Falling in love

It is really incredible how much a tiny little creature can make its way into your heart, and then continue to grow and grow, taking your heart with it all along. The love is so great it encompasses your whole body, making you heartsick and yearning to constantly connect with that beautiful little body and soul. His smile is a window to sheer dependence and unconditional love, and there is nothing sweeter than his little body sleeping on mine.

I think back to those early days with such tenderness! His little movements were so slow and tiny, though his strength was always evident. We celebrate every little milestone of development and wonder at his amazing feats. All the sleepless nights in the world are so worth it!

Laughter

Okay, nothing in the world beats the laughter of this little one. It makes our hearts bubble over!!

Funny

So I read this in a babycenter update about Noah's development:

You didn't know becoming a parent meant...

• Stacking today's unread newspaper on top of yesterday's unread newspaper.
• Eating dinner like you're trying to break a Guinness world record for the most pasta swallowed in the shortest amount of time. Standing up.
• Letting your partner choose between poop and laundry as a conversation topic.
• Figuring out how to pee without putting the baby down.
• Spending three hours getting the baby to sleep and then waking him up two minutes later to make sure he's still breathing.

Nano started getting the Wall Street Journal to keep on top of financial news, and I think we must have had at least 37 newspapers stacked up waiting for him to read... he actually wanted to read them in order, but I think he's finally up to date...

We definitely started eating dinner as if we were breaking world records for fast eating...

And I can tell you that peeing is not the only thing we got done in the bathroom without putting the baby down...

Studying Fertility with Baby

Most people who know me know I am in a PhD program in demography. However, only the bold few ask, so what the #@%& is demography, anyway? I'm sure there are more eloquent descriptions, but I'll put in a plug here. Demography is the study of populations and how they change over time as a result of health and mortality, fertility behavior and migration patterns. Health and mortality are affected by public health measures, sanitation policies, medical advances, health systems and many other forces. Fertility behavior is affected by marital patterns, female labor force participation, education, use of contraception, and a host of other behavioral characteristics. We learn about all those things, plus theories to describe the forces behind the demographic transition, or the historical shift from high mortality and high fertility to low mortality and low fertility among developed nations. Demographers also have their own set of analytic tools and are particularly concerned with age-composition effects on various measures in a population, since fertility and mortality rates are different for different age categories.

So, here I am in the spring semester taking a course on fertility, while caring for a new baby. It definitely gives me a different perspective on the articles I read! For example, I just read a paper entitled Why Have Children in the 21st Century? The paper basically asks the question, given the huge costs involved in having children these days (education, etc), and the excellent alternative opportunities available to women in particular (excelling in one's career, living off the fruits of that success), why would anyone choose to have children at all? It highlights three major theories in the literature: biological predisposition, social coercion and rational choice.

As you might imagine, the biological argument suggests that humans have evolved to reproduce. We have a strong sex drive, and genes for pleasure-seeking. We have an underlying biological desire to reproduce. The social coercion argument centers around social institutions that generate different fertility environments for individuals. For example, consider the baby boom in the U.S. -- the economy was good, people were moving out to the suburbs and had lots of free time and space on their hands. Everyone started having lots of babies. The social environment was saying, make more babies! The rational choice argument points out that we make rational decisions to have children. Reasons behind having the first child may be emotional and or psychological (i.e., to have a child to love, to carry on the family name), and reasons behind having additional children may be for family building and sex composition in the family.

So why did we have Noah, anyway?

I definitely think there is a biological predisposition. When I was in my early 20s, I could not imagine wanting to have children. Then around age 27-28, the maternal instinct kicked in, and I knew I wanted eventually to have a family. Also, I think women are genetically wired to respond to their children. When I hear Noah's cry, it causes a surge of adrenaline to rush through my body. I wake right up if I have been sleeping. Other babies' cries however don't have this affect at all. As one of my friends said, "other babies' cries sound like a tape recording." Other women have told me they feel the same way -- even previously deep sleepers will wake up in an instant if the baby starts to cry (of course, on the other hand, you get so sleep deprived that this has to break down at some point...).

