Golden Pig Tales

Ezra can be fussy. And there are many reason for him to be fussy. -v- and I have discovered Ezra’s Poopy Dance as one of these fussy states, so we can now relax and do what we can to make his poopy dance successful when he gets his groove on.

Ezra’s Poopy Dance usually begins with the kicking of his legs. Sometimes the leg kicks are synchronized and sometimes the kicks make him look like he is marching through air.

After the legs begin kicking his face usually becomes tense. His brow wrinkles. His nose flares. His lips close and bottom lip slips under upper lip. Then a slow moan escapes.

With feet kicking and face tense, the arms begin to swing a bit. Usually they fling up and hold like he his being held up by someone with a gun. Then his low moan becomes a groan. His face becomes bright red. Sometimes he cries out, but not for a long time. Only in a few short bursts to help free the poop.

Ezra’s Poopy Dance is not always successful, but when it is successful there is an instant calm that overcomes his body that makes even me feel relieved.

Of course, Ezra’s Poopy Dance in some ways is similar to other fussy states, but through observation -v- and I have discovered Ezra’s Poopy Dance.

We are not claiming this discovery will lead to a life as a skilled ballet dancer. (The poopy dance is more modern dance than ballet and we wouldn’t want to further pressure the child by making him take ballet classes instead of modern dance classes.) We are claiming that if you pay enough attention to your baby you will begin to listen and understand before the baby can speak. It does take time and sometimes a few calls to other parents or the pediatrician.

I need to tell Ezra that it is too early in the morning to be a Father, but I can’t seem to get him to understand my Infant Speak.

Ezra received his Social Security Number card today. Now he is officially a U.S citizen and a number like all U.S. citizens.

Ezra will need this number for his heath insurance, which we will use for him when he goes to the pediatrician on Wednesday to check for acid reflux. He will need this number, so we can use him as a tax break. He will need this number, so he can legally get a job in the United States and not get deported and work for his own health insurance. Of course, he will need to learn to walk and support his own body before we can put Ezra to work.

It is likely Ezra has some sort of reflux issue. Most the symptoms of reflux he does exhibit and the methods to decrease the effect of reflux like making sure to feed him in smaller quantities and hold him up right after feeding has helped stop him from crying a lot and puking up.

He has been crying today, but only during the past few hours. It was only after giving him his pacifier that he was able to relax and sleep for a few minutes and not make us feel too helpless.

The helplessness is only further enforced by sleeplessness of being a parent. The mind seems to slip further into doubt of self the more tired one becomes. At least mine does. And it sucks. It sucks because there were many moments of joy today that I had with Ezra today like when he was smiling this morning or like when he was sleeping on my chest or when he was looking around at the world as we walked outside, but all these moments are now silent due to the recent screams and cries of Ezra in pain and misery echoing in my mind. A mind that is wanting only rest and to be calm and to see a smile on the face of Ezra.

The day rest of the day was good. Ezra was calm and only the only time he got fussy was when he did his poopy dance. He did not puke and only spit up a few time after feeding and not an hour after feeding and not the amount or consistency that he puked up yesterday. AND he has had many poop and pee filled diapers, so despite there being a very slim change of him having Pyloric Stenosis all symptoms point to acid reflux.

-v- will probably still be taking him into the doctors on Monday or some day next week to have him checked for acid reflux. We will continue to hold him upright for thirty minutes after feeding, which seems to have solved the large amounts of puke and spit up experienced yesterday. We will also continue to track and note his feeding, pooping, and peeing habits.

I am sure if the puking and large amounts of spit would have happened earlier or later or later in his life Pyloric Stenosis would have not been thought or been suggested to be the cause for it is something that typically only occurs in babies between 4 to 8 weeks old. (Ezra is over five weeks old for those people who still use weeks to count the age of a child after the first month has passed. To me he his one and a half months old.)

After last night, and this morning, and today, and now, it seems that he only has a case of acid reflux, which we have read and have been told is very normal in babies.

Yes, being a parent makes you crazy and consider the worse when something is wrong with your baby. It will keep you up all night long and all day long.

Yesterday Ezra had a day of being pukey. Pukey because the spit up was more frequent, greater in quantity, and sometimes chunky. And he was really fussy at times and crying more.

The pediatrician was called. Pediatrician said we should make sure after Ezra is fed to hold him upright for a half hour for it could be Ezra has acid reflux or just needs more time to burp. Pediatrician said to call back on Monday for it could also be Pyloric Stenosis, which something very serious and could require surgery.

-v- and I took turns sleeping last night to make sure everything was okay and to hold him up right after feedings. We are both tired. But Ezra hasn’t puked up anything but the normal amount of spit up, and he has been calm and a normal fussy baby. Best of all is the amount of poop and pee Ezra has created is normal, and because poop and pee creation is at normal amounts it is less likely to be Pyloric Stenosis. We know his poop and pee amounts are normal because we have been recording all his feedings, moods, diaper changes, and spit up amounts since yesterday then comparing with what we have observed during the past weeks. We will still be calling the pediatrician on Monday, and we will still be recording his fluid input and output.

During the chaos of parenthood there are moments when you are holding the baby and you just need to quickly set the baby down for a few seconds to adjust a hold, or to search for the pacifier, or to wipe the tears from your eyes, or to scratch an itch. So you try to find the quickest and safest spot. Inevitable, it seems, that right as you set the baby down the baby spits up.

