Adventures in Solids, and Sitters

"Yes, Hello, is this the Bullshit Remission Department? Oh, good, well, yes, I would like to file papers showing that I have received my full share of shitty circumstances for 2009.....Yes, I realize there were other people enduring more painful events than me....Yes, I also realize that 2009 is only three full months old. However, I have mourned the passing of one dear person and two dear creatures who all meant quite a lot to me and feel that this high quantity of fuckedupedness, so close together, qualifies me for bullshit remission acceptance......"

Here's hoping, anyway....

Speaking of Anyway, the sorrowful events of late preempted my announcement that Snippet is ALL about solid foods now. I had intended to wait to introduce them until he was a full six months old, but he was telling me loudly and clearly that he wanted to start at 5.5 months. He was super snatchy-grabby anytime I ate or drank in front of him. He was several pounds over his doubled birth weight. And, most notably, he suddenly decided to start waking up to nurse every 1.5-2 hours ALL DAY and ALL NIGHT long. He had gotten into a very comfy routine of nursing every 2-4 hours during the day and 3-4 hours at night. I loved the big 4-hour chunks at night, but then they suddenly evaporated and Snippet behaved as though he were starving around the clock. I considered holding out on solids until the six-month mark, just to stick to my guns and good research. But, then I realized that this mentality completely conflicted with my stronger beliefs in attachment parenting and the value of listening to my child's cues. I decided to give solid food a try and we picked bananas for the first official meal. We skipped cereal because I had read in several reputable places that breastfed babies particularly dislike the bland taste of cereal. So, instead, we opted for bananas---simple, sweet, squishy and yummy. The look on Snippet's face at first bite was Gorgeous---big eyes, happy smile and grabby hands begging for another spoonful. To see the big event for yourself, check out the video on the private picture blog.

Since the big first day, we have moved on to avocado and the mixing of bananas with oatmeal cereal. Snippet happily approves of it all and is super enthusiastic about it. In fact, the only problem I have while feeding him is that he likes to excitedly dive onto the spoon as it nears descent, thereby sending the food squishing up his nose instead of into his mouth. I'm working on better anticipating when he's going to try to swoop in, so I can pop the spoon back away from his greedy little beak. I have also discovered how much I really enjoy making his food myself. It's been so interesting researching recipes and prep methods, storage methods, and understanding which foods are appropriate at what time, etc. I'm hopeful that the involvement and care I'm taking in preparing his food will go a long way toward helping me emotionally wean him eventually. Maybe if I can channel my nurturing into preparing his food, instead of nursing him, I will be able to make the transition less painful for me. Well, maybe.

In other news, Jake is gently encouraging me to agree to a babysitter for Snippet sometime in the next few weeks. We haven't had a baby-free date night since Snippet was born. The only time he has been to a sitter was just a few weeks ago when I needed someone to watch him during the MRI on my knee. That incident went rather poorly since he wasn't taking a bottle at the time, but since he now will drink from his Mam bottles, Jake feels we should trust him to someone so we can enjoy a night out and go see Watchmen. I would truly love to get out and see it, but I feel so conflicted. I worry that the sitter won't understand all of Snippet's many and subtle cues, which will end in prolonged crying and frustration on both sides. How can I subject him and a friend to that just so I can indulge in popcorn and pop culture? But, then I think perhaps things wouldn't go so terribly. Perhaps all would go well, with just some minor crying? Maybe it wouldn't be infant armageddon afterall, and maybe our sitter friend wouldn't end up hating us and swearing off sitting with Snippet ever again? And, assuming this is the case, how do we choose someone? It's all very overwhelming for me just yet, but I'm trying to give it good consideration. And, Jake is being wonderful about it, saying that if I just can't do it, he'll go see the movie with one of his friends, instead. Guess I have some brooding to do...

Endeth the Reign of Hell-Cat

No one has ever liked my cat, Adah, except me. Jake pretends to, but I know she gets on his nerves. She's fat, smelly (since she isn't all that flexible when it comes to bathing) and has a loud, insistent meow. However, she also is a wonderful cuddler and likes to lay on my chest and make little imaginary biscuits with her paws. She purrs so loudly during our cuddle time, and I know she's especially happy when she drools down my neck. She loves to roll in the dirt outside and then bring the bits of leaves and driveway dust inside with her. She gets ferocious with the dogs, and takes no nonsense from my boy-cat. She is a tough, bitchy girl, but I have always loved her.