I also think there is social coercion. This is not to say that society forced me to have children, but rather, that social institutions matter. One of the reasons I could not imagine having children when I was in my early 20s was the deep fear that had been instilled in me since I was in high school. The dark message booming from all of society was, "getting pregnant will ruin your life." It took a while to get to the point where I realized that message was no longer relevant. Then, of course, I would be lying if I said I wasn't affected by the fact that virtually every single inhabitant of the country of Chile asked Nano and me when we were going to have a baby.

And, of course, we also had Noah because of the emotional bonds we suspected it would create, to watch him grow, to enjoy the warmth of a family, and all of those other motivations behind a "rational" decision.

Another thing that struck me in one of my readings was a series of interviews with new mothers in which two major themes emerged: "1) Women are surprised and overwhelmed by the amount of work and energy their young child requires and 2) they did not anticipate how completely they would fall in love with their offspring." (This is Morgan and Berkowitz King 2001 discussing McMahon 1995).

I completely recognize both of these themes! I knew that you don't get any sleep after you have a baby and that it is exhausting. I knew it wasn't going to be easy. However, superficial knowledge is entirely separate from the intimate understanding of having experienced it! You are completely exhausted from +/- 17 hours of labor, and then you never really get to sleep again. On top of that, it takes infinite energy to keep baby content!

The love is also infinite, and yet continues to grow each day. In the beginning, it was more of a protective kind of love, and that desire to protect him has since grown. I have dreams that I leave him with someone else for a few minutes, and terrible things happen. When he started smiling around weeks 4-5, we finally got some feedback. Now, he interacts all the time, and every day there is something new. I love it when he wakes up fussy and uncomfortable, and then when I smile at him, he beams his beautiful smile back at me and forgets all his fussiness. I love holding his little body against me, and there is nothing more fulfilling then having him with me.

Adventures in Poo

We took our first outing together when Noah was around 3-4 weeks. As any new mom can understand, I had a need for a couple of new shirts. Since it was cold outside, we were using the "Bundleme" liner for the car seat, which is basically a really warm sheepskin covering to keep your baby nice and toasty. Well, we managed to forget to unzip the thing when we got him inside Old Navy, and after about 15 minutes of Nano strolling him around the store, he literally began to toast ... and then to fuss. We unzipped the thing, and pulled out a now red, crying baby. Poor little dude! We took him into a dressing room to nurse, since his 2 hour internal hunger alarm clock had gone off. When he was almost done nursing, I felt something wet on his clothes, and asked Nano, "Did he pee?" Just as Nano was about to reply, Noah ripped out a two-minute long wet one [pbfpbfbpfbpf], louder than Nano's reply. Then his back really started to turn wet...and yellow...and the poo started to ooze through his clothes. Somehow it seemed like there weren't enough hands to hold the baby, keep the poo away from our bodies, pull out a new outfit and change his clothes. Amazingly, I was able to ward off the yellow mustard flow long enough for Nano to pull out the change of clothes that we had miraculously had the foresight to pack. Yes, we were very clumsy, but we managed to get him into a clean diaper and clothes!

Then, just a few weeks ago, after our trip to Miami, we went to Cosi for lunch on a quiet Saturday afternoon. Nano ordered his standard sandwich, and I got my favorite salad. We had just purchased a new comfortable convertible carseat, convinced that Noah's infant seat was too uncomfortable, so we didn't have the old car seat to put him in while at the restaurant. We took turns holding him on our laps instead. We heard the telltale sound of a poo, and so we prepared to change him. I checked the ladies' room for a changing table, and while one was available, it was covered in dirty paper towels and nasty old poo. The men's room wasn't much better, so we decided to change him on the booth's bench instead. I laid out the diaper pad, placed Noah on it, and got the wet diaper off. Just as I was starting to clean up, [pbfpbfpbfpbfpbfpbfpbfpbf!], out shoots more projectile mustard! I looked over at Nano for help, but he had become incapacitated with raucous laughter. Everyone in the restaurant must have turned to look - if not for the sound of the poo, for Nano's guffawing. I tried to shield myself with the wipe, but of course, the poo got all over my hand and shot all over the diaper mat. By some stroke of luck, it did not get onto the booth (really, I swear). It took about 10 more wipes and 3 trips to the bathroom before we got that one all cleaned up...

