Kid Amnesiac

Our little guy is clearly a Tarheel. For any of you who have been to North Carolina, you know that the greeting of choice is the three-syllable “hey”. It comes out something like “hay-e-ay”. Live there for a while and you’ll find yourself saying it no matter how much you promise you won’t.

Well, Simon is just dying to talk to us, and this is one of his favorite “words” at the moment. We first heard it Monday night. I was settled into bed when Matt summoned me into the nursery with a “I think Mom needs to get in here.” So Mom reluctantly got out of the warm bed to see what Ole Stinkpot was up to. And there he was, smiling on his changing table and saying “hey” over and over again while Matt repeated it to him. He’d smile a huge, gummy smile after each “hey”, and Matt praised him effusively. I looked on and melted.

Last night we were treated to a command performance. This time Simon didn’t get out as many “hey”s, but it wasn’t for lack of trying. While Matt would look at Simon and say “hey”, Simon would study his face intently and repeat back something like “ha”, “hu”, or “ay”. At one point, Simon sucked in so much air from trying to make a “h” sound that he gave himself the hiccups. It was adorable. Until the hiccups arrived, he was all smiles during this talking session, too.

Moments like this are fascinating and a joy. Who knew babies could be so interesting?

Two weeks ago, I purchased a Bebe au Lait nursing cover-up. I like to call it the nursing burkha, and I can’t believe it’s come to this.

If you have been pregnant or know anyone who has been pregnant in the past decade or so, I’m sure you are aware that right now breastfeeding is hot. “Breast is best” is the message clearly provided by books, OBGYNs, pediatricians, magazine articles, obnoxious billboards if you live in New York City, and random strangers if you live in Berkeley.

What complicates this, however, is the lack of a widespread acceptance of women nursing in public. You’ve probably read about women being kicked off planes, cited for indecency on beaches, or just being leered and jeered in public places if they nurse. The general rule in my part of the country is that nursing is mostly OK so long as you are discrete. “Discrete” in this usage means covering yourself so that no part of the breast is visible at any time and usually entails placing a shawl over yourself.

This shawl bit is much trickier than it looks, especially if you have a young baby who needs help or handling while nursing. I have yet to figure out how I can rearrange my clothing, adjust my nursing bra, hold my baby, get him latched on and keep a shawl in place all at once. I can’t do it. To make matters even more complicated, I have a baby that interrupts his nursing once or twice per session to spit up all over himself.

I bought nursing camisoles thinking they would solve my problem. If you double them with a cardigan, nursing is quite discrete. There’s no conspicuous shirt lifting, and other than the few seconds it takes to get baby latched, nothing can be seen at any time. Perfect, right?

Wrong. I tried this approach in front of my brothers and they both froze in terror and discomfort. I felt like Medusa. These are grown men. They are married. They are fathers. They have seen rated R movies. However, the possibility that they might see part of their sister’s breast for a nanosecond was so terrifying to them that they stammered like adolescents on a first date, kept their eyes firmly over my head, and backed out of any room I was in. They are not alone in their reaction.

So, it seems I had several choices. For one, I could accommodate people’s sensitivities and go into a separate room every time Simon needed to eat. I call this nursing purdah. It’s an approach I used early on that got old and lonely in a hurry. At the other extreme, I could simply nurse in front of whomever and let them leave the room if they became uncomfortable. This in-your-face approach is kinda tempting, but not very kind. Frankly, it’s an approach that plays better in San Francisco or Berkeley than Louisville Kentucky. It’s also an approach that only works if other people’s embarrassment won’t make you feel self conscious yourself. So not for me.

Enter the Bebe au Lait. It ties around your neck like an apron, fans across the baby and your lap like a shawl, and has a curved rigid neckline that stands away from your body and allows you to see and position your baby.

It’s perfect. It’s ridiculous. It’s perfectly ridiculous and ridiculously perfect. For about $35, it has allowed me to stay in the room during several family meals without turning anyone into stone. No doubt money well spent. And more than anything else I can think of, it captures the zeitgeist of motherhood in early twenty-first century America.

Back when I worked for a Hebrew publishing house in Albany, my boss (hi Claudia!) used to talk about the benefits of having a “mommy job” if you were a mother. The mommy job is part-time and ideally has flexible hours. It provides enough intellectual stimulation that you can flex your mental muscles and remember your pre-baby self, but it doesn’t involve enough time or stress to distract from parenting.

I only half-listened to this advice when it was offered because at the time I was obsessed with finding a “real job”* and had no immediate interest in childbearing. Flash forward six years: I have had a real job for seven years and a baby for three months. Suddenly, I’m incredibly interested in the mommy job.

I blogged here that I went back to work on January 2. What I did not blog about–as was still in negotiations with my company–is that I requested part-time work and had decided not to return in a full-time capacity. This was a decision that came much more easily than I expected. When I left for maternity leave, I was coming off my worst year ever professionally and was quite burnt out. Still, I could not see how I could walk away from a “real job” after having wanted one for so long. Who would I be without a full-tiime job? How would I answer those “what do you do?” questions? Where else could I work once Simon was older? What else could I do? It was terrifying.

