girlfiend

The baby is two months old, and yes, he still needs a blog name.

He’s very strong, and can push up on his arms now when he’s on his belly. He also holds his head up straight when we hold him upright. The other day we were at the pool at my dad’s condo and I was holding the baby so that he was looking intently at something over my shoulder. My dad wanted to show him off to a friend and asked me to turn around so she could see his dark blue eyes. As soon as I turned he turned his head back to what he was looking at. I turned again and again he turned his head. My dad’s friend moved to see him better.

We had his two month appointment the other day. Our pediatrician is in the process of moving into a new office/new health care system so we had to see the guy who bought out her previous practice. The office was a mess and the doctor was a douche, but we did learn his height and weight and get him one of five vaccinations. The doctor, who may have been insane, lifted the baby in his arms, holding him up superman style. He sort of flew him back and forth over the exam table. The baby looked confused and a little bit stricken and he was as stiff as a board up there, wide-eyed and flailing his arms. I don’t know what the fuck that was about, but the doctor said, “Good, he passed,” and put him down.

Sleeping is good. I don’t expect it to last forever, but I’m still enjoying it while it does. He naps in a crib by himself when the day allows it and he sleeps by himself in a crib at night. His long stretch of sleep is usually between 10 or 11 and 6 am. He wakes then to nurse and goes back to sleep for another hour or so. If I remember to put him back in his crib instead of leaving him in bed beside me he’ll sleep for even longer. I am surprisingly well rested.

He’s not so great in the car. He was fine for weeks, but for the last several he mostly cries if he can’t fall asleep. It’s one of the only times he screams. Today he didn’t fall asleep in the car and he didn’t scream either. I’m hoping that’s a sign that he’s becoming more tolerant and a ride to the shore won’t be torture on the ears.

He spends more and more time awake each day and though he still spends most of his awake time nursing, the rest of the time he’s alert and aware, examining the world around him. He’s discovered his arms and likes to wave them about. He gurgles and coos and likes when I repeat the sounds. He plays, which means he makes funny faces and flails his arms, and he smiles. The smiles are brilliant- charming and goofy all at the same time. He sometimes winks when he smiles, like we’re sharing an inside joke.

He’s perfect. Really. I am completely smitten.

When I last posted about the Fiendling I was distraught. I didn’t recognize him anymore and didn’t know how to help him. I was scared I’d lost him. Just a few days after the 27month update he came around. A few good days in a row led to a few more. Since then we’ve had some typical toddler meltdowns, nastiness and tantrums, but my sweet boy has returned. Boyfiend and I agree that he pretty much stopped developing and regressed during the first five weeks of the baby’s life. By week six, the Fiendling’s brain kicked back in and now his vocabulary, sentence structure, and ability to communicate returned full force.

He uses pronouns properly now and corrects himself if he accidentally says, ‘carry you’ instead of ‘carry me.” His sentences have grown more complex and he’s often unintentionally hilarious saying things like, “No I won’t say cheese, I’m playing with trains,” when we try to take his picture. Now he’s getting too smart for us and we have to be careful about what we say around him. It’s not just that he repeats what he hears, it’s that he’s able to draw conclusions. He knows who we’re speaking with on the phone and can figure out what plans we’re making. He also knows when we find something funny and tries to repeat it.

One night he was running around naked after his bath and Boyfiend was taking pictures and videos. Of course he peed on the floor. It didn’t occur to either of us to put a diaper on him as I cleaned up the mess and Boyfiend continued to record him running in circles around the train table and playing with his trains. In mid-recording I looked up and realized he was peeing on the floor again. We laughed and laughed. The next night after his bath Boyfiend tried to get him in a diaper. The Fiendling yelled, “No! I’m going to run and pee on the rug.”

The Fiendling is much better with the baby, even helping me burp him and change diapers. He’s been gentle and understands that he’s not supposed to hit, kick or bite the baby, though he does climb on him and squish him a bit now and again. He’s also been much better with me and tells me he loves me and gives me kisses unprompted.

