Another night of bedtime FAIL! Tonight featured Mommy (Em) for the first period, then I nursed him for a second time, then Mommy again, then she took him for a walk in the Ergo in sheer desperation from 9:20pm to around 9:50pm, tried to put him in the crib once he was down, his leg got caught, then the cats were ridiculous and I had to try again and a third round of nursing and rocking and he finally went down at 10:25pm. My only hope is that this was a full 20 minutes earlier than last night, so if we keep up this trend, in just a short 9 days, we'll be back to east coast time. Sigh...

Coming back from the West Coast is such a disaster for children's sleep.

Is too much, let me sum up*

• I am currently exiled to the bedroom because the first two times I tried to put the baby to bed this evening ended in such failure. This is try number two for Em and we have been trying for a collective 3 hours. I have decided to blame bedtime tonight on having arrived on a red eye from California yesterday morning and my kid believing it is 7pm right now and not 10pm.

• Except for the above, I would say that bedtime and naps have been going really quite well, except for the whole Traffic Game problem, which means I can never ever say that.
  
  
• X finally got around to learning to walk at 14.5 months, after 7 months of cruising. He apparently just didn't see any point in walking when he could get around just fine. Now at 17 months, he walks well, is trying to figure out running, climbs big people stairs only holding on to the railing with one hand, plays basketball (okay, so all he really does is throw a ball in a toddler basketball hoop, but he does it 20 to 30 times in a row and applauds himself after each shot), and is a big fan of downward facing dog.
  
  
• He has acquired an obsession with balls (a.k.a. ballp. We have no idea why he has decided there is a p on the end. He is perfectly capable of saying ball without a p, he just chooses not to do so.) He has five or six different types of balls in the living room at any given moment and loves throwing them to us again and again. He also enjoys throwing them past the baby gate toward the kitchen and then begging us to retrieve them for him.
  
  
• Which leads us to the next point, he has learned to say please. He has also discovered that smiling and tilting his head to the side while doing so gets an even better response. His first multi-word phrase was "ball please get". Now we are working on thank you once we get the ball for him.
  
  
• My mother (Nana) taught him another important word/concept when we were visiting last month. I love her dearly but she will never be on time to anything in her entire life. After twenty minutes of us telling him that we would go to the museum as soon as Nana was ready, he proceeded to stand at her front door in his coat and boots, holding on to the knob, yelling "GO GO GO!" A new word for X, a familiar experience for his Mama.
  
  
• He loves books. We are so happy. Our family of bookworms welcomes a new member. He brings books to us when he wants us to read to him. He also will pick up a book, sit down with it and turn the pages while talking to himself quietly (he's "reading" it to himself, just like his mommies). Last month, he fell asleep "reading" to himself for the first time. Cutest thing ever:

• He is also obsessed with ducks, or "qacks" as he is wont to call them. He loves all images of ducks and all books about ducks. He is also willing to accept substitutions as long as they are close.
  
  
• ....I return after my third and finally (!) successful attempt to put X to sleep. To sum up tonight's bedtime, five moms (Kate, Em, Kate, Em, Kate), four hours=sleeping child and bone tired moms. There is much else to say to sum up the last four months, but for now, this will have to suffice because it is 11pm and we haven't had dinner yet.
  

*title borrowed from The Princess Bride, by way of the awesome ladies at Two Hot Mamas

One Year Molar for the WIN!

And just to make life interesting, Emily called down the hall this morning while changing his diaper. Guess who just had their first one year molar break through during the night? The poor baby, his entire head hurts.

We have an answer (well actually two answers)

X was running a fever of 102 when we checked this morning, so we were off to the pediatrician again for the second sick visit this week. We waited 45 minutes to be seen, but as soon as they took his temp and it was 102.6, everyone was very helpful. We were given tylenol to give him (which made me a bit anxious as it was 20 minutes early and he's on both tylenol and ibuprofen, but oh well). The nurse tried to give it to us in a suppository, and we were like, "we are not putting anything up his butt that we don't have too, please can we have the liquid", and she gave us the liquid in a cup, and we had to ask for a syringe, because our twelve month old is seriously not going to drink medicine from a cup, even if he is the best baby ever at taking his meds.

