Kid Amnesiac

Simon’s love of books seems to be increasing at a rate proportionate to his understanding of them.

A favorite for many months now, they are now nearly always his first pick of toys. Watching him “read” them is funny and inspiring at the same time. His normal routine is to pick the book up, turn each page one by one, then flip the book over and start from the beginning. He’ll repeat this many times in a row, each time carefully holding down a page with his left thumb while his right forefinger sits on the top right corner of a page, poised to turn it.

I’ve never seen him turn pages backwards. For the past week or so, he won’t read books upside down, either. If handed a book this way, he rotates it until it is right side up, then begins his page flipping. On many pages, he’ll point to one or more objects that catches his eye. His reading is frequently accompanied by babbling.

I am surprised at how much Simon understands about books. Because he sat up but couldn’t locomote for nearly six months, I had the idea his development was stalled. Clearly, that was not the case, as his book reading demonstrates enormous leaps in fine motor skills and cognition.

And as with his discovery of the sky, fresh air, grass, leaves, and trees, this interest makes me regard books with a bit of refreshed wonder myself. How amazing is it, after all, that pictures and ideas can be captured between covers to revisit whenever we’d like?

We are clearly reaching a fun and amazing point in Simon’s development. He’s beginning to use a few recognizable words, and he has obvious favorite songs.

The words first. He’s said “mama” for a while. Despite—or perhaps because of—Matt’s desire to be called “papa”, Simon has settled on “daddy”, which alternatively comes out “da-da”, “da-dee”, or (don’t ask) “ya-gi.” Whichever way, he clearly means Matt when he says it. I know this because I rarely heard it the week Matt was in New York City.

Other words are “light”, which I’ve previously blogged about, and “nein.” When Simon doesn’t want something, he screws up his face, bats away my arm or hand, and yells “Nein! Nein! Nein!”. This clearly means “no.” Whether it’s the result of his German or Yiddish heritage I won’t know until he’s old enough to say “oy vey”. He’s also played with “what” and “baby”, but not enough to add it to our vocabulary list.

Next up, favorite songs. A great favorite is “Twinkle, Twinkle Little Star.” Whenever it plays on his toy piano, he bobs up and down and pumps his arms. This is baby dancing, a form of dancing only slightly less elegant than stiff white guy dancing. Lately we’ve taken advantage of this love by singing “Twinkle, Twinkle” during clothing changes or face washings.

Hilariously, Simon is also a fan of Radiohead. Friends Kaya and Kelley sent us a copy of Rockaby Baby Radiohead when Simon was born, and we’ve played it a lot. Just yesterday Matt watched Radiohead perform on TV and was somewhat surprised to see Simon get very animated when “No Surprises” came on. Then it dawned on him that Simon knows this song from its lullaby version. Funny stuff!

These are fun times in our house. The only thing I wonder is when Simon will stop working on fine motor, social, and language skills and START working on things like pulling up, standing, cruising, or walking? In his preferences and developmental strengths, he’s so like Matt and me that it hurts!*

* He’s more like me than I realized when I first typed this. My mom called a bit ago to tell me that she got out my baby book and read that I was scooting on my butt by 10 ½ months and began to walk at 15 months.

I’m having a bit of deja vu this Thanksgiving weekend. Last year at this time, Matt was working way too much, I spent the Friday after Thanksgiving visiting my mom and my Goldstein cousins, and Simon was learning new tricks. This year, Matt is working way too much, I’m spending today visiting my mom and my Goldstein cousins, and Simon is learning new tricks.

And yet, things really could not be more different. On a purely superficial level, Simon’s new tricks include pointing, saying “light” (sort of), and kissing his stuffed bunny instead of smiling and holding his head up. And this year when I visit my Goldstein cousins, my Aunt Marcia won’t be at the house.

But the biggest change—for me—lies below the surface. Last year this time, Simon’s reflux and colic were gearing up, and we were having some very hard days as a family. And since he was still so little and needed to nurse every three hours, we were all quite sleep deprived, which made coping with a screaming baby even more difficult. In fact, it was around this time last year that I hit my parenting rock bottom.

I recall with quite a bit of embarrassment the day that Simon screamed so loudly for so long that I actually got a bit rough with him. I was swaddling him, and he was shrieking and spitting out his pacifier. At my exhausted wit’s end, I rolled him over to his side with more force than I intended, causing him to roll over onto his belly and shriek louder than ever.

For the tiniest moment in time, I felt actual anger that my attempt at a moment’s relief was being rewarded with even less peace. As I stood looking over my face-down, howling baby, I felt oddly removed from him. For a minute, he stopped being my adored baby and became an alien nuisance I wanted to escape from.

I never blogged about that incident because I was profoundly ashamed of it and what it said about my mothering skills. I remember being horrified even at the time, thinking to myself that I wasn’t so different from “those” people who shake their babies or do other awful things. I was humiliated by my own loss of control.

