OCD (the Elephant in the Room)

I thought I could keep up the consistent dedication required for daily posting. False.

But I thought about you, alot.

I had a lengthy conversation with Dad-to-Z regarding OCD yesterday. As I start packing for our two week or so vacation to Maui. Oddly enough the conversation wasn't about my pre-washing and pre-packing Lil'Z's stuff two weeks prior to leaving.

Over the first to second month of Lil'Z's bedtimes, I developed a bedtime routine that I looked at in a brief but searing flash of unbiased outside light yesterday.

I might be seven lightswitch flicks away from full OCD.

The steps of "the routine" have gradually become a ritual to me similar to that of the batter box rituals of Nomar Garciaparra or the detested Derek Jeter (that's right, his royal smugness aka king-s$#%-of-turd-mountain).

There's no stretch to me equating these rituals. I feel I could practically be out there (not with Jeter, yuck, I typed his name again) high-fiving Garciaparra as he trots over home-plate post out-of-the-park and saying, "yep, it was all in the second re-fasten and the timing was seamless". And he would say to me, "8.5 solid hours, nice, it was all in the perfect temperature/positioning of the hot water bottle and your smooth stair climb was classic".

Home-run or to get a wee baby to fall asleep easily and dream happily with her little kitten snores all through the night.

Long story short.

Dad-to-Z and I, driving along in the car at last night (we do our best sorting out there). I said, "I just don't think you take the steps seriously enough. The other day the bassinet was not pushed up against the bed correctly, the wrong light was on and you had the hot water bottle only on the bottom sheet but not covered by the top sheet so it wasn't warmed. And the gromits on her sleep sack were cold."

I could hear myself and remained silent. Vunerable. The true depth of the details exposed.

The man, bless his heart, said the following...

"I can guarantee you if she doesn't sleep through the night, it's not because you did something wrong. It's because she has a cold, or she's teething, or she just didn't feel like sleeping all night. We will wake up together and figure it out".

Sigh. So simple.

That being said she is growing out of her bassinet. Or has outgrown it, as it's only weight-rated to 18lbs. So when we get back, she has to sleep in her crib in her nursery. I can already see making myself a bed on the floor beside it.

The Cat's Pajamas (or the best thing to sleep in comfortably)

Looking back I think the intense, intense paranoia that went along with Baby Z's first weeks of life MIGHT have had something to do with hormones. Mind you, I still lay my hand over her chest at least seven times a night to feel her little chest rise and fall if I can't hear her little kitten breaths. One of the big items on the SIDS preventive checklist is keeping the room cool, in fact balmy 65 degrees or between 16 Celsius and 20 Celsius.

(The rest of the checklist and link can be found below)**

What works out well is that our bedroom is the coolest room in the house. However, finding that balance between combating SIDS and keeping our sweet bean warm is a tough challenge.

What works for her?

A GroBag, the cat's pajamas (Bada-bing!) combined with the BabyGap 'first favorites' (gift from Nana to Z). The GroBag is the cat's pajamas because it has the great features most sleep sacks do: impossible to kick off, cover her face with and suffocate under and keep her toasty warm. Specifically the GroBag is even better than the average sleep sack because the zipper doesn't come up the chest (leaving a metal tab at the top which could be pushed into her teenie sternum) but comes around the side and snaps with a protect tab over the hard part. The Grobag fastens at the top with gromits and fastens under the armpits to keep her from being able to slide down in the bag. Also, the amount of info and degree of accuracy for fabric weight to room temperature and clothing pairing is very reassuring if your as OCD as I am. Mind you it's pretty straightforward information, read it once and it cements common sense and probably will bring to mind a couple things you might haven't had considered.

The clothing we put Baby Z in under the GroBag is the BabyGap first favorites long sleeve diaper shirt. The material is the nice comfortable white t-shirt cotton and has long sleeves (wrist or slightly past) and flat comfy seams. The best thing about the diaper shirts are what they don't have, which is extra junk (ruching, seams, folds, fancy edging etc). They keep her arms warm, but not hot, and they wash very well.

When warmer summer weather comes, I will have to reevaluate, likely to short sleeve diaper shirt and light weight GroBag.

In the meantime...Baby Z is outfitted for safe happy dreams.

**

http://www.bestchance.gov.bc.ca/you-and-your-baby-0-6/caring-for-your-baby/baby-care/sleeping.html

Rocking Good Times

It's 1:10 in the AM. I am sitting beside the Fella as he rocks Baby Z in the glider. Seemed like a good time to discuss the Glider, and the silent con-trov-esy (I am obsessed with saying it the way they do on the Masterpiece Theatre: "con-TROV-essy") of sorts the surrounded it's addition to the nursery.