Then we saw our doctor, without even seeing the resident first. And it was so great that we got to see Dr. A, because for the first time all week, X didn't scream the entire time he was being examined. He was quiet and let her poke him and check his ears without even turning his head away and even gave her a tentative smile. I love our pediatrician, she makes my sick baby smile. She smiled as soon as she checked his first ear and said, "We have an answer" and then checked his second ear and said, "Actually we have two answers." Yup, poor X has a raging double ear infection. Poor baby. He is now on anti-biotics and should be feeling better in the next day or two. Thank heavens for an answer that doesn't involve the word flu.

Baby continues to be ill

We are slogging through. He remains feverish, whiny, clearly in pain. We'll head to the doctor tomorrow if he hasn't improved. I really hadn't realized on a practical level how pleasant and lovely it is to have a well child until the last two weeks. No one is getting enough sleep and everyone is cranky. To remind us all that there is a happy, smiley baby in there somewhere, here is X on a happier day:

There is no place in the Baby Book for "Baby's First ER visit"

Well, we have survived X's first (and last, at least for a long time, I hope) trip to the Emergency Room. Chalk the trip up to first time parents and a child who has breathing trouble even before he has a fever of 101.3 for two days and heavy congestion.

We ended up going because his fever wasn't getting any better and after waking up from his afternoon nap, he seemed to be in worse distress and his breathing rate was increasing and so we called his doctor and she said to take him in because she couldn't tell if he was getting sicker and better safe than sorry. We rented one of the two Zip.cars in the garage a block and a half from the house (yay, I love Zip.car) and drove to the hospital where he was born, home of the local pediatric ER. It was actually a very positive ER trip. Everyone was kind and good with X and he was seen quickly and we were reassured and not told that we were crazy first time parents (which we were kind of expecting to happen). And we got him home in an hour and a half and only an hour late for bedtime.

The funniest thing to come of "Baby's First ER Trip" was this: The first sentence in his discharge papers: "Your son has been diagnosed with a viral syndrome, also know as a 'cold.'" When we saw this we couldn't stop laughing. The entirety of the discharge paperwork was so clearly written by someone insanely frustrated by constant ER visits for silly things. This is totally going in his baby book (if I ever get to filling it out!)

My baby is sick

My baby is sick. We were blessed in X's first year with a child who pretty much was never sick. I mean he has his breathing issue (a separate post to come), but no particular illness. But now at 12 months and two weeks, he is making up for lost time. He's had the family cold for the last few days (tired, achy, congested, seriously runny nose) but seemed to be doing a little better. He hasn't needed to swim breathe in order to nurse in a day and he can suck his fingers (the middle and fourth finger of his left hand are his best friends) without choking and having to suck in air through his mouth.

He's been feeling antsy and he was looking better so I took him to the first class session of Baby Boogie at the YMCA (we just joined two weeks ago) this morning. He enjoyed the first part of class, playing with the kids his age (playing = crawling over and attempting to play with the same toys they are already using) and then he suddenly started melting. We were in the middle of doing the "meet another baby" segment of class and he started crying and clinging to me. So I excused myself and sat down to nurse to see if that helped. He hadn't had his morning nap and Em and I had agreed that if he got tired at class, I'd just pack him up and come home. Nursing didn't help and he had started wailing in a way that he has done so rarely that I started getting worried. I strapped him into the Ergo and walked to the bus, took the bus home and walked to the house. He sobbed the entire time. He collapsed into sleep five minutes before I got to the house, but woke as soon as I got inside, beginning to scream, the scream he only does if he is in pain.