Since then, I have never felt so angry or drained, and I have had infinite more patience with Simon. There are several reasons for our overall improvement. First, by mid-January, Simon himself became happier and therefore demanded much less from me. Secondly, we’re all sleeping better these days. Last night Simon was asleep by 8:30 and awoke at just before 9:00. Last but not least, he’s becoming more and more a little person these days, a little person I know like the back of my hand and love deeply.

The measure of that came last night at Thanksgiving dinner. This year’s celebration was hosted by my dad and Ruth and included the entire Whitworth and Franke families. (My dad may have been the host, but we Goldsteins were outnumbered 14-2.) By 7:30, barely two hours into the celebration, Simon began to rub his eyes and was visibly shot. Last year, under similar circumstances, I waited for Matt to volunteer to put Simon down on his parents’ bed and work with him to get him to sleep. I was desperate for a break and some company, and I didn’t want to leave the crowd. This year, I happily volunteered to take Simon home and put him to bed. At the most basic level, since I still nurse him at night and since Matt was with his entire family, it just made good sense. But at another level, it didn’t feel like much of a sacrifice.

There are worse things you can do on a clear Thanksgiving night than walk a short half mile from your dad’s house to your own, get your baby into pj’s, cozy up together, and then tuck into bed early. In fact, I can think of few better.

Simon has discovered something that is–for today at least–even more fascinating than ceiling fans: lights. Beholding this wonder, he felt it was his duty to point them out to Matt and me today. Heading into the kitchen, he pointed up to helpfully call out the fixture over the island. On the changing pad, borderline fussy, he roused himself by pointing out the lamp on the dresser. Getting into his pj’s, semi-hysterical on the bed, he managed to carry out the single longest Cryin’ Charlie of his life while also pointing up to the light overhead.

Sometimes, these gestures were accompanied by narration. We heard a lot of “la”, “lie,” and “lide” today. We may have even heard one proper “light.”

We did interrupt our light obsession today to go outside and play ball. Actually, mama had an ulterior motive. The ginkgo next door has turned a marvelous yellow and blanketed the yard with a glorious splash of color, and today we had some decent sun. I’ve been waiting for this happy confluence of events to take some fall pictures of Simon. Posted here is a close-up from one of my favorites.

When Simon wakes up from his naps and nighttime sleep, Matt and I let him talk or sing to himself a bit, then go in to get him once we hear crying. For several weeks, we reliably heard a bit of happy babbling before Simon grew tired of being alone and started to whine. Then, a few weeks ago, the pattern changed. Simon would begin to cry quickly, and when we arrived in the nursery, we’d be greeted by watching Simon struggle to get out of a belly-down position.

Typically, we’d see him prop up on his arms and wriggle a bit, then give up, flop face down, and wail. I understand why he’s not crawling in his crib; he can’t crawl, and he has nowhere to go even if he could. What I don’t understand is why he isn’t rolling over, since he’s been able to do that for ages. He doesn’t even try to roll over. He just gets up on his arms, struggles like a 90-pound weakling doing a push-up in gym class, and then collapses in despair.

It’s disheartening. Even more so is that sometime during this drama, he inevitably hits his head on his crib aquarium and thereby sets up a multimedia show in the middle of the night.

Matt and I decided to investigate a few nights ago, and what we found surprised us. One late night I tip-toed into the nursery around midnight because Simon was crying. I found him tummy down and still half asleep. I gave him his pacifier (we call this “re-corking”), walked out, and he fell right back asleep. A few nights later, it was Matt’s turn to investigate. Matt walked in to find Simon making noise and “swimming” in his crib. He tip-toed out without taking any action, and again Simon went to sleep.

Clearly, Simon is now sleeping tummy down. That being the case, I am perplexed as to why he is so unhappy waking up that way, why he won’t right himself, and why he’ll do anything to prevent being tummy down when he’s awake. It’s a mystery.

So blah, blah, blah, blah. Enough talking. We finally got a few new pictures off the camera, and since Gallery is down, I thought we’d share.

I think he’s adorable.

Oh dear. I have blogged before about motherhood’s effect on brain cells. At the time, I was alarmed to realize that my recall and memory were not what they were pre-Simon, and I looked forward to the day when my old brain returned to me.

Now I fear my brain is worse off than ever, and this time I can’t blame the boy. In fact, I can see now in hindsight that the early days of motherhood—those super-intense days—afforded me a luxury to think big thoughts even if my memory was shot. The thing about being glued to a nursing chair for 8 hours a day (minimum), is that you have a lot of time to listen to quality radio programming.

When I think back to all the programs I followed: Morning Edition, All Things Considered BBC World Service, Day to Day, Fresh Air, Talk of the Nation, Diane Rehm, etc., I realize I was—for a few months at least—astonishingly well informed.

Now I have a son who nurses only twice a day and who can play by himself quite a bit. So I should be back in fighting shape. If only! Instead, I realize that I have to be ever vigilant with Simon lest he pull something over, scoot where he shouldn’t, etc. And so, while I have more time to myself cumulatively, little of it comes in large blocks. By the end of the day, I am so used to my new state of Continuous Partial Attention (CPA, and props to colleague Mark Taub for introducing me to this term) that the effects linger even after their cause is peacefully slumbering.