Every night the last part of a successful BabyZ to bed routine relies on some smooth rockin' glide time in her nighttime blanket (**Blanket Theory to follow - remind me if I forget **). The glide time is really the nuts and bolts of the nighttime routine, it can either take 15 sweet-lovin' minutes or three hours of endurance marathon movement. Which sounds like how I got into this mess, if you catch my drift. Anyways, we freakin' love our glider. It's the Monte Luca Glider in Stone. My criteria for a glider was:

-soft arms to avoid me cracking someone's little braincase against wood and for my elderly elbows

-comfortable enough to fall comfortably asleep in

-could be used elsewhere in the house when the baby rooms become fun adventure castles of kid-driven wants and needs rather than soothing poop changing homages to all things I think are cute

-glide function that doesn't endanger fingers, appendages or puppy dog tails

-recline function is added bonus

Needless to say, the Monte Luca met all this criteria and more (you could ask whether the criteria came along before the discovery of the Monte Luca online, but that might bring up questions about how I sold the idea of this glider to the Fella, so let's avoid).

For the Con-TROV-essy:

It was $1500 with tax and delivery.

Egads. Lucky for us, we sold an old family vehicle for nearly the same price and it morphed the old ride into the new glide. Bada-bing.

Would we have shelled out the cash (or credit to lurk over our heads) if we didn't have the vehicle to sell? I like to think so but it would have been a lot harder to stomach.

In addition there was the debate about colour choice. The debate hasn't been entirely settled yet as the Fella felt that Charcoal would be the safer choice given all the projectile liquids that can come out a baby. I thought Stone was the only way to go.

We have the glider, we use it every day at least once. In the beginning I found it challenging to breastfeed in, but I have the hang out it now. And I have slept in it a bunch of times, sometimes reclined with a BabyZ on my chest. Othertimes I have have fallen asleep while gliding and singing lullabies and only known I was asleep because I went from singing a catchy but repetitive nursery rhyme to discussing the inventory of the Old Navy online baby wear catalogue. I know this because it was witnessed by the Fella, who took over for me and sent me to bed with a chuckle.

**Blanket Theory:

That you should always use/keep the same blanket in the same location for association reasons. Smells, textures excetera all come to be part of The Routine of that area. That's why it might have been as weird for you when you were a little kid to wake up on your bed with the couch/family room afghan on you, unless you were sick or something equally unusual was going on. Why is this scratchy yarn afghan of brown,red,yellow and green chevron stripes on my bed, my world is amiss! Or taking your bed pillow to the couch. Again, nap blankets in the nap areas, sleeping blankets in the sleeping areas.

How to Deal with Poop.

How to deal with it. I'd be lying if I said I wasn't apprehensive going into having a baby about the shitty end of things. However, turns out it's not the least bit gross so far, more funny and science experiment-ish (I can eat a granola bar while chatting to the New Dad as he changes her and look over his big shoulder to see the diaper contents. Then discuss the contents). Helps that Baby Z seems to enjoy diaper changes and laughs and smiles her way through them (provided she's not super hungry or sick). The routine is pretty simple, pop her on the changing pad with a couple of sheets of papertowel underneath the bum to catch sudden pees or a huge messy splatter bum poop. A couple of swipes with the Nature Made wipes (referred to as "the German wipes"). I warm up a wash cloth (special ones Nana-to-Z bought before you panic about having wiped your face in the shower at my house) and put the wipes on top of the hot washcloth before I start and then the wipes are warmed. A swipe of the wipes, a final thorough wipe with the washcloth and then a creaming with either the Best Bum Cream Ever (not it's real name) or the Live Clean Diaper Rash Ointment. Usually try to let her air dry after the wash cloth but not always possible. During the air dry we play with rattle-puppy or the Einstein rattles.

Long story short, the diapers of choice in this house are "the german ones". They are more square then the traditional name brands and she seems to find them quite a bit more comfortable. Also they are super absorbent. And they are super easy to put on.

Anyways, the local store that sells them is almost always sold out. Proof is in the bum pudding.

Sucks.

This week things that suck have been on my mind. No reason in particular.

A few weeks ago after telling our Doctor, Dr. B (who in the words of the non-religious but fairly spiritual Nana-to-Z post birth, "that man walks on water") that Baby Z was nursing for hours at a time (apparently called non-nutrative nursing). Babies hang out on boobs for fun and comfort apparently (kind of like teenage boys? too far?). And that's what Baby Z was up to, chilling with a boob in her mouth, wrapped up in a blanket and resting on a pillow. Kind of makes sense when cast your mind to it.

