him in his swing knowing he would fall asleep. As he did, I did too. I was so exhausted. We both slept in till twenty minutes after eleven AM.

I live with my mom since my husband is away at training (we sold our condo in January because we knew he was leaving and I did not want to be along). My mom came through the living room and asked how Maddox slept to which I replied "really sh*tty, I'm exhausted." Later on in the day, my mom told me she wanted to let me sleep tonight and she wanted to try putting Maddox to bed. Let me make a note by saying that I DO NOT believe in the cry it out method of putting babies to sleep, but for his to learn to semi-self soothe and to sleep in his crib, he is going to have to cry a little. My mom wanted to try something she used with my brother and I that got us sleeping through the night. She put him in his crib awake after being fed, changed and burped. If he starts crying, she will allow him to cry for 10 minutes, then pick him up and rock him/soothe him, then put him back down again in his crib. If he starts crying again, she will let him cry for 10 minutes then do the same thing till he ends up falling asleep. She came downstairs a bit earlier to do some laundry and I could hear him screaming on the monitor. It broke my heart! This is the whole reason she wanted to try this herself because she knows I cannot let him cry for ten whole minutes without picking him up. After ten minutes she went upstairs and picked him up and rocked him for a few minutes, then layed him back down. He didn't cry anymore after that. She just went and checked on him after not hearing him stirring on the monitor for a bit and he is sound asleep. Now, we will just see how long he actually sleeps. I love that little boy so much. Even though I KNOW it is important for him in the long run to learn to fall asleep on his own and to sleep in his own bed, it is hard for me to listen to him cry. I know he is not physically "hurting" but I am afraid he might feel emotionally "hurt" that mommy doesn't come scoop him up and snuggle him tight. *sigh* I'm such a softy when it comes to my baby boy.

Sometimes I think this part of motherhood is the hardest. It is so hard to watch your baby upset even if you know it is what is best for the. Well, since I have the night "off", I should go get ready for bed myself. Until next time..

Love, Ashley

This is how it started...

Hi, all. I'm Ashley. I am 20 years old and a new wife & mother. I married the love of my life on December 16, 2008 at 6 months pregnant. We were blessed with a very unexpected pregnancy at the beginning of our engagement and it's been pretty much a roller coaster ride since. My husband's name is Eric and he is nearly 13 years my senior. He is 33 years old. I met him on Myspace, believe it or not, when I was a senior in high school. Two days after my 18th birthday to be exact. It took some convincing him (6 months of it) to get him to give us a serious try. The age difference freaked him out, which is actually pretty comical because many of the people I'd tell his age thought of him as some pedophile,in which they would respond, "what does a 30 year old man want with an 18 year old girl/woman?" Oh, it used to drive me nuts! I wanted to say, only if you realized! TEN months after we met, we became "official" and we have been inseperable since.

After we found out about our "unexpected but very wanted" pregnancy we had to come up with a plan about what we were going to do as far as finances and our future. I was only a sophomore in college and though he had a bachelor's degree (in business) and his real estate license, the economy sucks where we live in NW Georgia. He had been looking for a good job for such a long time and the economy was only getting worse at the time, so we were running out of options. That is when we discussed him joining the service. We decided it was the route for us to go. He did some research and found out that he was too old for all branches of service except for the Army and Airforce. He really wanted to go into the Airforce, but his college GPA wasn't quite high enough. It was a about .4 less that the required GPA. So, that made his choice easy, the Army it was. He visited his recruiter and began the recruitment process. He took the ASVAB test and surprised all of the recruiters in the office by only missing 4 questions total. He scored in the top 98% on the ASVAB test. When he told them he had a college degree, they were very impressed and decided to court him for Officer Candidate School (OCS), which is very difficult to get into by the way. We found that out really quickly! After many rigorous tests, both mental and physical, he was officially accepted into the OCS program this past February.

On March 23, 2009 our beautiful son Maddox was born at 11:22am via csection weighing 8lbs 10oz & was 19.5" long. He is the most gorgeous little man in the world ;) The past 9 weeks have been life changing. Eric & I have a new found love and respect for one another & I have felt a love that I never knew I could feel and that is for my precious little boy.

On May 26th, Eric left for 9 weeks of Basic training. Today is day 3 and I feel so empty inside. My son is in his swing crying at the moment. I am at my wit's end. He can sense my despair and I've NEVER seen him have three fussy days like this in a row. He cries even when held, so for my own sanity, after he was fed and changed, I just put him in his swing and let him fuss a bit. I know he misses his daddy. I feel like I have a broken heart. My husband is at basic training in Lawton, Oklahoma at the moment. He was originally supposed to be in Fort Benning in Columus, GA, but his post was changed unfortunately. In 9 weeks time, Maddox and I will fly out to OK to watch him graduate. Following his BCT graduation he will go through 12 weeks of OCS which will be at Ft. Benning as that's the only post in the US that has OCS. Afterwards, we are unsure of what his training will hold. This is definitely way harder than I had imagined, but my son is my number 1 priority so I have to make it through.. and I will. I definitely look forward to the day when he is finally stationed and we live together as a family again. But, until then, I will enjoy my Maddox and take this opportunity to lose my baby weight & get fit again!

Well, I suppose this is enough for one day. I am sorry it is so lengthy but I wanted everyone who may read in the future to know about how this crazy life of mine began (well the wife and mommy part). Until next time...

Love, Ashley