He felt hot, so Em and I took his temperature and it was 100.8. We called the doctor and were told to bring him in. We packed him up and took the subway to the clinic while X finally slept for 30 minutes. Em checked us in. She told the office staff we were here for a sick visit, they asked if he had a fever, we said yes, they said don't even sit down, we'll put you in a room and we were ushered right in. They are clearly pulling all potential flu cases out of circulation, which is really smart. He woke up and started crying again and continued to for the full hour we were there, except for five minutes where Em lay on the exam table and held him. The poor baby doc (intern/first year resident, he didn't say) was so scared of him. He found it impossible to listen to X's lungs or check his ears because he wouldn't stop screaming. Babies are like dogs, they can smell fear. The intern finally said he just go get the doctor and fled the room.

I love our pediatric practice. There are four doctors and I like all of them. The doctor we saw today was the only one I hadn't met yet and he was great. Friendly, good with X, and very informative, explaining everything really well. We are really lucky that the practice we had with our awesome insurance pre-job loss is also the practice that runs the peds clinic at the hospital X was born in and takes Medicaid. Dr. G checked his lungs and ears and declared them clear. X's fever had gotten to 101.3 by the time we got to the office. We are to give him tylenol and ibuprofen in rotation to bring down his fever and watch him closely. We took him home and he nursed and fell asleep for an hour and when he woke up, he was much more like the baby we know. Tired and hot, but friendly and smiling and playing some. He went down around an hour early for bed and I am hoping will sleep through the night and feel less dreadful in the morning.

Returning to Blogging

I went away from blogging. I think it had a lot to do with the level of denial needed to get through our life at the moment. Well, at least denial about the financial part of our life. I have this beautiful, amazing, funny child and a loving, wonderful wife and we have a roof over our head. Most days this is what I focus on and I let a lot of the little details of how our life has changed in the last nine month slip away. Writing concentrates the mind on the details and I've been taking a holiday of sorts. However, I think it may be time to stop with the holiday. So I'm back and we'll see how this goes.

A great deal has happened in the last year. X has grown from a tiny newborn baby
to a big one year old.


I went back to work for six days before being laid off in the middle of February. I have been a SAHM for X's first year, although this was not a choice I made but just how life happened. I would not trade this year home with him for anything, but I would trade the way I got there.

Emily has officially entered the academic job market, applying for quite a few jobs. It is exciting, yet nerve wracking, waiting to hear if/where we will be moving this coming school year. This job hunt has the effect of putting aspects of our lives on hold. I look forward to being able to move forward decisively at some point.

We are recipients of multiply types of state aid. X is on Medicaid and he and I are on WIC (because according to the state, I am a single mother), although now that he just turned a year, WIC is now just for him. I have been receiving unemployment benefits since February which are due to run out in the middle of January. When that happens our family will suddenly qualify for food stamps and more free health care, which is good because the COBRA subsidy for my health insurance runs out December 1st and I REALLY can't afford the COBRA insurance without it.

So this is our life right now. Well, at least a small portion of it.

The Great Rolling Over Experience

We just arrived in Rehoboth Beach after a wonderful weekend in DC (much to be said on DC later, but tonight's post is on a different topic). Over the weekend, X got to play (ie. stare at other babies and toddlers while they played, he was the second youngest) with many children and had a wonderful time.

Perhaps inspired by the antics of all the other children, he did the most amazing thing at 8pm this evening. He rolled over for the first time! It was so cool. We were giving him naked tummy in the middle of a diaper change and we were talking about what soft skin he still has and we weren't even paying that much attention to what he was up to, and boom, he rolled over! We put his diaper on and then he rolled over two more times! For the sake of posterity, I will note that he is fifteen weeks old now.

Many thanks to the many children who inspired him over the weekend to go where he had not before!

A full Year of X

Today is the day. X has been present in our lives in one form or another for one full year. Yes, that's correct, today is the day our little baby was conceived (although there is some argument it might actually be tomorrow). It's amazing to think about a full year of X. Even as a tiny fetus he had so much personality. And looking at him now, he's the same little being he was long before he was an outdoor baby. On my way out the door to work today he gave me a sloppy, almost kiss and proved to me that all the work is worth it for a loving, happy baby who is always excited to see me.