Who could resist this smile?

Noah has developed the most beautiful smile. I'm sure all parents say this about their babies, and I even read that the smile has evolved to charm caregivers into giving babies the care they need. Well, it works! We melt every time we see it. Here is a recent video of his smile:

Surviving the first 3 months

Noah is now over 3 months old, and the changes he has gone through in the last three months are incredible. There were few tranquil moments in the early days of his life outside the womb. I remember that we asked the doctor at our second visit, when he was about a week old, whether it was normal for him to be either crying or sleeping almost all of the time. He cried for 3 hours straight most evenings in the first several weeks, and nothing we tried would calm him. Well, sometimes things would work at first, but his pout would erupt into even louder screeching after a maximum of 3 minutes. Holding him was not enough during his unsettled moments. Rocking him was a joke. We swaddled him and tried dancing to Beatles music. However, it only worked if we were bouncing so hard we could not last more than 5 minutes ourselves before becoming exhausted. We tried swinging him in the car seat, but we may as well have been swinging him over the seventh ring of hell the way he wailed. His cute infant seat guaranteed screams of utter despair. Nano took him for a spin in the car, and the resulting screaming was almost enough to shatter the car windows. We took turns trying to calm him, and each time we handed him off to the other, we fretted with frustration and failure.

For newborn Noah, one of the very worst infant torture mechanisms ever invented was the diaper change. As soon as we laid him on the changing mat, the ends of his mouth twisted into a frown, his eyes pinned shut, and the wailing began. We tried getting a wipes warmer, thinking that it might be the cold against his skin causing discomfort, but his warm wipe wailing equaled that of the cold wipes. We pitched all clothes that were not easy to get on and off, and only used pajamas with feet and snaps, but even still, it seemed to take us an eternity to get the snaps snapped.

We soon started to look for help. We called friends to see what had worked with their babies, and no one had had an experience like ours. "Well, we've been lucky, he's an easy baby," or "We had to wake him up to feed because he slept all the time" was all we got. They asked us if we had tried holding him, or swaddling him, which was like Baby Calming 101 for us. We resorted to the internet for ideas, and found new tips, like turning on the vacuum cleaner, or putting him in the car seat on top of the running dryer (supervised, of course). The vacuum cleaner worked once, and we never tried the dryer because it's too cold in our basement. We tried the 5 S's of Harvey Karp's Happiest Baby on the Block -- swaddling, side/stomach position, shushing, swinging, and sucking. Nothing worked. No one told us it could be this hard. But then again, only on the internet did we find stories of babies that were as "fussy" as ours. All the resources said was that the fussiness would subside by 12 weeks. We were on week 2. There was no way we could make it for 10 more weeks without checking into the looney bin.

At that early doctor's visit, they suggested it could be something in my diet. She said it could be diary, soy, beans and legumes, or the broccoli family. I decided to start with dairy and beans. According to articles on the internet, dairy was one of the only things to have been proven to be connected to allergies in babies, so it made sense to start there. Milk and (especially) cheese were consumed in great quantities at our house, so it was a new challenge to try to go dairy free, but I was willing to do anything to stop the crying. It can take quite a while for all the dairy to get out of your system, but I cut it out in chunks. I continued to consume some dairy most days in things like pancakes or chocolate for a while. One night I ate a piece of flan, not thinking about the fact that it is pure, thick dairy. That night he awoke crying every 30 minutes to an hour. Eventually, I cut out all the dairy, including almost all chocolate (I've found at least one that is dairy free).