She chose to live with us during a scary autumn thunderstorm 10 years ago. Jake and I, and our boy-cat, were sitting inside our apartment when we heard a loud meow outside, even above the noise of the thunder. When I opened the door and saw her sitting there (a smaller near-clone of boy-cat), I hardly had time to say, "Oh! There's a cat!" before she came racing inside. She didn't hesitate or freak out---just zoomed in and headed straight for boy-cat's food bowl. Poor boy-cat was stunned, looking at me like I should be doing something to thwart her, but I was too busy laughing at her bravery and nerve. She decided that day that she was going to live with us, and she has been a part of our family ever since. Our next-door neighbor at the time disliked her so much that he nicknamed her, Hell-Cat---a name that I always thought was more than a bit overly dramatic and a little unfair. She earned the name because she would often be all rubby and purry with strangers until they tried to pet her, and then she would attack in hopes of snapping off a bit of finger. But, again, despite her bad reputation, I continued to insist to Jake that she was just eccentric, and secretly loved her all the more for being so cantankerous.

I noticed a few weeks ago that she was losing weight. I felt a hard dread about it, and postponed calling the vet. I pretended lots of things---it was good she was losing weight. At 19 pounds, the vet had been after me to trim her down for years. As she continued to lose weight, I became less able to make excuses and knew, without any veterinary confirmation, that something awful was happening to her. She seemed normal in every other way, though---still bitchy, still giving the dogs hell, still wanting to go outside and play. These things made it easier to ignore her shrinking size and hope that maybe she just had a bug, or some other fleeting illness. Suddenly in the past week, though, she stopped eating and drastically lost weight. With dread in my heart, I took her to the vet today and learned that she has a softball-sized abdominal tumor. We are spending tonight with her, and then letting her go tomorrow.

It's strange to be losing so many lives that I love this year. It almost feels like nothing will be left by the time Snippet is old enough to love along with us.

Corporate Gush

Today I did something I have rarely done---I wrote a letter of sincere thanks to a corporation. I have only done this once before, when Levi's came out with a really great bootcut jean that worked great for me and some of my booty-endowed friends. I fired up the keyboard of thanks again tonight in a gushing letter to Sassy Baby, to thank them for making Mam Anti-Colic bottles.

Snippet has rejected every bottle we have ever tried, in fits of absolute agony. He would get so incredibly upset---big tears, wailing, and complete frustration as he actually tried to drink and was unable. I always took it as a good sign that he didn't turn his head away in rejection of our bottle attempts, but despite his earnest efforts, he only ever ended up with milk all over his face and nothing in his empty tummy. It was heart-wrenching for me to be shoving a cold piece of plastic between he and I, when I knew all he wanted was to happily nurse.

Despite his disdain for bottles, he has loved his Mam pacifiers since the first time we gave him one at five days old. I randomly chose the Mam because I liked the design of it, but Snippet developed a sincere attachment to it and refused to use any other brand or style. We bought a stockpile of the Mams and now have them stashed in every room of the house, with extras in the kitchen cabinet in case of an extreme paci emergency.

In all of my bottle researching, I never came across the Mam bottles. I didn't even know they existed until Karen (my friend and trusted baby product resource) told me that she was using Mam bottles for her daughter, Evie. Karen suggested I try them on Snippet to see if the nipple might seem familiar to him, in light of his hardcore paci love. So, tonight we made the trek to Babies R Us and snatched up a 3-pack. When I first put the bottle into Snippet's mouth, he cringed and made a sour face, since he was clawing at my clothes trying to nurse and certainly was not expecting to have a plastic nipple shoved at him. The disdain only lasted a moment, though, as he began sucking at the bottle and then made the connection that there was more than just empty plastic behind it. He immediately clicked a latch and successfully, happily sucked down the three ounces I had loaded up for the trial run. He never flubbed, never lost the latch, never looked a bit frustrated. He just contentedly went about the task and, when finished, switched seamlessly to nursing to finish up his dinner.

How relieved am I? Enough to send a fumbling, frantic note of Thanks to a corporation, just in case they had any crazy ideas about discontinuing this product. Whatever they did, however they made this bottle, they did it right.



Edited March 22: Okaaaaay.......So, we eagerly filled a bottle for Snippet this morning, hoping he wouldn't have had a change of heart overnight. Well, he, in fact, did have a change of heart, but not the one we expected. As soon as I showed him the bottle, he started flapping his little penguin arms and reaching for it. Seriously! As I passed it to him, he chucked both of his little grabby mitts around it and pulled it to his mouth and went to town. I had only put two ounces in it and it was gone in just a blink. When I pulled it away, he threw a total tantrum, and was all pathetically reaching out and waggling his fingers at it. I calmed him down and nursed him until he was full, then promptly decided that the bottles could happily live in the kitchen cabinet until Jake starts staying home with him. Last night, we thought it would be a good idea to give him one bottle each day, to keep him familiar with them, but seeing how uber-attached he already is, that just seems like the worst idea ever. I want him to like the bottles, but not love them more than the boob. I tell ya....if it's not one anxiety, it's another......