He sings to himself often, sometimes even in tune. His repertoire consists mainly of songs from Thomas the Tank Engine though Baby Beluga has been a recent favorite. He plays imaginatively for real now, and his trains talk to each other and even argue- “No, I’m not a green engine, I’m a blue engine.” or “Don’t pull this tender, it’s my tender, not your tender.”

His favorite activity is still playing with trains but he loves the playground and the sprinklers and the library. He loves to run, and will run around the block rather than walk or ride in the stroller.

He’s still bossy, telling me to stop singing or stop talking when he’s tired, cranky or just wants my undivided attention. He’s also still a toddler which means he’s unpredictable and insists on doing things all by himself which leads to screams and tantrums.

He’s so big. He’s lost his baby roundness- he’s now this sticky, dirty, skinny little boy running around with skinned knees demanding cookies and popsicles.

But he’s back. He’s sweet and smart and funny and lovable, and spending time with him is fun again.

We visited my mom at the shore for the first time this summer and things didn’t go too badly. Things actually went quite well- no fights, no failing to choke back my rage, no insanity. The Fiendling didn’t want to go to sleep so bedtime was a battle both nights we were there, but the baby is easy going and my mom didn’t make me crazy so everything worked out. I even fit into last summer’s bathing suit with only a small amount of muffin toppage. If this keeps up we may actually be able to enjoy the shore this summer.

Don’t worry though. I haven’t lost my mind entirely. I know that any more than two consecutive nights is asking for trouble. My mother is still crazy and I still cringe at most of what she says. Sadly I missed hearing this gem first hand. My mom told Boyfiend some story about her friend’s cooking. Her friend G, who I’ve known since I was born, loves to entertain but isn’t much of a cook. There’s always something strange about her recipes and things always taste better when others are helping out in the kitchen. My mom described eating some meatballs at G’s house to Boyfiend and said that they were really cocked up.

As he recounted this to me I needed some clarification. What exactly was the context of the phrase “cocked up?” Does cocked up mean that the meatballs were good or bad? What was cocked up about them? The answer is that the meatballs had cheese in the middle and that cocked up means that they were good. Boyfiend thoroughly grossed me out by explaining that perhaps the cheese oozed out of the middle, hence the word “cocked.” We giggled about it for a while. A long while.

A little later Boyfiend went into the kitchen and I asked him to get me some ice cream. With berries. And pretzels. I wasn’t sure if he heard the additional request so I followed him in. He turned around holding a large bowl of ice cream with strawberries, raspberries and pretzels and said, “Here, I really cocked it up for you. I cocked it up good.”

For the first time since the day I went into labor I stepped on a scale at my in-law’s house yesterday. Here are the stats.

Weight gained during pregnancy: 38 lbs
Weight lost since: 28 lbs
Pounds to go to pre-pregnancy weight: 10
Pounds to go to pre-pre-pregnancy weight: 18
Pounds to go to weight I’d be happy to settle for: 15

Not bad. Considering that I had 25 lbs to lose for months and months after the Fiendling was born and I actually wore a pair of pre-pregnancy size 2 pants with a waistband yesterday, I’m in pretty good shape. Now I just have to get back to the gym.

My baby is one month old. It’s kind of tough to do a monthly update for a month because at one month not much happens. Babies are still so fetal, and my little one-month-old is no exception. But he’s getting so, so big. He’s grown out of some of his diapers already and moved to a more generous snap setting on the diapers that were so huge just a few weeks before. His face is losing that newborn puffiness and starting to look more like the baby he’s going to become. His hair, while still dark, has lightened considerably from black to brown. His eyes are still a dark navy blue, a blue that makes me wonder what color his eyes will become.