In other news, my workplace is pretty much collapsing around my ears, but that is a thought for another day.

Second Day in Florida

Today was a good day, mostly. I got up early with X (7am, sigh) and we read and sang and visited with Pops and then Em got up and did a dissertation interview over the phone and then we ate lunch on the back porch. We split up for the afternoon and Em and X went with J (Pop's girlfriend) to the Salvador Dali museum in St. Petersburg and Pops and I went to the marina, rented a boat and took it out to the Gulf of Mexico.

It was a gorgeous day and a lovely boat, which I got to drive once we were out of the difficult bits and in the open Gulf. According to my father, I did quite well driving the boat. Being out on the boat with my dad was interesting. I had wondered when he suggested earlier today that we split up and do this for the day if he wanted to talk to me by myself, and in fact, that may have been why he suggested it, but being my father, he is remarkably incapable of speaking about emotional or difficult things. Sad considering the man is a psychologist. My mother always spoke about this problem as the shoe makers children having no shoes. He's good with other people's emotions, just not his or ours.

According to Em, the museum was nice, although X was largely unimpresssed and needed a lot of attention in order not to have a small meltdown on the guided tour. We attempted to have dinner around 6:30pm, but X was totally done for the day and cried whenever we tried to sit him or ourselves down. He screamed and fought when I tried to nurse him, so I made the radically assumption that he wasn't hungry and was annoyed that I'd tried to silence him with food. Em walked him while I ate and then half way through dinner, he went insane and I left the table to try nursing again, and this time it worked and Em sat down for dinner and I fed him and we reheated my meal after he was done. He continued to be sad and whiny until we finally got him down after another nurse at 9pm. I think that this trip has been hard on him with all of the new things. Although he almost rolled over today, which was awesome. Another day, I'll tell you about how my child doesn't like sunshine.

Flying and Florida

I may not have mentioned this before, but I really don't like flying. I avoid it. For our honeymoon we went to Florida, and to honor my dislike of flying, we took the train from NYC to Miami. Lovely and romantic, but a little insane to take a 27 hour long train ride when the flight is 3 hours. Now, my solution used to be valium. Sleeping on Em's lap for the entire take-off and early flight (the part that makes me craziest) works well. During pregnancy that didn't work, so I suffered through.

Flying with X is an entirely different challenge, because I have to be strong for him and not freak out all that visibly. I nursed him while we waited for the plane to take-off and, get this, he slept through the entire take-off. Strike that, the entire flight. He was amazing. And I coped decently well, only holding him very tight against me and clinging to his little hand as he slept through it all. And once we were up in the air, I listened to my ipod and held him sleeping on my lap and it wasn't so bad. And I don't have to do it again until next Saturday, so that's good.

Florida is nice so far. We are staying outside Tampa with my dad and his girlfriend, which is interesting. Their house is nice, but appears to have no heat and although it is Florida, it is also January and I wish they had more blankets. We have so far had dinner, gone to the CVS for diapers and snacks (they have no food in their house, I swear, but that is a comment for another day) and watched a British mystery on the TV, with my father falling asleep 20 minutes in and snoring, which actually was kinda nice, as it reminded me so strongly of my childhood, where that happened pretty much every night.

First Day Back

Today was my first day back at work. It was also the day that Emily finally became the third person in our home to come down with the Death. I was really worried that would happen, but hey, what can you do?

We got up at 8am, X and I sang songs together, Emily got him changed and dressed and we went in the living room and we put together my working supplies (breast pump, bottles to pump and store, freezer bag with ice packs, snacks). Then I sat down and nursed him and we cuddled for a few minutes and in no time, it was 9:10am and I had to leave. I cried...a lot. I tried to smile and wave and leave and not upset him, but I just couldn't pull it off. I actually don't think I upset him but he got pretty wet.

