TMI Tuesday: Watch The Winkie!

We are currently operation at DEFCON 2!

It is pretty much guaranteed that when I get home after work our son’s diaper is going to be a little bloated. At nearly 12 pounds, he doesn’t really hold anything back. However, most of the time it is not what you usually think of when you hear about the droopiness of his drawers. While sometimes it is of a stinky nature, most of the time it is the flood waters that are testing the limits of the dam. This is confirmed by the bright blue racing stripe that appears on the front of the diaper.

Of course, whenever in doubt just wait for the crying to begin… our son is not a fan of the squishiness. These are the easy diapers to change… most of the time. Regardless of what he just finished doing, whenever the seal is broken and the emanations are exposed, the shields have to go up… there is just enough help back that a launch could occur at any moment.

While the nerves don’t take to kindly to the free flowing of flatus, it is the tinkle that usually causes the most trouble. At least with a number two you can hear him pushing and watch as his face turns a deeper and deeper shade of red. When it comes to the whiz his only tell is when his winkie decides to imitate a cold war missile drill. The launch could happen or it might not. Best thing to do is prepare the defenses and hope for the best.

My wife and I have discovered that you can really change a diaper quickly when under the threat of attack and most of the time the new diaper is on before the rain begins to fall. When this happens we just hope not to hear thunder which pretty much guarantees that precipitation is eminent. That is when we see the redness disappear and the smirk slowly grow into a full smile… at least it tames the fussiness for a moment.

In hindsight, all of this is a simple source of amusement. Thankfully, we haven’t had any major issues with changing our son… not like the rainbows that we encountered during our first month. With that said, we still have to remain cognizant of the limits of the diaper sizes. Our son is growing quickly and so are his volume requirements so we are continuously cognizant of the issue of proper containment. Hopefully we can continue limiting the onesie casualties, stay ahead of the growth curve, and make sure we keep changing him as fast as possible.

Well, That Was Useless!

The learning curve is steep when you have your first child and there are many instances when you are scrambling to find the answers to questions that seemingly pop out of nowhere. Sometimes you reach out to family and friends who have kids to see what advice they have and chose from one of the many options that have inevitably been offered. Other time you reach out to the professionals and either call the doctor or, as we did a number of times early on, ask the doula. Each time we listen to the advice from those people who have “been there, done that.”

Thanks to social media, we can get a plethora of opinions and answers to our questions in a very short amount of time. At least that is what I have seen on my wife’s Facebook feed as I have usually just picked up the phone or asked someone in person when I run into them. While my approach may take longer and seem outdated by many, it is how I prefer getting the answers and advice that we need. It also eliminates the “other opinions”.

I have had countless conversations and have heard the many humorous anecdotes from family and friends who used social media (mostly Twitter and Facebook; these aren’t LinkedIn conversations) when they first became parents. While they received the helpful hints, tips, advice, and answers that they were looking for they also got the opinions of those who don’t have kids but “read somewhere that this is the best thing to do” or passed along the half of the conversation that they heard 5 years ago when their friend was considering having a child. Basically, useless information… I actually heard of someone saying that you should hold your newborn upside down and lightly shake them if they get hiccups. Wow, just wow. Either they don't have kids or they're in jail. 

While I have an opinion on just about everything (I know, you’re shocked) there are certain things that I will not offer second hand advice on. This includes parenting. And I still hold fast to that as we are only 6 weeks in so I can’t really speak from experience on anything. If specifically asked, either by phone or in person, I will gladly share my experience but I can’t give advice especially when there are general posts made on social media. Maybe after we have done this more than once I might offer my opinion but I doubt it.

Learning How To Get Back Up

I was never a particularly tough child. I remember complaining and crying when I got hurt and not wanting to push through minor injuries when participating in sports or playing with friends. While not as bad as some that I can remember, I was by no means a tough child. I learned how and enjoyed pushing through injuries later in my youth but it took some time and a bit of determination to overcome the weaknesses I had when I was smaller (I can’t say that I was ever actually ‘small’).

Over the years however, I have built up a tolerance for pain that is a bit baffling to some and considered stupid by others. From broken bones and dislocated joints to kidney stones and fighting Fibromyalgia, I have experienced all kinds of pain and only stopped when it was preventing me from living. I’ve set bones, popped joints back into place, put duct tape over large cuts, and simply walked things off when they really started to hurt. Up to that point I would keep pushing and pushing until finally I had no other choice than to give in and let myself heal. Of course, for the truly minor things like bad ankle sprains, dislocations, cold/flu, and migraines it was better to keep going and work my way through them.

This is the kind of thing that I want to instill in my son. Not to the extent that I have taken it but I don’t want him to let the small things stop him. Bumps and bruises are a part of living life especially when you are young and I want our son to enjoy every moment of growing up while he can. With that said, we have to do our part to let him fall and let him scrape his knees so that he can learn that it really isn’t that bad. Of course, we will always be there when he needs us but some things he is going to have to learn just by doing and experiencing.

All that we can really do is guide him and try to set him up for the long life ahead of him. Bumps (and bruises) are just minor things that happen along the way but you can just stop everything that you are doing when they happen. Life is still going on around you and if you take a break, there are potential memories that you will be missing. I guess you could say that I want to make sure that we instill in our son adversity as it has served us both incredibly well in our own lives. Hopefully we can get that message through to him early on… the same lesson that my parents tried teaching me which didn’t take hold until much later in my life.