He still spends the majority of the day sleeping, but when he’s awake he spends his time looking around with those dark blue eyes. He’s mostly calm and content and very rarely cries for reasons I can’t figure out immediately. He’s a good sleeper and naps on his own for hours at a time in his crib, the pack n play in my bedroom, or on a mat on the floor. At night he wakes to eat twice between 11 and 6 but generally goes back to sleep immediately after nursing for a few minutes. Last night he pleased me by sleeping for a good six-hour stretch. I am grateful.

He nurses quickly and efficiently and doesn’t spend a lot of time just hanging out on the breast, which I really appreciate. The quick and efficient nursing makes him pretty gassy which leads to spectacular spit ups once or twice a day. It’s astounding how much liquid can spew from a newborn’s mouth without them really noticing or caring. The pooping seems to have slowed down, and while there’s still plenty of poop (one of the downsides of parenting) I no longer have to change three diapers in a 30-minute period because of it.

The poor little guy hasn’t had the best health so far. He’s already had a staph infection, a nasty yeast rash (which the other pediatrician in the office told me was not yeast when I brought him in the first time. Two days later she wrote me the prescription for the yeast cream and it promptly went away), and now he’s got a cough. The same cough his brother and I both have. It’s awful to hear his little body coughing, especially since I know how much it hurts. But it hasn’t seemed to affect his mood and it hasn’t affected his sleep.

He’s really pretty strong. He surprised everyone by lifting his head and looking around immediately after his birth and he’s continued to show off his impressive head control since. When he’s on his belly he pushes up on his arms and looks around. He’s also got strong legs. Sometimes when he sleeps he’ll push himself several inches forward. One day he turned a full 90 degrees. I’ve also seen him turn from his back to his side. He’s so advanced. (doesn’t every parent say that about their kid?)

My little baby is growing up. It’s amazing how easily and how immediately we loved him. I’ll miss the newborn stage when it’s over. I love how soft and cuddly he is and how perfectly he fits under my chin. But I can’t wait to see what he’ll be like as he grows.

So far 27 months is miserable. The Fiendling, totally shell shocked from the birth of his little brother, is not himself. Four weeks into big brotherhood and he’s still sad, angry and regressing. Right now I’m stuck in the house with him because after trying to kick his baby brother off of the couch and hitting me when he was in time out I told him we wouldn’t be going to story hour if he hit me again. Of course when he got up from time out and gave me a hug and a kiss he promptly hit me in the back twice as I walked back into the other room. So no story hour.

He might be getting a little better. He’s not hitting, biting or kicking quite as often as he was a few weeks ago, and he’s cuddly with me again, but it’s been a shitty couple of weeks. It doesn’t help that he got some sort of virus that led to a fever, snotty nose, and terrible cough. It also doesn’t help that we’re in the middle of a god-awful heat wave and it’s been in the high 90s with a heat index in the 100s. His third floor bedroom is ridiculously hot and the sound of him coughing over the monitor was keeping me awake so he’s been sleeping in our room. He didn’t accept the mattress on the floor. He preferred to sleep in the pack n play, or the green crib as he calls it, since the baby gets to sleep in the blue crib in our room. I fear we won’t be able to move him out after the illness and heat subside, but at least he’s been sleeping through the night.

He no longer plays nicely with any of his friends, yanking toys from them and shouting, “It’s mine!!” at the top of his lungs. He screams open-mouthed, arms extended as soon as another kid touches anything, whether he wants it or not. It’s embarrassing to have play dates where he argues and fights and whines and cries the whole time but it’s worse when we’re stuck in the house.

Now when he’s tired or sad he’s taken to saying, “Mommy, Daddy, Fiendling,” clearly mourning the loss of our three person family. It breaks my heart to hear it.

Good news? Ummm. Well, I guess he’s getting better at speaking. He speaks in complete sentences a good portion of the time and is using pronouns (usually incorrectly) instead of his name. He plays very nicely by himself and can occupy himself with his toys and trains for long periods of time. He’s interested in longer books these days and has discovered The Cat in the Hat. It’s nice to no longer have to read Thomas stories every night. He’s still sweet and cuddly with me when the baby’s not around and I’ve been spending as much one-on-one time with him as I can. Now instead of taking the Fiendling out when he gets home, Boyfiend takes the baby so the Fiendling and I can spend some special mommy-Fiendling time together.