The insane crying eventually diminished. We also invested in an infant swing, which allowed us to make and eat dinner, and a couple of hands free carriers that allowed me to get things done while having him with me. We also introduced the pacifier around week 2-3. He fought it at first, but finally took it once and allowed the sucking to sooth him. We started playing an mp3 of womb sounds at full blast next to him while he was sleeping, and that really seemed to help.

Looking back, I think part of the difficulty was certainly the dairy causing discomfort (he is still sensitive to dairy, as well as soy). Part of it was also probably the transfer from a warm, safe soft, protected environment where all needs were automatically met, to a cold environment where one had to be fed, warmed and changed. Part of it was probably just inevitable.

I think back to that newborn and realize he is miles away from the little baby we have now, who instead screams from the sheer pleasure of seeing his feet kick the toys in the baby gym. He now loves to have his diaper changed, and makes some of the most beautiful smiles and laughs in those moments. He is entertained in the infant car seat enough to let me take a shower in the morning. He likes listening to music. He settles when I bounce him. He likes his pacifier when he's tired, but rejects it from time to time. The one thing that probably hasn't changed much is his aversion to the car, though there is still a one in two chance that he might do okay, at least for about 15 minutes.

He did also have moments of amazing, beautiful wakefulness in those early weeks, especially in the mornings. I swear he imitated me sticking out out my tongue and opening my mouth. Here is a video of one of those wonderful wakeful moments of the early days.





So, here are some thoughts on how we got through the first several weeks...


Top baby survival items:

1. Pacifiers - you have to be willing to convince them to take it -- they may not want it at first, but it will help oh so much until they can learn to suck their hand or thumb

2. Infant swing - not just any swing, it has to be a nice, comfy cradle swing. We swear by the fisher price cradle swing.

3. Hands-free carriers - Nano used the Snuggli, I got the Moby wrap. They allow you to not break your back or wear out your arms. The wrap keeps them swaddled against you, just like when they were in the womb.

4. Really good swaddle -- the miracle swaddle is great, but you can use a regular swaddle blanket if it is big enough and you wrap it tight enough. Learn how to do them up really tight -- there are great examples on youtube. Babies will bust their arms right out of those velcro ones they sell at babies r us, so don't bother with that.

5. Mp3/cd of womb sounds - we downloaded them from the internet and played these by his bedside when he was sleeping at night. It helped a ton to lengthen his sleep time.

6. Harvey Karp's Happiest Baby on the Block - it really helps to understand the first 3 months, and the dvd is great to show you how to actually implement the techniques. I don't think we did them quite right at first, though Noah really needed the extreme level of all of them (e.g., shushing didn't work, but womb sounds blasting did work).

7. Infant seat - eventually very helpful if you need to go to the potty & can't leave your baby with someone else, or have to set him down while putting on a baby carrier.

8. Black-out shades -- these have allowed us to get a few extra winks in the morning, and also lets us block out the light when he is over-stimulated.

Top Baby Survival Strategies

1. Patience

2. Split up the nights. Nano took the first half, 9 to 1 or 2, and I took the second, 2 to 6 or 7. Even though I was breastfeeding and had to feed every two hours, at least I didn't have to burp him afterwards, or wait for him to need a burp 15 minutes after I fed him. It's better to have 2 half-sleep deprived parents than 2 completely sleep-deprived parents.

3. Work in shifts. When baby is crying inconsolably, and it is not diaper or food that is needed, work in shifts of 15-20 minutes in order to give yourself a time out, and not get to frustrated with the situation. Recharge your batteries while the other is trying to meet the baby's needs. As all the books say, when all else fails, and you are exhausted, put the baby in a safe place and let him cry while you re-charge for a few minutes. We didn't have to do this since there were two of us most of the time, but I can see how it might be necessary if you are by yourself.

