Post-Partum Hair: WTH Happened?

One of the most glorious parts about being pregnant is your hair. Whether it looks more shiny and beautiful or not, it gets thicker than normal because it doesn't shed. For someone like me, who has very thick hair, your hair gets super thick! I didn't mind so much except when it got warm out and I wanted that thick mane off of my neck.

It has now been over 4 months since I gave birth to Grace. About three weeks ago, it started. The shedding. My head finally decided to let go of all that excess hair. It has been shedding in clumps. Every time I comb out my hair or wash it, loads of hair falls out. Every time. My hair has gone from super duper thick to very slightly thick. It is thinning daily though so I'm sure it won't be in the thick category much longer.

My hair post-partum with my oldest daughter, Ginny.
The hair didn't change. It stayed as curly as normal.

There has been another interesting development with my hair this time around. The character of it has changed.

When I was little, my hair had a little bit of wave to it, but for the most part it was straight. It was like that through high school, except on the rare occasions where I got a perm. I got my last perm soon after high school graduation, the spiral perm which was big at the end of the 80s.  Unfortunately, the perm started to fry my hair so during the spring of my freshman year in college, I got the perm taken out and cut my hair shorter to get rid of all the fried hair. Not long after this, I found that my hair seemed awfully curly. I thought that the perm must not have come out fully and just assumed that for a long time. Then, one day, I realized that my hair was getting curlier. The nature of my hair went from slight waves to curls. Every year, no matter how long my hair was, my hair got curlier and curlier.

My hair now. It has wave and some curl, but not nearly the
same as before.

Until now that is. My hair seems to have reverted back to the way it was in high school. It has definite waves and some curl, but it is no longer as curly as it was. It also requires that I wash my hair more often. When it was curly, my hair dried out faster and I washed it every 3-4 days. Since it is straighter, I find myself having to wash my hair every other day.

I'm not sure what to think. Is this change temporary or permanent. I guess only time will tell. Until then, I guess I will have to pull out my curling iron to style it since letting the curls go natural no longer seems to work.

Flailing Arms

A rare event. Grace asleep without being swaddled.

When Ginny was an infant, she hated being swaddled. She would wiggle and squirm until she could get her arms out of her bindings. Then, once out, she would roll onto her side and sleep. She started doing this Houdini act at 2 weeks old. I stopped attempting to swaddle her by the time she was 3 weeks old. There really was no point.

Grace, our charming 4-month-old baby, is nothing like her sister was. She loves being swaddled. She needs it. It calms and soothes her. Ginny used a pacifier to sooth herself, but Grace won't take a pacifier at all, much less suck on her thumb. So, swaddling it is.

I wish that I could get away with no longer swaddling her. I can't. If she is not swaddled at bedtime, she starts to flail her arms about and wakes herself up, every time. I keep trying, but it has yet to work.

The problem is that we are beginning to running into issues. Grace is a big baby. The swaddling blankets are getting smaller and smaller, making it more difficult to achieve a tight swaddle. Most baby stores sell the product Swaddle Me, but they only work on babies up to 20 pounds. Grace is very nearly 20 pounds, if not that weight already.

Hopefully, someday soon, she will either learn how to fall asleep without flailing her arms or how to sleep through the flailing arms. Maybe. I hope. Sigh.

Wordless Wednesday: The Toddler Tornado

There is nothing quite like the way a toddler can make a mess. In only a few short months, I will have 2 toddlers. I can only imagine how bad the mess will be then.

My clean, picked up living room! How it is "supposed" to look.

Another angle of my clean living room.

20-30 minutes after Tornado Ginny came into the living room.

Another picture of the effects of my toddler tornado.

I'll have to ask my husband,a meteorologist for the NWS, where this mess sits on the Fujita scale...merely an F1 or could it be an F3?