u-no-poo - the constipation sensation that's gripping the nation

Everyone without kids is going, "another post about poop?" and all the readers with kids are saying, "yep, I remember that."

Yes, this is an excrement-related post. Actually, this post has no excrement, because there has been no poop from Kaden for EIGHT DAYS. He's swallowed a half gallon of prune juice (he loves the sippy cup now), I'm pressing on his stomach, and I've just taken his temperature about 600 times. No luck. A little longer and I might have to employ my Aunt's suggestion of, no kidding, sticking a pine nut up there.

He recently started eating pureed foods for the first time, which it seemed immediately banded together inside my boy and formed the Hoover dam. In the last eight days we've travelled to Kennebunkport, then to visit the Halloran's in CT, and been on countless walks. All that movement and still no.. uhh, movement. Frankly I don't know how there can be any room left in there.

Kaden has been fairly good natured about this whole crapscapade, but I'm afraid if it goes much longer he's going to poop his own body mass. And that, frankly, is going to totally mess up my weight charts.

Kaden, I feel like we've got a repore going, you and me. I mean, communication lines are open. I get when you scream bloody murder the moment your butt touches the floor that you would much rather me wet myself than set you down for a moment to use the bathroom. After all, it's not like you need a little privacy to go or anything, right? You've adjusted, why can't I.

And I get that you love when I give you rasberries on your tummy and it makes you laugh. You like it enough you've been careful to make it the only thing that gets you laughing, thereby causing me to do it 200 times a day until my lips are chapped and bleeding and your stomach is red and swelling. But you laugh.

So the whole incentive/disincentive game is working out well. Except, if when I blow rasberries on your belly you continue to have to grab my hair and yank it like your pulling a Ford F150 out of a ditch single-handedly then I will have to cease your laugh enducing fun. Seriously, I've got enough worries about becoming an old dad without losing my hair this year.

Thanks Kaden.

Oh, and keep being cute, but do something about that breath. It smells distinctly like old milk.

PS - Yes, he's sleeping better. Partly out of exhaustion, and therefore I am sure he is simply resting up for revenge of the sleep nazi. But he has been converted back to his crib, we have our bed back, and we are ready with Feberization this time my friend. Cold, cold, people we are.

out of my way I'm sleeping

We've got confirmation from a nurse (she's qualified for this kind of stuff) Kaden is likely teething! Score one for Joey and the first time parents. Although the nurse did warn it will probably be a month of pain before we actually see teeth (yipee!), this explains why his previous wonderful sleep habits have disolved.

Kaden has been in our bed the last two nights and it's getting better slowly but surely. I'm quite enjoying being socked in the face by a fleshy little fist instead of screamed at from across the apartment. Ah, but I hear intrepid readers asking, how is he hitting me from beneath his mummifing wraps? Well he's unswaddled now and exposed to the world, flailing like a beached octopus. All of my relatives and friends of the previous generation can now rejoice that the horror of wrapping our child has ceased. Kaden seems happy about it, although he has absolutely no idea what to do about some fleshy thing that keeps hitting him in the face when he's sleeping.

I know how he feels.

Take back the night

So tired. This morning it felt like we needed someone in tights and a cape before we would feel better, because it's like sleep ghetto in the Start-Up house and there's a rescue needed. I feel like I should be making a badly Photoshop'd poster with our tired faces that looks like an old B-rated horror movie ("It came from sleepless land"). We are so tired we have become bipolar; switching between playing on a tropical island total euphoria as he smiles and plays in the morning, then by the afternoon falling into hopeless on a desert island despair.

And then.. well, this is why I love Start-Up Mom so much. She just woke up and put her foot down said "we're not going to take it any more." She put up a schedule on the fridge, and right there in black and white for everyone (including the sleep nazi) to see it says, "8pm sleep" and then she has the GALL, no, the CAHONES, to put no other events between 8pm Sleep and 7am Wake.

And it's like a beacon, a bat-signal for sleep. We are energized, we will vanquish the sleep nazi, we have a schedule.