So I researched local daycare and quickly investigated the three good choices that were suggested to me. Options 1 & 2 have waiting lists that are longer than the gestation period for babies (How is that possible?), while Option 3 was less well known and so had a much shorter list. Excellent! Or so I thought until right before Christmas, when I got a Dear John letter from Option 3 telling me that too few babies graduated to the toddler room and therefore they had no space for Simon.

So there it was. I was due back at work in less than a month and had no childcare. At my salary, a nanny is not a reaistic option. And frankly, the past weeks had been so blissful, which I expected, and so profoundly life altering, which I had not anticipated, that I was OK with being on my own. In a way, the Dear John letter gave me permission to follow my heart and stay home with Simon.

Everything I’ve read indicates I should be torn about this choice: I should be worried about my next job, next career, lost networking, lost brain cells, etc. But I’m not worried much at all! And if you know me or have read much of this blog, you know that me not worrying is like Nicole Kidman showing up at the Oscars in sweatpants. It’s simply inconceivable. OK, maybe I’m a smidge worried. But only just a smidge.

Mostly, I’m rolling with it. It looks like I’ll be doing 1/2 my current job for 1/2 the pay for as long as I and my company are happy with the arrangement. My current position is an experiment and comes with no benefits and no job security. I have demoted myself right out of the “real job”. On the other hand, I can also take Simon for walks at 1 p.m., nurse him during the day, and let him sleep and feed on his own schedule. Paradise.

So here’s to the mommy job! Whether it be this one or another, I am content at the present to work a little now and save the “real job” for later.

* A “real job”, as I have internalized the term, has a title people understand, is with a company people are familiar with, entails at least 40 hrs a week, and includes a benefits package and corporate credit card.

Simon is now fourteen weeks old, and I have not been away from him for longer than a single feeding, a maximum of around 2 1/2 hours, since we brought him home on October 20.

For many mothers, especially those who bottle-fed babies or went back to work right away, this schedule appears to be restrictive. I’ve heard my current situation be referred to as being “tied down”, or even “tethered.”

And of course I am tied down. And while I know bottles will be sanity savers later on and am getting Simon used to them, I’m not too excited about this development. Truth be told, I’m enjoying being tethered. It’s a primal, intimate connection that I’ve never shared with a human being before and may never again.

Part of the reason I enjoy being tethered is that it keeps my anxiety at bay. I know that the more I nurse, the more I can ensure a good milk supply. Supply hasn’t been a problem for me, but I still worry about it. Especially now that Simon has dropped a feeding, I keep thinking that my milk will dry up, I’ll have to go to formula, and the formula will make his reflux worse. And yes, I do understand that this is catastrophic thinking. (But it could happen, right? You can’t deny the possibility.)

There are, thankfully, happier and more mentally healthy reasons I enjoy being tethered as well. Part of what I like is the hormone release that occurs while nursing that makes you feel warm and happy. That’s certainly nice–a safe, legal, and non-addictive substitute for opiates.

Another part of it–odd as this may sound–is my feeling of kinship with all the other mothers on the planet, be they people or animals. This past spring we had house wrens nest in a hanging fern on our front porch, and I checked on those eggs and chicks with an interest I had never had before. In fact, when I realized that going out the front door made mother wren fly away, I started going out the back. I really identified with this little bird! After a lifetime of trying to somehow stand out from the crowd, it’s a pleasure to start focusing on commonality.

But I think what I enjoy the most is the physical and mental tether itself. If you nurse every 2-3 hours, you really can’t do much big planning. Or, to be honest, big thinking. Days pass by in short segments that are all anchored by nursing, and the nursing itself takes about 30 minutes at each go–time you are forced to sit down with, hold, look at, and take care of your baby.

I’m a restless person. I fidget when I sit. I don’t sleep much. I’m terrible at just hanging out. I get bored and distracted easily. Nursing has introduced a new and welcome sense of stillness to my life. As this stillness has suited me so well and is so fleeting, I am reluctant to let it go even for just a few hours. I have my whole life minus one year to be untethered, for the next six months or so I plan to relish the tie that binds.

There’s a scene in the Princess Bride in which Vizzini (Wallace Shawn) declares something that has happened “inconceivable”, and Inigo Montoya (Mandy Patinkin) replies: “You keep using that word. I do not think it means what you think it means.”

It’s a funny line from a funny movie. And I feel this way myself now when I hear the expression “to sleep like a baby.” Who came up with that one?!

I always thought the expression “to sleep like a baby” meant to sleep soundly and peacefully for a long duration. If I’m correct, this is simile gone awry, as Simon does none of these things–at least not without a fair bit of intervention.

In the first place, he can’t fall asleep on his own yet. He has to be held, rocked, sung to, etc. Secondly, he needs to be swaddled to sleep. If not, his arms flail about, he hits himself in the face, and he wakes himself up. Thirdly, he has to have white noise to drown out other distracting sounds while he sleeps or he has trouble settling. Fourthly, babies go through sleep cycles faster than adults do and are prone to waking at 20-minute intervals. This sleep pattern is likely a survival mechanism that keeps babies from sleeping when they are somehow vulnerable. And last but not least, until they are four months old or so, babies wake at least once during the night to be fed.