Sometimes he’s sweet to his baby brother, kissing him and telling him, “It’s okay,” when he cries.

It blows that I just can’t think of anymore nice things to say right now. I love him so much, but things have just been so hard. I dread hearing his screams of “It’s mine,” and I dread being alone with him and the baby. I hate letting the baby cry to get to the Fiendling first and putting the baby down in a room out of sight and out of reach to keep him safe. I feel like I just can’t baby this baby the way I babied the Fiendling and I know he’ll never get the full benefit of cuddling all day long. The poor kid gets yanked and pulled almost every time he’s on my lap when the Fiendling’s in the same room.

Fiendling, I am so sorry you feel so awful. I am so sorry that you’re angry and sad. I am doing everything I can to let you know that you’re loved and wanted and every bit as important to us as you were four weeks ago. I just hope that this stage ends, because I don’t know if I can handle this forever.

After the Fiendling was born I could not lose the weight. I was puffy and bloated forever and despite my careful attention to diet and exercise I couldn’t fit into my pre-pregnancy pants for 9 months. Three weeks after the birth of number 2 I’m small again. I’m not pre-pregnancy size and I don’t plan on trying on my jeans for a few more months, but I’m not puffy or bloated. I’m surprised when I look in the mirror by how much I look like myself. I don’t know what happened and I’m not complaining. This is a gift.

I have mastitis. On the holiday weekend. I caught it early and it’s not as bad as it could be but it still sucks that I feel tired and run down and sore. I was hoping for a margarita and all I got was a breast infection. Awesome.

The Fiendling (who has recently added grinding and clicking his teeth to his list of ways to show mom he’s unhappy about his baby brother) is also sick. He has a runny nose, a slight cough and had an unfortunate diaper incident that led to an immediate bath and load of laundry. This morning, after waking up once in the middle of the night, he woke up just before five and couldn’t go back to sleep despite my best efforts. I hope he’s feeling better tomorrow. Though I appreciate how cuddly he is when he’s sick (and his brother isn’t around), I don’t appreciate the excess bodily fluids and the night waking.

Tomorrow is my neighborhood’s sad little Memorial Day parade then we’re going to a barbecue at my in-laws’ house. Hopefully we’ll find time to put the flowers and herbs we bought on Mother’s Day in pots. My garden has been seriously neglected.

I am tired and the baby who is peacefully sleeping beside me smells like spit up and cord stump and desperately needs a bath. I don’t want to wake him, but it’s inevitable.

Caring for a newborn is easy compared to caring for a toddler. The baby is a dream, still all sleepy and hungry, and the Fiendling has been a complete fucking nightmare when it’s just the three of us or four of us, hitting, biting and generally being a shit. Is it wrong to refer to your two-year-old as a shit?

It breaks my heart to see him like that, so unlike himself. He’s usually so sweet and lovable that it kills me to see him so upset. He’s been getting plenty of attention and just about all of our visitors have been thoughtful enough to bring him a big brother gift. I’ve been carefully timing feedings so I can put him to bed and get up with him in the mornings. He’s been getting one on one time with me and with boyfiend and`aside from the obvious addition of a crying, pooping baby in the house his general routine hasn’t changed dramatically.

I know that this kind of adjustment is common and I know the behavior won’t last forever, but god does it suck.

Still nameless (and nicknameless for the purposes of this site) my second baby boy was born last night, a full week ahead of his due date, at 10.30 pm after a long day of labor and 5 minutes of pushing. He is perfect. At birth he was 7 lbs 9 oz, and measured 20 inches long. He has dark eyes and a head of thick black hair. He looks nothing like his big brother but he’s every bit as handsome.

Now I’m going to eat lunch and take a nap while I still can.