Thursday, July 2, 2009

Back on the bicycle

From my prior posts towards the middle and end of June, you all should have known by now that my wife and I just had our third kid. That in itself is fantastic. But that doesn't mean that it's been easy for anyone of us since that time. Now I'm not going to go into the BS of the problems and delays that we had in the NICU, you can read that if you want here. What I'm posting about is more or less the day to day things that we're trying to get adjusted to again since our two oldest boys are four and six; it's been a while since we had to do the whole baby thing. Oh, and whoever said that it's like riding a bike is completely full of crap. It's more like getting back behind the wheel of a bumper car; you know that they're gunning for ya and you have little room for error when they all try to ricochet you in that steel arena.

Now I was going to write this post later (maybe after our baby had been home for a week) but I feel that now is a good time to let it all out.


First off, I love the little booger; I love him just as much as the older two boogers. Even throughout all the times I was feeding him and he decides to lay out a huge explosion of poop in his diapers; even that he's the hardest to get to burp and fall asleep to train into any resonance of a schedule; even just to do all the behind the scenes things that we have to do for him because we (my wife and I) decided a long time ago to institutionalize; I still love him until the day I die and afterwards, just like his brothers. But the one gripe I have to say is just the general maintenance of what we want to have for our baby. We are using cloth diapers that my wife made by hand for his sensitive skin to not get a rash (it's hereditary, I had it and the boys had it too.) The upkeep with those is to collect enough of it to make a load for the wash and get it recirculated again for more peeing and pooping from the bowel factory we gave life to. It's pretty draining, but it's a labor of love. Plus it's a helluva lot cheaper than buying disposables like Luvs and Pampers in the long run. And that maintenance is totally separate from just making sure he has clean cloths. So that's like a major/minor thing, but it's still a drain on energy.

Another thing that wears on my wife and I is the breastfeeding. Any parent knows that breastmilk is the best thing that you can feed your child. We try to keep store of reserves via breastpumps to extract milk from my wife and store it in our fridge and freezer (thaw first before serving, eating a breastmilk popsicle is not as appetizing as you might think....) But that drains a lot out of my wife, literally and metaphorically. She is wanting to breastfeed our newborn straight from the source, but he sometimes want no part in that. It was suspected to be the nipples from the bottles we were using that allowed more to flow with less effort. Now that we switched, he is using less of the bottles and more of the breast. I like that because of research that shows that babies that are fed directly develop better than those that don't. That and I really think that my wife likes the bonding between her and our little one (I swear that it's almost symbiotic in nature.)

But the biggest thing that is draining all the energy from us has to be execution of daily tasks. I think that we've grown accustomed to having older kids to help and not drag around while doing such things as grocery shopping or going to the library. Our buffer of conveyance has been our demise (or at least mine) in execution of such. It isn't that much of a crimp in that lifestyle, but it is a noticeable, but well welcomed, nuisance. Sure I don't mind carrying a 9 pound baby across the library while my boys pick out books they want to read, but that's not stopping me from thinking in the back of my mind: "Grow up kid. You really need to learn how to walk. I ain't gonna carry you forever you know. Just ask your brothers." Call me lazy, call me a glutton for punishment, but I love both side of the equation.

I mean I can go on and on and have a point-counterpoint match up with myself all day. But do you all really want me to drag this on more than necessary? I know I don't, but I just wanted to let some of the air out, vent, and recollect myself. I think I made my point and hopefully by now you understand it just a little as well.

BootLeG sampler.. signing out...

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