4. Ask for help. I know all the books say it, but let's get more specific. The first 4-6 weeks post partum is one of the most emotional and vulnerable periods of a woman's life. Mom is trying to meet baby's needs for food, love and security, and is usually working on a sleep and energy deficit, since you never really get time to relax or sleep once you go into labor. It is important to have non-intrusive help from someone you trust and with whom you can share your vulnerabilities. Help with food and housework is essential. This is in addition to hubby, who should be helping out too.

5. Dad, take over basic chores for 4-6 weeks. Mom is focusing on baby's needs, and while all the books say to let the housework go, no one wants to live in a pigsty. Dishes, laundry, and picking up around the house will keep things running. Offer her lots of fluids, and find a way to procure food.

Noah's first trip: Miami Beach

Noah took his first plane ride at 3 months!

We had to stop twice on the way to the airport because Noah either hates riding in the car, or hates his carseat, or both. He finally settled down just in time for severe traffic on the blue route due to the untimely closure of I-95. Nano dropped me off at the airport with Noah, and then went to park the car. He came back with all of the luggage (what a trooper) just in time for US Airways to tell us that he had missed the 45 minute cutoff, and we could not get on the plane (who knew there was a 45 minute cutoff??). We ended up having to sit in the airport for two and a half more hours while waiting to get on the next flight. Noah slept for a while, and then got fussy just in time to get on the plane.

Wouldn't you know it, the ticket agents gave us two seats in the LAST row of the airplane, those non-reclining seats next to the roaring engine and bathroom traffic. He cried for the first 40 minutes of the flight, much to the despair of our chair neighbors. The guy across the aisle from me pleasantly picked up the burp clothes and blankets that constantly fell as I tried shifting Noah's position. Noah seemed to be saying, "get me OUT of here!" He finally settled and was able to sleep once I was able to get out of my seat and bounce him in his carrier. Poor guy!

After arriving, getting the rental car and attaching the carseat, we finally got to the hotel at 5 pm, just in time for dinner with my brother and his wife. Nano took a much-needed dip in the ocean before dinner to wash off the stress of the day.

The next day we took Noah on a walk on the boardwalk with his cute new hat and Chilean outfit:



Noah eventually tired of the wind, so we decided to take a drive to see other parts of Miami Beach. Of course, he wasn't thrilled about the car ride, so we stopped for lots of breaks. We had lunch at a fancy open-air mall, and then made our way back to the hotel. By around 5 pm, the sun had gone down enough for us to take Noah down to the beach. The wind was relentless, however! Here is a video:





Here is our family -- Noah is studying his fist!


After the beach we went out to dinner. Noah decided to fall asleep early, and was distraught to find he wasn't in his bed when he woke up in the stroller with a burp. I ended up taking him up to the hotel to go back to bed.

The next day Nano and I went swimming in the ocean! The wind had calmed and it was a bit overcast. The water was cold, but we got used to it quickly. Noah stayed happily with his grandfather Tata in the hotel room. We found a great Mexican restaurant for lunch, and I was happy to have some decent fajitas for the first time in over a year.

The trip back on the plane was a mix of tranquility and desperate sprinting. Noah decided he was hungry at the trickiest times, namely just as we were going through security and when boarding the plane. Luckily, I have figured out how to nurse less conspicuously with the carrier. Our flight was delayed and we had a connection in Atlanta. Once we finally exited the aircraft, we had 6 minutes to get to our next flight in another terminal. Nano grabbed the stroller and carseat, and sprinted at top speed to get there. People looked at him like he was insane, thinking he was running with a baby! Somehow he made it to the gate by departure time, and convinced them to wait for Noah and me. We rode back in first class!

Noah was out like a light before the first flight took off, and stayed asleep until he woke up in his own bed the next morning. He had no idea how close we came to staying in Atlanta for a night! We breathed a huge sigh of relief when we got back.

I think he enjoyed the open air and new experiences of the trip. However, judging by the number of big smiles he gave me the next day, I'd say he was happy to be home!