I digress. Dr. B ("that man walks on water" I hear it in my head whenever I say 'Dr. B') said, "but she's not actively nursing all that time is she?". I cocked an eyebrow and asked, "well, sometimes her mouth moves differently, flutters rather than gulping". A-doih. Dr. B ("that man walks on water") in addition to having miraculous skills also is quite patient with overtired NM's. He said, "you could use a pacifier". Praise heavens. Numerous blogs and health nurses had said we couldn't introduce a pacifier because before the magic 6-week mark it could interfere the GOLDEN LATCH and screw up my boob relationship with Baby Z.

It was a huge boost because it seems the advice/action tree goes like this as far as I can reckon:

Dr.B

|

My Own Mother

/ \

Health Nurses Moms-I-Know-and-Like

/ \

Mayo Clinic Baby Center KellyMom

/ | \

Parenting Mags Moms-I-Don't-Like Bartenders

/ \

W ikipedia Mother-in-law

|

People-who-don't-have-kids

(no offence intending as I was a long time DINK*DoubleIncomeNoKids)

Permission granted despite pacifier related fears of : ear infections (true), speech impediments (possible), GOLDEN LATCH-ing problems (not a problem) and last but not least the fear of being accused of lazy parenting (one day pacifier, next day orange pop in a formula bottle). As the one thing that trumps all, "our Doctor said we should".

Anyways, the pacifier we use (and love love love) is orthodontic shaped, all nice friendly non-cancerous rubber, hypoallergenic, non-face marking and impossible to hurt your mouth when you bang your face against your Mom's clavicle as you learn to hold your eggshell melon up.

I highly recommend....

The Natursutten Orthodontic Pacifier. Available at all well-meaning but somewhat hoighty-toighty baby stores around. You know the ones I mean.

On the subject of Mucus.

I hate snot. It disgusts me. I have been known for lengthy, uncontrollable dry heaves in the middle of a staff lunch room (setting off a chain reaction of dry heaving) after seeing people picking their noses while driving by on the street below.

So this made it pretty unusual that I would embrace, without a second thought, a device that involved me sucking the snot out of someone's nose. But the nose is question might be the cutest nose ever of all time.

Baby Z has been snotty ever since she was born. Mucus-y, snotty. After she developed a cold two weeks ago, I started looking for ways to help her breathe better ("what do you mean babies can't blow their own noses?"). The public health nurse suggested taking her into the bathroom while the Fella or I were bathing or showering to get the steam to help clear things. I found long walks outside were more effective, but enjoyed having BabyZ snoozing in the Snugabunny beside the tub while I had a super hot long bath (still a novelty after pregnancy).

What works much better?

The HydraSense Nasal Aspirator for Infants. It comes with saline drops to help soften the mucus, and then using a bulb with a soft tip you insert in the nostril, you gently suck the mucus out of the nose. Not only does it help instantly, but it seems safer than the hand bulb and has the elements of a science experiment as the bulb is clear.

I highly recommend picking it up and keeping it in the medicine cabinet in case you need it when the pharmacies are closed. Rather than listen to the baby snuffles all night with your eyes open staring at the ceiling and counting the minutes until you can wake her up and hold her because it makes you feel better.

Dreigel Driegel Driegel and Fart Smarts

Someone is six weeks old today. What is a driegel? Someone's current favorite 'word'.

I can ask her, "would you like to go downstairs?" She'll reply, "dreegiel, driegeellll".

It's all in the tone. You kind of have to be there, or ask me to do it in person.

It was a busy couple days prepping for more visitors. Everyone keeps saying "let the housework go" and I have a little, but in this compact townhouse it's a bit like a ship and everything must stay in it's place from me to retain my sanity. Fortunately Nana-to-Z came over and hung out with us while I ran the Dyson for the first time since foaling and it was very satisfying.

And someone won't stop hitting herself. I finally figured out (a-doih!) that she was probably trying to scratch the dry patches around her ears and eyebrows. So I greased them up with some of the most amazing bum/face cream ever (Bum Cream by Peas in a Pod - link to follow). Her skin looks so much better, especially as I mix the creams and with the introduction of nightly baths. No pooping in the tub yet, but some serious farting.

Today I was told by the public health nurse that farty babies can turn out with a higher intelligence then non-farty babies. (I should have opened with that line). She said the extra rhythmic rocking that farty babies get to calm them helps them build synaptic pathways.

I heard farts=smart.

BabyZ=lots o' farts=quite smart.

The routine progresses. Word is that a baby has to repeat a change for three days before it becomes set. I think the routine is pretty set.

Tomorrow: humidifier shopping and more Bjorn time.