2 month check-up and doctor-swapping

My favorite baby is ten weeks old.

He had his 2 month exam and vaccinations last week.  He weighs 14 pounds.  Or did last week.  He’s probably up to 20 pounds now.  I’m pretty sure he is full of dark matter.  Or it’s possible that he has the density of a dying sun.  Little man is HEAVY.

I have a hard time with confrontation or disagreements in general.  And once I commit to something, it’s hard for me to walk away.  So I get all sneaky about it.  I’m telling you this because…

I’ve decided to go with another pediatrician.  Dr. Moustache is knowledgeable and he’s been a pediatrician for 30 years, but I’m starting to think that may be too long.  He’s tried to push formula on me twice now.  I don’t like that.  I was asking him about fussiness and explaining the McCloud’s new found love of spitting up all the time, and he suggested he is fussy because he isn’t getting enough to eat while I’m at work and that we should supplement with formula.   But he’s in the 90^th percentile for his weight, so clearly he is getting enough to eat, otherwise he wouldn’t be such a chub and his glorious neck rolls would be far less glorious and maybe he would only have one leg roll instead of one thousand.  Also, Dr. Moustache was late for our appointment, then rushed through it.  There’s a reason I schedule the first appointment of the day and that is because my time is valuable.  So, goodbye Dr. Moustache.  I’ve found someone new.  We are transferring to Dr. Soul Patch.  Unacceptable facial hair aside, he seemed more compatible with me anyway.  And my midwife thought he and I would work well together when I suggested him as a potential pediatrician.

One of my friends who also recently had a son had a super shitty, c-section happy doctor.  She had a high risk pregnancy and was on bed rest at the end of her pregnancy and they were talking about inducing early because her baby was too big and that was the argument for the c-section or something, but the baby was born close to McCloud’s birth weight.  I feel that, as ladies, we often times don’t want to rock the boat so we just accept whatever doctor we have chosen because we don’t want to be rude or something, but I’m going to tell you all something very important:

You can do whatever you want.  You are paying these doctors, so it’s your choice.  You can switch to a different OB or midwife when you’re 39 weeks pregnant if you want to for whatever reason you want to.  Or you can switch pediatricians.  And you shouldn’t feel guilty about it.  Granted, I’m a big fat chicken-y chicken, so I’m not telling Dr. Moustache that I’m leaving him, but I also don’t think he would care even if I did.  What would I say?  “Sorry, Doc, I’ve found someone else with different facial hair.”

Back to Hamburglar’s 2 month exam, though: He’s in the 90^th percentile for head circumference and weight, but right in the middle for length.  So, what I think the doc was trying to tell me is: he’s a giant headed fatty.  I’ve unofficially changed his names to Chubs McBabylegs.  And sometimes I call him Chumbawumba.  And I was telling Mr. Adventure all about how the band Chumbawamba went into the future and met our baby and that’s how they came up with their band name.  Because I like to make up stories.

Last night I was singing a song to the wee babe about how I was going to eat his head or how there is vomit in his neck rolls or something and I turned to Mr. Adventure and our conversation went something like this:

Me: How long do you think it will take for the wee babe, McCloud, to realize that I am completely insane?

Mr. Adventure: By the time he’s 6 or 7.

I thought for a moment, then asked, “What if I stop singing to him?”

Mr. Adventure: Then you probably have until he’s 9 or 10.

So, happy Thanksgiving everyone!  I’m thankful that my son is too young to know how batty I am and that Mr. Adventure and the dogs don’t care.

It's Almost Time to Eat!

As Thanksgiving approaches here in the US of A, my mind can’t help but wander to this image:

And from there, I start thinking about how Hamburglar McCloud is probably about 12 pounds now, which is a decent size for a turkey, but I think we may wait to eat him until he is a little bigger.

Just kidding.  We’ll eat him now.

Not really.

But I am planning on dressing him like a turkey and putting him in a roasting pan so I can get a picture.  I may even dress up the dogs like a pilgrim and an American Indian.  Because that's the kind of person I am.