With newfound motivation we have been talking to our fellow new parents. And at first they all gave strange looks, sometimes saying vaguely helpful things like, "yeah, sometimes they just go through periods of sleeping less." To which I would like to kindly reply, "LESS, less is like 6 hours instead of 10, this kid is waking every hour and a half. The Mossad use this tactic to drive people utterly insane until they will do anything." (hmm... is that Kaden's plan?) But despite their smiles they don't look like it's quite as rosy with their kids as they let on anyway, so I let it go.

We do probe a little more though, and after a little unfurling I find some blogs that mention this same issue. As we go back to several friends and press a little more they seem to remember a little more, and we start to see a pattern. Turns out just about every one of the friends we talked to had a problem around four months where sleep got worse.

So, at first I'm ecstatic that we are not the absolute worst parents in the world and completely incapable of sleep-training a child. But then I'm like WHY DIDN'T ANYONE TELL US THIS BEFORE. Is there some conspiracy here? Why didn't the utterly self-contradicting and patronizing books like Healthy Sleep Habits mention this AT ALL!

I know, there are a lot of fans of the book, and there are some helpful things in it. But you mean to tell me this so-called doctor who did all this supposed sleep training, which I now believe was conducted on three baby squirrels and a chicken, didn't notice this trend that I - a completely distracted first time parent trying to simultaneously help run a company - was able to un-earth? I feel like a freshman in high school getting hazed and after trying all sensible logic with the seniors they finally break down and say, "well someone did it to us, so we have to do it to you." Now, I know older parents and ranted-at authors will find this unfair and claim they simply forgot all the details of what happened when, likely as they wave their hands about distractingly. But I will have none of it. I am here as the deep throat of month 4.

Yes, they smile like everyone says, and they even laugh a little, and they are generally awesome little things you just want to eat up they are so cute, but THEY WILL NOT SLEEP. IT WILL SUCK. And they will wear you down until you are just short of breaking and then you will say ENOUGH and you will Ferberize or take them back to bed or take away the pacifier or whatever drastic action adheres to your particular worldview. And from everything I have been reading that action will work, and you will feel triumphant. And all will be well.

And then they start teething.

Ah, but that is another rant sometime soon. For now, as Vizzini advised, "when a job went wrong, you go back to the beginning." When he last had sleep problems we put him in the bed for a week and then we moved him back to the crib and he was great. So, we restart. Kaden, welcome back to bed while we recharge for round two.

Slate has a roundup of interesting-sounding music for (and in some cases, by) kids that promises not to drive parents crazy. Since I've been on the search for cool kids music to replace the terrible tunes I sing him, I was very happy to see the roundup.

Kaden storms the beach

Kaden's first trip to the beach went well, as long as we kept him off the sand, out of the sun, and away from the waves. Seriously, Kaden clearly could not fathom why people flock to a place that makes you hot, sticky, and lathered in sunscreen so thick it might as well be crazy glue. After all he's already got a massive noise machine at home (aka A/C) so what does he need the waves for?

But as long as we kept him not hot or sandy he was very entertained by all the people and had a great time. He thoroughly enjoyed playing with his Uncles, Grandparents, Jenny, Lewis, and even cast a few curious glances at the Guthridge's dog Maggie. For her part, Maggie was immediately protective of Kaden, slept outside his room, and seemed eager to help every time he was fussy. There was plenty of hands to play with Kaden, so Megan and I got to relax a little. Although there was a price to pay for that relaxation, it lead to us slipping on the nap schedule and therefore the sleep nazi arose. Which meant in the end it was a somewhat bleary eyed, but wonderful time, for us.




Photos from the trip here. Or if you are pressed for time, just view the shots from Kaden's first swim, they came out quite well.

growing up baby

While it may be obvious that Kaden is picking up and learning from us, what's stranger is that we seem to be mimicking and learning from him as well. He does all these natural over-exaggerated movements; rubbing his eyes when he's tired, stretching when he wakes up, and of course the patented frown. I may have not really done them much in the last twenty or so years, but they feel really good. The next time you wake up just give out a big huge stretch in bed.. good stuff I tell ya.