Cognosco

Happy One Month birthday, Little Dude!

I can’t believe that it has been a month since you made your entrance into this world. Already, you have changed so much. You have stopped twitching so much, and you wake yourself up a lot less often (thank god). You made noises in your sleep the first few days of your life that sounded just like Tweek in South Park that were accompanied by your startle (Moro) reflex. The sound was a highly charged, gutteral “Ah!” that has already become a distant memory. I didn’t know that the Moro reflex was a common newborn thing until recently, so I just thought it was funny as hell. I am fascinated by all of your primate reflexes—the way your little toes try to curl around things and your hands curl around my fingers and I find the Moro reflex fascinating, although annoying, when it is the culprit of frequent waking. Already, these reflexes are fading a little.

You made all sorts of noises when you were first born, and the midwife dubbed you a “talker”. I would have to agree. You mutter and mumble and make all sorts of noise all the time, even in your sleep. This makes you officially a Terrell. I think of you as my little cranky old man, because your astrological chart is stuffed full of Pisces and Capricorn. You were born with an Aquarius Sun, a Cancer ascendant, and a Capricorn moon. It’s a pretty heavy natal chart, and vastly different than you daddy’s or mine. You have lots of karmic old soul stuff going on, and it shows. Once I began thinking of you as a crabby old man, so much of your behavior made sense and became endearing rather than annoying.

You love to be held, and in fact, there was a rough patch where you would only fall asleep being held, and promptly wake (no matter how deeply asleep) as soon as you were put down. I thought I would lose my mind. Were it not for your daddy, I probably would have. But in the last few days, you have actually slept in your own cosleeper or the pack-n-play several times for varying lengths. You may fuss when initially put down, but usually go back to sleep. You like to be put down on your side, although you often eventually roll to your back.

Other quirky things—you love to have the balls of your feet petted, a fact discovered by the woman who took your blood for the newborn screen. I love to touch your little feet, as I fondly remember the feel of them kicking and sliding around inside of me. You also love the hair dryer. I discovered this due to your nasty diaper rash, when I began using the hair dryer to dry your bottom effectively. At first, I thought it was just the sound. Oh no. It’s the feel of the warm air on your feet and nether-regions. I can let it run after the diaper is on and actually have a chance to wash my hands before you demand to be taken off of the changing table. Of course, you love the vacuum cleaner sounds too, so my floors have never been cleaner. Surprisingly, you are not particularly soothed by car rides and spend much of your time in the car screaming instead of sleeping.

You discovered your tongue about a week ago, which was ever so amusing. That’s about the same time you discovered you could suck  on your hands. You try to fit the whole hand in your mouth. If you keep it up, there may someday be a slot for you on David Letterman. 

We set up your swing a few days ago, and much like swaddling, you protest loudly at first, but then are slowly overtaken by its soothing effects. Speaking of protesting loudly—YOU HAVE A TEMPER. Like, a serious flash temper that is amazingly powerful and passes in an instant. It is in this respect that you remind me most of myself. Your daddy says you look like me and nothing like him, but I say you have his ears and his lips and you make several expressions that remind me so much of him it is startling. Ah, the joy of genetics.

You have already been sick twice (not counting the Jaundice). You and I shared a cold, which may have contributed to your resistance to sleep last week. Now you have a weird rash, that I thought was baby acne until it took over your body. It is not accompanied by any other symtoms, and is likely a weird virus or the aftermath of the cold. Maybe that doesn’t count as "sick", but I wanted to document it anyway. 

There are a few things I have learned in the last month already:

• Fitted diapers kick ass, and I love my SIL for sending them to me.
• Bumkins diaper covers kind of suck. Yes, they are cute. Yes, they are breathable. But they have a lot of badly placed Velcro that will either scratch the hell out of the baby, or scratch the hell out of you if there aren’t clothes on top of the cover.
• Medela pumps are fascinating and worth every penny.
• Babies are hard to take care of.
• I really should have slept when the baby slept those first few weeks.
• Diaper rash is a nasty beast, and babies (maybe particularly boy babies?) have all sorts of folds all over their bodies I didn’t know about that hide all sorts of weird funk..
• Not all babies like water. The fact that we didn’t have the water birth we anticipated was apparently a foreshadowing of your disdain for the substance. However, we managed to bathe you in the last two nights without you screaming bloody murder, so maybe you are warming to the idea.
• Baby toots are funny.
• I have a lot more patience during the daylight hours.
• Cosleeping is not as scary as I thought, but is not particularly comfortable (for me, anyway). It is, at times, absolutely necessary.
• Breastfeeding while lying down is awesome once you’ve got it figured out (if you have large boobs, it helps to put something under them).
• A simple piece of cloth can be made into a baby carrier that is much more comfortable than a sling, but you can get a sling on and the baby calmed down much faster.
• Swaddling really does help.
• Bouncing on a birth ball really does soothe a fussy baby. Which is cool, because I only used mine for about 5 minutes while in labor.
• Motherhood is so much more than I expected. So much more work. So much more fun. So much more, period.
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Pictures soon to follow…