In my new, motherhood-induced ADD state, I find that my brain is scattered like buckshot most of the time. I can’t read anything longer than 40 pages. I have trouble watching anything longer than 30 minutes. And I’m distracted all the while.

How bad has it gotten? Confession time. After reading a bit of Salon last night and then failing to make it all the way through a cousin’s article I promised to edit, I resorted to some TV time. Started out watching Miami Ink to see if I could get past my extreme tattoo revulsion, and when that failed flipped over to Bravo, where something called “The Real Housewives of Orange County” was playing, a show that surely rots one’s brain even as it sucks out your soul. I was riveted in a train-wreck sort of way.

Then I realized that if I didn’t turn away quickly, I would either become someone who watches this show regularly (bad) or match the intellects of its bleached and botoxed “stars” (worse). On the one hand, it was scary to see how far I’ve fallen, but then I was oddly reassured to see how much worse things could get.

Thus inspired, I think tonight I’ll pick up Jeffrey Toobin’s The Nine and take a crack at sustained non-fiction. Just as soon as “Project Runway” is over that is.

I play a little finger game with Simon pretty regularly called “Where is Thumbkin?”. Each finger has name: thumbkin, pointer, tall man, ring man, and pinkie. You sing it to the tune of “Frere Jacques”, and for the past few weeks, whenever we get to pointer, I’ve been awaiting Simon discovering his own pointer.

He’s been pointing at items in books for a while now, but I was eager to see when he’d look up, out, or over to something and point at it. This interest is motivated in part by my simply thinking it’s cool to watch my baby hit textbook milestones and in part because I know that on-time pointing is a sign that a baby does not have autism. So pointing: good stuff all round.

Last Thursday, we finally got to say hello to pointer when he pointed to something while spending the day with his Grandma. Friday I finally caught him in the act. Then Saturday, he was suddenly eager to show Matt and me everything in the house. It’s as though he wanted to make sure that Matt and I realized how wondrous it was that we lived in a house with windows, cats, and ceiling fans.

I could almost hear him. “Look ma, a ceiling fan. Do you see it? Up there? It’s a fan. Ceiling fans are cool. Aren’t you glad we have one?” Given the long streams of gibberish we’re getting these days, I am sure he something similar to this.

So that’s it: another milestone ticked off the list. In fact, last week was eventful in Simon’s development. He began to scooting much faster, is getting into more things, is much more vocal, is pointing, and is now self-feeding the vast majority of his food.

Autism fears now at bay and a new menu in the works, the next milestone I await is Simon finally getting from his belly to a sitting position on his own, as he awakes thrashing on his belly from every nap and every night’s sleep.  But it could be awhile, because I am learning that while Simon’s fine motor, social, and verbal skills are on or ahead of schedule, he’s a slow-poke at the gross motor stuff. Given who his parents are, this seems about right.

At the one year mark, it just should not be this hard to get out of the house. And most days it’s not. Most days either before or after Simon’s regularly scheduled nap, I put on our coats, him into the stroller, grab my keys and wallet, and off we go. One—two—three—out!

Then there are days like last Wednesday, when, heaven help me, it took several hours and three tries to manage this not-so-spectacular feat. How can that be? Here’s how:

9:30 a.m. Breakfast. We all eat oatmeal and enjoy ourselves downstairs after Simon has slept in unusually late.

10:30 Simon’s normal nap time. But he shows no signs of fatigue. So we play a bit downstairs. By 11:00, I decide it’s time to go out for a bit.

11:00 I grab Simon’s coat and go to dress him. Noxious sounds and smells emanate from him. Time to go upstairs for a diaper change.

11:15 On the changing pad, Simon starts to rub his eyes. He’s ready for that nap now.

11:15-12:00 Delayed morning nap.

12:00 Simon wakes up; I decide we’ll walk now right before lunch. Realize Simon is wet and go to change his diaper first.

12:15 Whilst being changed, Simon begins to cry and puts his fingers in his mouth. He’s hungry.

12:15-12:45 Lunch

12:45 While I clean up from lunch, Simon plays in the kitchen and scoots around. While my back is turned, he gets into the cat dish and makes a horrible mess.

1:00 I take the very messy baby upstairs to change his diaper and clothes.

1:20 Clothes changed. Diaper changed. Baby fed. We’re ready to go!

1:30 Just as I lower Simon into the stroller, he bucks, cries, and rubs his eyes some more. The morning nap wasn’t long enough.

1:30-2:20 SECOND morning nap or first afternoon nap, depending on your perspective.

2:30 He’s up and a bit pekkish. Time for a little snack.

2:45 At last, we are ready to suit up and go outside. Two naps, two meals, one change of clothes and three diaper changes later.

You just have to laugh. Thank goodness most days we’re in better synch than this