So do I want to sleep like Simon does? No way! Now a cat–that’s an animal I wouldn’t mind sleeping like…

Most nights, sometime between around 7:30 or so and about 11:00, Simon flips out. His face turns bright red or purple, a vein on his skull sticks out, he balls up his fists, and he screams bloody murder. We call this “fighting mad”, and the hour (or two or three) during which it occurs is fondly called “the witchng hour.”

When Simon has a good day, he still usually has a witching hour. We just figure that that time doesn’t count. It’s a scratch, you could say. It’s not real time or the real Simon. It’s just the witching hour, a phenomenon that has nothing to do with his true self.
In recent weeks, as Simon has been doing better all round, his witching hour has also lessened. When it comes, he’s less hysterical and the whole thing is over faster.

Then there is last night. Last night Simon skipped the witching hour altogether. We fed him around 6 or so, and he stayed up until we fed him again at around 8:30. During that time we sang to him, read to him, and put him in his bumbo seat. He was happy throughout. Then, after the 8:30 feeding, we played with him some more and gave him his bath. Still happy.

Finally, at 11:00 we gave him supper and put him down for the night. He fell asleep quickly and stayed asleep until 7:00 this morning. Happy Baby! Good Baby!

Check out happy Simon pics here and in the album.

Tonight Simon laughed for the first time… I think.

I was over at Mom’s while Matt’s band practiced, and sometime between dinner and dessert mom leaned over his Papasan seat (he was our centerpiece at the table) and made a funny face at him. Simon went wild. His eyes opened wide, and his dimples deepened. Then he opened his mouth and make a sort of yelling noise. Not quite a “ha!”, but close.

So this might just be the laugh I’ve been waiting for. Whatever it was, it was certainly delightful. In fact, Simon himself has been delightful for six straight days. We’re getting all kinds of smiles from him, he’s falling asleep faster and staying asleep longer, and he’s babbling like mad. Favorite “words” are “M-be” and “Uga”. Last night he put together a crazy string of vowels and vowel-consonant combinations that imitated speech to hilarious effect.

For the record, if we do end up with an early talker it will not be because of the Goldstein genes. While most of us can absolutely talk you to death, we were all late getting started. So late that my mom worried my brother Steve might be slightly mentally challenged. Nope, it’s Simon’s introverted dad who got an early start gabbing. If Simon ends up with my affinity for talking coupled with Matt’s ability, we will one day have the most exhausting two-year-old ever. But I’m getting ahead of myself with that one.

Simon’s other new habits, documented here in the blog and in the photo gallery, include enjoying morning naps in our bed and being propped up in chairs to better see the world around him. All in all, as his fourth trimester comes to a close, Simon has become more engaged with the world around him.

This trend is so much fun that even though Simon turns three months tomorrow, I’m not feeling misty about lost time. I’m just looking forward to the developments ahead.

I have a troubled history with television. I’m perfectly happy to go without owning a TV (as I did for most of my college years), but once I have access, addictive viewing usually isn’t far behind.

Some people with TVs can be content to watch a few good shows, some sports, and a little PBS. I am not one of those people. Sure, I may discuss The Office or The News Hour with Jim Lehrer, but odds are I’m also watching Blind Date and America’s Next Top Model as well. Worse, I may be watching reruns of Blind Date or America’s Next Top Model.

Now I see that my addictive TV viewing may have a genetic component. Matt and I haven’t had access to broadcast, satellite, or cable TV since we moved to Louisville, so Simon slept through a few DVDs early on but otherwise hasn’t seen TV. Until last night.

Last night, we were over at the Whitworths’ and Matt had Simon in the living room with himself and Jim while Evie and I had tea on the glassed in porch. The TV was on, and when I went to check on Simon the kid was mesmerized by a University of Kentucky basketball game. (Addictive basketball watching in general would also come from me; addictive Kentucky basketball watching would come from Jim.) Matt reports that earlier in the evening Simon was equally enraptured by portions of Dances with Wolves. So there it is: My not quite three month old baby is already in the thrall of TV.

Thank goodness his access is so limited. And thank goodness the Whitworths don’t watch Blind Date!

On an unrelated note, Simon has also spent the past two weeks or so with his hands in his mouth all the time. We know this is a typical developmental milestone, but we would like to note that it is also a disgusting developmental milestone.

An update on my friend Jen Bortel’s baby, Sam.

After having open-heart surgery on December 22, Sam went back into the OR on Monday to have a pacemaker fitted. He came out of that surgery well, was off the ventilator by the time he left the OR and–best of all–he came home today.

Way to go Sam! (And hearty congratulations to the entire family.)

Man! Taking care of Simon is such hard work. Really — it is! It’s not all sleeping and snuggling, no matter what the photographic evidence seems to indicate.

I mean, I was up from 3:00 - 4:00 AM this morning dancing and bouncing and singing song after song after song trying to get a totally wired, mildly cranky, somewhat vomitous baby back to sleep, but does that ever get photographed? Noooooooooo…. But just let a naked, hairy Dad slack at his morning baby care duties for 10 minutes, and out comes the camera. Sheesh!