I got to work a few minutes early and the first part of my work day went well. I got handed a remarkable pile of paper and I started sorting through the chaos. For the time I am part-time (until March) I am only doing one of my jobs, the crazy details, infinite paper part. Em had a dissertation interview in the city, so Uncle watched X and took him shopping and to the library for Spanish board books (discussion of trying to raise X bilingual coming some day soon). Uncle, X and Em met at my office to trade baby and have lunch. It was great to see him and we cuddled and he got held by half my office and we nursed and then Em was feeling like death, so Uncle rearranged his scheduled and went home with them and stayed with them until I got home.

The second half of my day was also fine, until the last 5 minutes, when I got called into a tech crisis that I should not have been in charge of, even if demanding a problem be fixed 5 minutes before the end of the day was appropriate. Twenty minutes later, I couldn't fix it and had called our back-up tech guy with a desperate plea to come in the morning to help. I then packed up and ran to the subway, already 15 minutes later than I said I would be and with a sick wife, a sad, non-napping baby, and an uncle who had to be at work pretty much yesterday waiting at home. And then life went downhill.

I waited for 40 minutes on the downtown platform waiting for a frakking F train. In those 40 minutes 3 V trains came, so not helpful, and 4 F trains, all so full that I could not even try to fit on. Finally at 7pm, fifteen minutes after I am already supposed to be home, I get on an F and START my trip. I didn't get home until 7:45pm, at which point, Uncle kissed and ran and I went on duty with the baby and looking after Em.

X was sweet and happy to see me and we hung out and cuddled and played with his new bouncy seat that Uncle had bought him while they were shopping. He LOVES the toys that dangle in front of him. This is the first time he's really noticed toys on a toy bar, so this is entertaining. This bouncy seat converts to a toddler rocking chair when he's older and goes to 40 pounds, so that's cool. I changed and dressed him for bed at 9pm and we nursed and he went down at 9:30pm. I ran to the gas station on the corner (yes, we sometimes shop at the Mini-Market at the gas station when it's late and we don't have other options) and got Em Vitamin Water and then we watched some TV and now we are going to bed.

It has been a very long first day back at work, but I will focus on the fact that I survived it. Oh, also, X turned 3 months old today! His monthly review will come as soon as I find time in my life to write it in the next few days between work and flying to Florida on Saturday.

Unwell

I am still unwell, not vomiting, but aching all over and unable to sleep comfortably. Emily has (wisely, but it still makes me sad and anxious) told me to stop breastfeeding when I am feeling this unwell. Wisely because when I tried nursing him after watching the inauguration on TV (OMG! No more Bush! Obama!) he hit me and cried and refused to stay latched and I couldn't do anything but hold him and cry myself. He picks up on my unwellness and feeds right back into it, so I'm pumping and Emily's giving him bottles until at least tomorrow morning. I believe it's the right decision, but it makes me even more anxious about going back to work on Thursday. Have I mentioned I'm supposed to start working part time on Thursday, and I feel like Death on a Stick?

But we have a new president and I will focus on that and my beautiful boy and get over this stupid flu.

I have the Death

I woke up at 6am this morning with an irresistable need to vomit. This sensation has not gone away all day. Unfortunately, this has given Emily a crash course in staying home with the baby all day by yourself, as I have been barfing or sleeping all day. Adding to the problem is that X has just started a growth spurt and this makes him not nap almost at all and need to eat every hour. Boob mama not being available due to vomit, we had to dip into our freezer stash. Sigh. I guess a dry run of what the end of the week when I back at work will look like isn't a bad thing, but I could have skippped it, honestly.

I can, however, add a new impressive breastfeeding moment to my list. The first vomit of the morning was done into a bowl over X's head as he nursed. Yes, you read that correctly, I nursed him and threw up at the same time. I even impress myself.