Stuff, and Lots of It

Before my head explodes, here's all the news that I have been scrambling to find time to blog about:

TEETH: He's got 'em! Snippet's first tooth officially peeked through last week. I noticed a bright white spec in his lower gum and assumed it was a blip of spit-up, but much rubbing did nothing to remove it. The pediatrician verified it when we were at his vaccination appointment last Friday. I have built up a complete arsenal of teething coping mechanisms, but am skittish about using most of them. I did try the teething tablets this afternoon for the first time because poor Snippet was screeching without due cause. He had been fed, changed, and recently napped, yet nothing amused him and he insisted on just writhing and doing this high-pitched wail. I caved and popped two of the tablets under his tongue. Amazingly, within 15 minutes he had quieted and fallen asleep. Of course, there's no way to know whether he just whined himself to sleep, or whether the tablets soothed the pain and allowed him to rest. Giving them to him did make me feel somewhat proactive rather completely frustrated and helpless. I'm hoping I never have to use the gum numb-er because that stuff freaks me out more than the tablets, but if things get really ugly, I might be driven to desperate measures. (Has anyone else out there tried the tablets? What was your experience with them?)

SURGERY: I have to have it. You may recall in 2004 I had surgery on my left knee for a torn meniscus. Pregnancy, and my body shape in general, according to my surgeon, have put surgery back on the table for my right knee. This is sucky, sucky news. It took a solid 12 weeks before I could walk normally after the first surgery. How the friggin' hell am I supposed to be on crutches and manage a baby? I get the results of my MRI next week, which will bring the surgeon's recommendations as to how long we can delay. I asked him if he thought we could hold off several months.....he laughed at me.

STAY-HOME DAD: Jake is going to become one. We had abstractly planned to start sending Snippet to a home babysitter this fall, but every time I thought about it, my stomach churned. I have not been actively searching for a sitter, but rather just freaking out about it on a daily basis. Jake and I were talking it out over the weekend and decided that neither of us likes the sitter set-up. Since my job is the bacon-bringer, Jake is the only one of us who could stay home during the day. Jake will be searching for a night job around July, which is when Snippet will likely be getting too rowdy to stay at work with me much longer. This arrangement isn't great---we'll be broke-ass poor, Jake and I will hardly see each other and each of us will be basically single parents during our shifts with the baby. But, it's the very best thing that we can do for Snippet, so we're willing to take on the task.

BOTTLES: Snippet has to start using them. Due to the surgery and Jake's new role, Snippet will have no choice but to agree to let others feed him. We tried a bottle on him when he was a few weeks old and the meltdown was horribly memorable. We never tried again until just yesterday, when we decided we should start trying bottles on him once a day. It didn't go great last night (or tonight) but it could have been much worse. Snippet tries to nurse from the bottles, but he is very slurpy and sloppy and doesn't seem to get much milk out. He seems to be having a hard time getting a correct latch, and just ends up with milk spilled down his chin. After a few minutes of frustration, he finally gives up and starts screaming and wailing. Tonight, after about ten minutes of struggle, the bottle had gone down by only a half-ounce. We're trying Adiri (both size 2 and 3), Playtex Ventaire Wide and the Medela bottles that came with my pump. None of them seems easier to him that the rest, so we're mostly sticking with the Adiris, since they seem closest to boob-shaped.

In closing, I'm open to any and all advice on these issues. My brain is simply swimming!

Friends and Mothers

Karen and her adorable, squealingly happy baby daughter, Evie, came to visit us for a few days, and we miss them already! They were such a sweet diversion from all the sad air that has been hanging in our home since Jake's father passed away.

Greeting Karen and Evie (and joining Safire and her cuties for lunch) was such a wonderful moment of fulfillment. The three of us were diary writers on Preconception.com five years ago, and it was so satisfying to see how all of us had transcended the frustration of those early infertility days. It was such a joy to now sit with them and celebrate our children together.

Spending the last day and a bit with Karen was really wonderful. I wish I had more friends living here who were also mothers of babies, just for the valuable moments of trading stories and questions. It was really great to compare our experiences in person and share recommendations or points of confusion. Karen is incredibly knowledgeable and always has an educated opinion whenever I ask her advice. Whenever we talk, I leave the conversation buzzing with ideas and new methods to try.

During her visit here, something else was solidly confirmed. I had always suspected it, but now I have photographic proof: Karen is really and truly THE most organized mother I know. She puts me and my random acts of mish-mash, hodge-podge mothering to shame! Behold, the beautiful bottle library she laid out on the microwave after sterilizing all of Evie's feeding gear:

Shadow

Last year was so wonderful---so full of Life and Joy.

What a terrible contrast is 2009. Even in its infancy, it has cast such a dark shadow over our home.

Jake's father passed away last night.

He was always kind to me.