Usually, the spot for me to set Ezra down has been our couch in our main living area, which now has a collection of stains caused by baby spit up. Unfortunately none of the stains looks like Elvis or Jesus, so I can’t claim our baby’s spit up has qualities of rapture. One stain looks like a pair of lips. One looks like a beetle, and another stain looks like an amoeba, and yet another a sperm. The longest one and the most defined looks like the head and neck of a duck or goose.

Of course, as with all things religious, one may just need to look deeper, so maybe Elvis or Jesus are hidden some where in these spit up stains that I now see as something else, so before we get the couch cleaned next week I will take photos, so maybe I can try to find the hidden rapture in the spit up stains of Ezra.

Ezra makes weird sounds some times when he sleeps. It sounds like grunts some times and other times is sounds like the beginning of a hiccup and then there are times when it sounds like Eh, eh, eh, eh.

Almost every time when he talks in his sleep, I wake up. I wake up and think, <That’s my boy,> knowing I talk in my sleep.

Birthday one begins twenty-four hours after the baby is born. Day two and day three to day six are birthdays, too. Day seven, week one, is a birthday. From then on, birthdays occur every week until the fourth week.

After the fourth week the next birthday is the day with the same numerical value of the the day of birth, but the next calendar month after birth. (Here is where -v- has these weird ideas that the counting of months as birthdays doesn’t being until the second month after the baby is born. For example. I think last Friday was Ezra’s birthday because it was the seventh of September and Ezra was born on August seventh. I will not celebrate today as Ezra’s birthday for I am on the month system. -v- believes today is Ezra’s birthday for it is the fifth week since his birth and she says she won’t begin the month counting for birthdays until October 7th, two months after his birth.)

The second, third, fourth to eleventh months of the same numerical days as the day of birth are birthdays until the first year.

After the first year then birthdays are celebrated every year.

(-v- believes it is okay to revert back to counting the months as birthdays for months thirteen to twenty-three. She believes year birthdays officially begin after the second year.)

After the eighteenth birthday (in America) the child is considered an adult. And as an adult what they celebrate is up to them. As individuals we seem to forget birthdays after the eighteenth until the twenty-first birthday, which is the legal drinking age in America. Then after the twenty-first we wait until thirtieth to care much about birthdays. After the thirtieth birthday it seems birthdays with 0’s are important and the birthdays with 5’s sort of important. The fortieth birthday is big in the minds of many because it is considered middle age. The eightieth and ninetieth birthdays are birthdays that should be celebrated as much as possible. Any year birthday over one hundred is something news worthy.

…I will celebrate every birthday of Ezra’s.

After the dried and ugly shell of the umbilical fell off weeks ago, Ezra was left with a snot looking stub that stuck out of the belly button like a snot volcano.

At first Valerie and I didn’t apply alcohol to the snot volcano because the people at the hospital were so adamant about not applying any alcohol to the umbilical cord or the area. However, after we called our pediatrician twice about the snot volcano she suggested letting the belly button air out as much as possible and apply some alcohol to the area to help the drying process.

The snot volcano erupting from his belly button soon shrank to a snot hill. Then the snot hill became a snot mound. And for a while the snot mound made Ezra’s belly button look like a third eye with a snot pupil. During this time of him having a third eye with a snot pupil we had thoughts and talk that Ezra would have some scary looking belly button that could cause trauma later life and lead to early desires for cosmetic surgery.

I am happy to say that despite the fact trying to expose the belly button of a baby is difficult because of them being covered in blankets, onesies, and diapers that I noticed during his bath today that his belly button is looking like a normal belly button.

Ezra was more calm than crying this weekend. In fact, I didn’t regret being a father the entire weekend!

We even went for a car ride to visit two of Ezra’s Great Uncles, and Ezra was calm almost the entire care ride To and From! During the car ride From he needed to feed, and let us know by crying and crying and crying his i-am-hungry cry, so we had to pull over into a Burger King parking lot so Valerie could feed him. After that he slept the entire way home.

Now we are home. Now we are all tired.

This wasn’t taken during today’s sleepy quiet happy day, but on Ezra’s 1-month birthday. This is my little maniac, dancing like he’s never danced before…check out his little baby legwarmers! And his off-the-shoulder onesie! He’s totally channeling what’s-her-name from Flashdance!

It’s 3:45 and Ezra has just started his first crying spell of the day. That’s amazing! Almost a full 8 hours of quiet, sleepy, happy Ezra. This is a first. I was able to sleep alone for 2 hours, take a shower, shave my legs, fold laundry and eat 2 meals without interruptions! Dad was happy to have all that time with the sleepy quiet Ezra…but now, the crying has started because Ezra had a case of the hiccups.  Oh well…it was nice while it lasted : )

Woo Hoo!!!

I feel like I am going insane because my mood swings are continuously swung to extremes by the few extreme states of the baby: sleeping, feeding, waiting to cry, crying.

Yesterday was the first time I fed Ezra.

Valerie pumped some milk from her breast in to a bottle during the day. After work, and with a focused atmosphere, I sat down and wrapped the Boppy around my waist.

I was nervous.

At first I had the baby laying near flat like he was sucking on mom’s nipple. This choked the baby. He was crying. Mom then adjusted my hold and the angle of the bottle. Careful to not angle the bottle too much or not enough. It need to be just right to fill the nipple tip with milk.

It was weird trying to get him to begin his suction. I remember from the breast feeding class that rubbing the baby’s roof of mouth stimulates the reaction to begin to try to suck. So I did this. And it worked!

Before I knew it the baby has sucked the milk from the bottle and was crying for more.

The words of the past. The words of the first feed.