Best Mama Moment

I had one of my best moments as a Mom tonight. It was a fleeting moment, blink and you would miss it. X had been down for the night for about an hour and he was getting restless, crying in his sleep. This happens once or twice in the first few hours he's asleep, so one of us will get us and sit in front of him in his bouncy chair, where he sleeps until we all go to bed, and talks him back to sleep, just repeatedly telling him he's okay, that he's not alone and he settles back down.

Tonight, I crouched down in front of him, telling him that he was safe and Mama was there, and he stopped moaning, opened his eyes slowly, his eyes focused, he saw me, he smiled a sweet little smile and closed his eyes and went back to sleep. Just seeing me and hearing my voice let him feel safe and loved. It is so all worth it.

No More Newborn

X is 12 weeks old today. When we took our newborn care class (yes we took childbirth class, breastfeeding class and newborn care class: we are education nerds) the teacher told us that the first 12 weeks were the trial by fire, do whatever you need to to survive weeks. They were the newborn weeks.

I guess that means that I am no longer the mother of a newborn. I have become the mother of an infant. An infant who smiles and squeals with glea when we sit down to do our morning sing. An infant who discovered today that he can use his arms to push himself up very high indeed when he is on his belly, yelling and grunting the whole time, because he was putting so much effort in, but refusing to stop. An infant who still falls off the breast, milk rolling down his chin. I will miss my newborn, but this infant thing is awesome!

Handedness

A very quick thought tonight before I head back to the sad, moan-y baby in the living room:

So Em and I thought of the question we forgot from the random question post the other day:

X is showing a very distinct preference for one hand over the other and we're wondering if we are hallucinating or if he really is already left-handed? I guess it makes sense that if he's left-handed there is no reason that he wouldn't already be grabbing more with the left and sucking his left fingers in preference to his right, I had just never thought about it before. Hmm...

More about sleep

I've decided that any schedule X appears to be following is irrelevant for the moment, as he appears to still have the tail end of the cold he's had the last week. I thought he was over it a few days ago, but considering the remarkable amount of snot we've been pulling out of his nose and the slight cough, I'm thinking I was wrong.

He has good mornings with cheerfulness and a long nap (1.5 to 2 hours) and then his afternoons feature very short naps from which he wakes up crying hysterically and not stopping until he is held close and reassured that his moms haven't disappeared while he was sleeping. It's kind of amazing, he truly seems to wake up with the fear of being alone and all you do to calm him down is keep telling him that Mama or Mommy is here and he's not by himself and he starts winding down again. His congestion isn't helping the naps at all, either.

I never imagined when I started this blog that it would feature quite this much discussion of my son's sleep, but I suppose that's just because I didn't know any better. Sleep is REALLY important. I go back to work part time in less than two weeks and I really want him to be on as good a footing as possible before I do. Sigh.

Random Questions

So today's post is a series of random questions that Em and I have been wondering about. We have several books, but they don't all agree and we also are a little to crazy busy to read them at the moment (which is weird because we are both crazy readers usually).

When did your children start teething? X seems to be heading in that direction, but it seems really early and I think he may just be loving his new found hands.

At what age did your children grow out of their infant carseat? We're starting to shop for our convertible carseat and big boy (or at least not stroller frame with carseat) stroller and are wondering about time frame. He appears to be long and skinny, so may length out of his Snugride before he weighs out.

Well, I thought we had more, but now that I'm writing, we can't remember the other questions, so that's it for now.

On the sleep front, he woke up at 8am, we sang and read books, he took a two hour nap, woke up at 11:30am, took a second 30 minute nap, woke up at 1:30pm, we went to the library, we came home and he was up the rest of the afternoon and evening, except for a few micro naps of less than 15 minutes and was whiny and sad for the last two hours of his day before going to sleep after nursing at 10pm. So it was a good day, he just seemed as if another nap or two would have been good, but he couldn't settle. Oh well, we seem to be managing. Thanks for the advice on the sleep front.