Monthly Archives: June 2006

Scene: the Hatchling’s bedroom, from 9-11:30 PM.

The Hatchling: WAAAAAAAAAAAAH!

Squab: Whatsa matter, bean? Do you have a diaper? huh? Need a snack? (gets Hatchling up, changes her, offers boob)

The Hatchling: SUCK SUCK SUCK suck suck suck suck suck zzzzzzzzzzzzzzzz …

Squab (carefully scoots to edge of rocker, slooooooooowly stands up, tiptoes over to crib, gennnnnnnntly lays Hatchling in crib)

The Hatchling: WAAAAAAAAAAAAH!

Squab: Crap. (picks Hatchling up, reswaddles her even tighter, turns her sideways and starts to jiggle) Shhhhhh … shhhhhh … shhhhhhh … shhhhhh …

The Hatchling: waaaahh.

(Repeat for 10 minutes. Squab loses sensation in her lips and her spit dries up.)

Squab: Shhhhbbbth … fuck.

The Hatchling: waaaAAAAAAAH!

Squab (to Mr. Squab): Honey?!?! Where’s the radio?

Mr. Squab: What radio?

Squab: My boombox, the small one!

Mr. Squab: Hang on, I’ll find it. (sounds of digging around downstairs) OK, here it is.

Squab: Take her while I find a static station.

The Hatchling: WAAAAAAAAAAAH!

Mr. Squab: Shhhhh … shhhhh … shhhh … shhhh …

Squab (punching through every station on the dial): No … no … no … why the fuck isn’t there any pure static? How can there be stations close to every frequency?!?!

Mr. Squab: Try AM.

The Hatchling: WAAAAAAAAAAAH!

Squab (tries AM): It’s too quiet, it won’t turn up loud enough. (tries FM again, gets station with mostly static and decides it will have to do. Cranks it.)

The Hatchling: WAAAaaaaahhhhhzzzzzzzzzzz …

Mr. Squab (slowly puts Hatchling in crib. She stays quiet. Squab and Mr. Squab turn off the radio and sloooooooowly back away.)

*** Forty-five minutes pass ***

The Hatchling: WAAAAAAAAAAH!

(Repeat, ad infinitum)

Babies. What a weird bunch. So we brought the Hatchling to the Doctor on Friday, and she squalled and squawked just like she had been doing, and sure enough, the doctor said it was probably colic. (Or colic-esque, since true colic is supposed to go from 2 weeks to 12 weeks – shudder.) She told me to cut out dairy from my diet for 2 weeks, just in case it’s a milk allergy, recommended a book for us to get* and said, basically, be indulgent: if there’s anything you can do to calm the baby, do it, and don’t worry about establishing bad habits or anything. And if there’s nothing you can do to calm the baby, then just set the timer for 20 minutes and leave her in her crib while you take deep breaths. Oy.

But then … well … we brought her home and she slept. Didn’t fuss. Just slept, and slept, and slept, with breaks for feeding in between. And that’s basically been her pattern ever since. Sleep, eat, play a little, fuss a little, sleep some more. We’re letting her sleep on us, if that’s what works, and we’re still dosing her with Prevacid, but, like, what the hell? I mean, don’t get me wrong – this is a positive development! I’m not complaining! (Though god knows what I’d do if we had more than one kid and I couldn’t park my ass on the sofa for 10 hours a day.) But I sure am looking forward to the time when she gets a little more predictable. Whoo.

*The book, incidentally, is awesome. The Happiest Baby on the Block, by Harvey Karp. Dippy title, but a goldmine of helpful information.

Well, the Prevacid honeymoon was a brief one. The Hatchling’s reflux does seem to be better, but the fussiness reigns on unabated. Yesterday was the worst – the only place she’ll sleep during the day is on me, after nursing, and the only time she isn’t fussy is when she’s either nursing or sleeping. Around 5:00 her truly fussy time begins (just in time for Daddy coming home!), and last night this was punctuated with some truly impressive screaming. She’s beyond gassy, and still kind of constipated, and just generally seems like she’s in pain, pain, pain. Sometimes she still seems hungry after nursing, but offer her a bottle and she becomes absolutely ENRAGED. By the time we finally do get her to go down in her crib, my nerves are so shot that I wake up every hour, on the hour, in anticipation of hearing her start to fuss again. She sleeps for four hours, I sleep for maybe a total of two. Good times, people. Good. Times. It would seem that we may have gotten that glorious blessing, a colicky baby. We’re taking her into the doctor’s office this afternoon, just to rule out any other problems, but this may just be something we have to ride out. Which would totally suck, and why the hell haven’t they figured out this colicky thing by now, anyway? I mean, what’s with the resigned attitude? Like, if it’s colic, the clear indications of pain on the baby’s part somehow don’t count? WTF?

Prevacid and responsive pediatricians. We called the doctor yesterday and described the Hatchling’s symptoms, namely: cranky, smacking her mouth all the time, cranky, writhing as if in pain and did I mention motherfucking CRANKY? She’s had a bit of reflux ever since she was born, but the doctor said 6 weeks is often when it gets bad in a lot of babies, so he called in a prescription for Prevacid and Mr. Squab brought it home after work. The effect was instantaneous. She was very interested in the grape-flavor of the medicine, took it down like a pro, and oh! she feels so much better. As a sufferer of reflux my ownself, I knew exactly how rotten she was feeling and it sucked not to be able to fix it. Now she can lie down without getting heartburn, which makes it so much easier to be cuddled or to play or – most importantly – to sleep! To wit: she slept for five hours at a go last night. I mean, holy crap! Now if I can just get to the point where *I* can sleep for five hours when she does, we’ll be golden.