Eric is in his sling right now, laughing in his sleep. He doesn't smile when he's awake, but he has some very happy dreams sometimes.
My old cat Baby used to periodically change in some way, beginning with the first time Scott ever visited my room. I introduced him to the cats, and told him that while Susie would probably cuddle him, he shouldn't expect much attention from Baby as she was shy of strangers. Baby immediately trotted across the room, ran up Scott's chest, and butted him in the chin with her head. First we joked that she had been abducted and replaced by aliens, but eventually the joke became that there had been an upgrade of her system software: Baby 1.2, Baby 2.0 and so on.
Well, Eric 2.0 has arrived this week. Eric 2.0 comes with additional bonus waking hours during the morning and evening, but the morning hours are buggy--he gets tired but won't settle to sleep unless he's being held, sleeps in only short bursts, and is quite alarmed if he wakes up to find himself alone in his cradle. As a result, Su (who has not been upgraded, alas) can count on getting nothing done before 2 or 3 in the afternoon. It took me two hours to load the dishwasher this morning. It's not that he's very fussy, or fusses for long. He just needs short bits of attention, but he needs more of them. Or we have longish chunks of time when I just need to sit and hold him. Eric 2.0 still doesn't have undefined fussiness; it's always pretty clear what he needs, so in that way I suppose he's still easy. But Eric 2.0 is more demanding of Mom's time and energy.
One reason I don't get much done when he's like that is that when he does go to sleep, I can't always leap right up and be productive. After having all my attention on him for four or five hours, when he settles down for a good nap I sometimes just need to sit quietly by myself, or read a little, or check my e-mail, rather than, say, leaping up to clean the dining room.
More about Eric 2.0: his gaze is much more acute, and it's quite obvious when he turns to look at something. He swung his head around to see David this morning, for instance. It also seems to us that, although he doesn't smile yet, he does show pleasure. It's hard to put your finger on, but there is something in his demeanor that makes you think, for instance, that when he snuggles up against you he is enjoying it. Not just passively, but somehow actively, in a way that didn't used to be true for him. And he can go after both his bottle and his pacifier in a more directed way--he can help you get them into his mouth.
But let me tell you about the night we had last night: he ate at 10, 2:40, and 7! It's my new favorite night-time schedule. And after the 7:00 feeding, we slept on the couch until 9. We didn't get to sleep at 10 last night, though. He has developed a fussy period at our bedtime, we're not sure why. Maybe it has to do with winding down from being stimulated, now that he is staying up for several hours in the evening. Last night David took care of Eric during the fussy time because I was exhausted, but I still didn't get to sleep until after 11. I think Eric had settled by then. it was great to then sleep until almost 3. And then when I woke up at 6:40 and glanced at the clock, my first thought was, "Oh my god, is the baby OK?" But there he was beside me, just starting to stir in his sleep. He didn't wake up completely until he was downstairs in his bucket, as we call the Rubbermaid tub, while I got his bottle ready. When he woke up he just yowled. He has long suspected us of conspiring to starve him to death, and he was so hungry this morning that all his suspicions were confirmed.
In our Nintendo game, there is a Goron (a friendly but dumb rock-dwelling creature) trapped on an icy ledge. He's hungry, and if you talk to him he asks you to bring him food. "I want to eat just one more time before I die," he says. That's exactly how Eric feels right before every feeding.
I read an article about toilet-training in the paper this morning. Seems some people did a study of the factors that influence early vs. late toilet-training. Alas, they found to their surprise that easy-going babies do not toilet-train earlier than other babies. But the babies of single parents do. The thing that staggered me, though, was that the average age of toilet-training for boys is 39 months. Three-Nine months. Argh! As I have probably mentioned, living in the moment is an important parenting skill. If you start thinking, "I haven't had a night's sleep in seven weeks and may not get one for another year," it all becomes too big to handle. So you don't think that. Likewise with diapers. You just change the diaper in front of you and don't think, "Three more years of this! And they only get stinkier!" I had to carefully get myself back into Zen Mom state after reading that article. 39 months. Who'd have thought it?
Adrianne was changing one of Noah's poopy diapers the other day, and she identified it as a particularly gross one. I said pedantically, "Oh, no, Adrianne, you're not supposed to express disgust at the diaper contents, it can undermine the baby's self-confidence." Adrianne said, "What am I supposed to call an especially gross diaper, then?" I said, "An unusually productive fecal event."
Eric has already had one diaper that made my stomach twitch a little. Can't wait until he starts on solid food.
I have figured out the mechanism by which eating puts the baby to sleep. He must have a floater switch in his stomach, just like the one in your toilet tank only smaller. As he fills up with milk, the floater switch rises until it eventually knocks his brain out of its socket, inducing Milk Coma.
He has finally gotten big enough for his front baby carrier. Last night we all went for a walk and Scott carried Eric in his carrier. They both liked it very much.
After recognizing that my baby had been upgraded, I got out our baby books to read up on what I can expect from him in this new stage (he's going to discover his hands and feet soon). One of our books is by Penelope Leach, the parenting guru of the 90s. She's OK. I notice, though, that she keeps emphasizing that babies as young as Eric can neither love nor be loved. Even when they start smiling at you, it may look like love, but it's not. It's a programmed behavior designed to maximize the baby's chance of survival (babies who smile get fed; babies who don't get left on the hillside for the wolves). Likewise, the baby is not capable of being loved because it does not exhibit the kinds of predictable human behavior that love requires.
I suppose she is trying to reassure parents who find that they don't have an overwhelming feeling of love for their baby, but it seems weird.
Sometimes I forget that Eric is going to change into a whole little person. It's like I think he's some interesting pet we bought and he's going to be like this forever.
Here is one of my parenting challenges: accepting that babies and children come with many many tiny accessories which get separated from their sets and/or lost. Right now, for instance, we own five newborn pacifiers but I can only account for four of them, and it's driving me crazy. I know I need to just let go of Pacifier #5, which will probably turn up under the bed or in the cushions of the car just after Eric has moved on to the 3-6 month size, but I'm having trouble. Adrianne suggested that I have David buy more pacifiers but not tell me how many, but I think I need to confront this demon or it will plague me all the way through puzzles with missing pieces, Noah's ark sets with only one giraffe, shape sorters with no triangle, and so on. Pacifier #5, I release you to the universe!
Perhaps I'll give Eric a bath this morning. Here's a confession: I have not yet bathed my baby. It's a David job. I assist by handing him washcloths and standing by ready to receive the clean baby in a warm dry towel. I have also never clipped my baby's fingernails, though they really need it--in fact, that's what I should do now, while he's still sleeping and limp. I'll give it a try.
Posted by Su Penn at July 12, 2003 08:11 AM | TrackBack