One of my friends shared this post on babble and it is hilarious and well worth the 3 minutes it will take you to read it.  I read it the day before I brought the wee babe Hamburglar in to work to meet my coworkers.  The first coworker that held him had a baby last November.  While holding McCloud, she exclaimed how darling he is and how she wants to eat him.  She expressed particularly interest in wanting to eat his ears and his hands.  Now, as a chemist, I’m no expert in biology or in the best cuts of meat, but ears and hands seem like the worst part of an animal (or a baby) to eat.

But seriously, read that post on babble.  It is so funny, I just laughed while reading it again.  And I've read it at least ten times.

Things with the babe are going well.  From what I've read, I’m finally in the best/easiest stage of breastfeeding, for the next four months at least.  Dude and I have our routine down and my horrible wrist pain has gone away.  Though, my right breast DID pee the bed again the other night.  But that’s okay.  Though it does make me worry a bit that my supply may decrease.

We are exclusively breastfeeding the wee McCloud and I started back at work already.  I pump twice a day and bring it home so Mr. Adventure, who is staying home with our favorite baby, can feed it to the babe the next day.  For anyone else reading this that exclusively breastfeeds, I read this super helpful piece.  It states a lot of what we learned through trial and error (like, it IS possible to overfeed a breastfed baby from a bottle, and he will just vom all that extra milk right up onto you.  I think McCloud is going to buy Mr. Adventure some new shirts for Christmas…).

Part of how we are making breastfeeding work while I work is I feed the wee babe before I go to work in the morning (I’m blessed with a flexible work schedule and have keys to the lab, so I can come in to work any time between 5 and 8 am) and I feed him as soon as I get home.  Since we feed on demand, this quite often involves Mr. Adventure channeling all of his patience while a hungry baby yells at him for 45 minutes.

Speaking of yelling… it seems the wee McCloud is displeased that I go to work during the week now, and he expresses that displeasure by yelling at poor, Mr. Adventure.  I hear Mondays are the worst.  Mr. Adventure is such a great dad and I really hope those two work out the kinks and that things will be easier next week.  Keep your fingers crossed!

And, for those of you who are curious, the floor in the baby’s room is still not done.  All that’s left are the three coats of Waterlox, though.  I read a fable once that stated slow and steady wins the race, so we are winning the shit out of the preparing-the-nursery race.

McCloud (aka Chubby McBabylegs) has finally fattened up enough that he can wear the cloth diapers I bought!  I purchased a lot of 24 one-size pocket diapers off craigslist when I was pregnant and it is just now, at about two months of age, that he can wear them… on the smallest snapped setting.  With proper care, though, these will take us all the way through potty training.  And, speaking of proper care, I found this great post on cleaning diapers with hard water.  Calgon has made a huge difference.  To clean my diapers, I do a cold rinse with no soaps or anything (and I just throw the diapers in there without rinsing them and we are dry pailing, for the curious, which means we just throw the diapers in a bucket I bought from Fred Meyer for $3.99.  The other option is wet pailing, where you throw soiled diapers in a bucket of water or something, but that sounds gross to me), then I put in some Rockin Green soap (about 2T) and a cap full of Calgon water softener and do a hot wash with a cold rinse.  I don’t do an additional post rinse.  I just throw it all in the dryer and tumble it on low heat.  Be careful with your heat settings.  A friend of mine ruined her lot of cloth diapers when she was in Vegas by drying them in the dryer in their hotel, which was allegedly hotter than the fires of hell.

So that’s where I’m at.  McCloud is still smiling back and he gives me tons of smiles when I get home.  And he laughs!  It’s not like the baby giggles that come around 6 months or whenever, it’s a laugh that I wish I could describe in words because it is so funny.  It makes me laugh, which makes him laugh, which makes all of us laugh and it’s this whole circle of laughter.

Finally, for all of you out there that want something (else) good to read, I read this blog/post on Elephant Journal called “To My Post-PartumSelf: Things I wish I’d known.”  It says great things like this:

"Don't Clean.  Your house will still be messy in five years.  I am sorry, but it's true.  So when your baby sleeps, take a nap.  Read a book.  Masturbate.  Look at pictures of clean houses on Pinterest.  Look at pictures of clean houses on Pinterest while you masturbate.  But don't clean."

And there you have it.  Happy Friday everyone!