Daddy Ashore

Daddy takes Max for a little motorcycle ride in the village park.

After four long months, my husband has returned from sea.

One hundred and twenty-eight days have gone by since he last saw his infant son. His jaw-dropping, eye-widening smile when he came down the escalator at the airport and saw us standing there was worth every minute.

Max got a lot bigger since he was 2 months old. He wasn't ever a scrawny thing, but he has plumped up into a chubby chunk of absolute cuteness and several arm rolls. And he can sit up on his own and stand on your lap and babble away, which are amazing to a man who remembers him only crying, eating and pooping.

Baby and daddy adjusted to each other quite well. I'd like to think Max actually remembers him, but it's hard to tell and really doesn't matter.

It probably helps that every night I played for Max a voice mail Dan left for him and that I showed him one of our wedding pictures in which Dan is kissing me, saying, "That's Daddy! See Daddy? That's your daddy!"

Max is a happy, interactive baby, and he had Daddy enamored pretty quickly. He must have said, "Look at that smile!" a dozen times the first night home.

The next day, we put the baby in the stroller and did our village rounds, including the post office, hardware, bakery, and dollar mart. This time we added the park, and we both delighted in Max's little feet clapping away as Daddy pushed him in the baby swing.

We still have some things to work out. A minor one is that Dan isn't used to how baby things multiply like baby rabbits and spread all over the house. If he has a better solution, he can knock himself out. But most parents accept a certain level of it and deal with it.

A major one is that Max was still co-sleeping with me in our bed. I had made significant progress in Max sleeping in his crib for his naps, but we never got around to a different nighttime routine. He is still nursing a few times a night, and he rests best when he's cuddled up next to me.

But since Dan has been working aboard a ship for 128 straight days, standing a midwatch that gives him only a few hours of sleep here and there, his first night home was going to be spent in his own bed.

Max slept contentedly the first few hours in his own crib -- some pretty vital hours for a husband and wife to be alone in their bed after being parted for four months -- but protested mightily when I tried to put him back in there after a nursing session.

I gave it a good hour, and then gave up and took him into the guest bed and spent the rest of the night with him in there. I didn't sleep well at all.

But there's always a transition period, no matter the time away. This time is special because it's the first one coming back to a son who is older and bigger and different, but there will be more of those times to come.

For now, we'll all just sleep when and where we can. I'm the only one awake, keyed up after seeing the new James Bond movie for our date night. Max is still asleep in his downstairs playpen where my mother laid him, and Dan is curled up in the big chair asleep with his dog.

My plan is to wait until Max rusltes, take him upstairs, nurse him back to sleep, and conk out with him in his bed. Shh ... don't wake Dan.

Max's Anthem

Here's a little dittie about a baby on the tittie.

As promised on Facebook, these are my lyrics for "No Sleep till Boobie" -- an homage to The Beastie Boys' "No Sleep till Brooklyn":

Foot in the bootie never ever on loosey
Daddy reading stories from Mother Goosey
My job ain't a job, it's a baby's dream
Front to back I'm covered in cream

On lactation touring around the nation
Breastfeeding boy's always on vacation
Itchy diaper rash but a stable change table
I do what I do best because I'm cute and able

Ain't no faking your milk I'm taking
Going left to right watching all the boobies shaking
While you're on the job pumping nine to five
The breastfeeding boy needs it all to stay alive

No sleep till ...

Another cream another rash, another bottle in the trash
Another nap another fight, another drive all night
My parents are crazy they always seem tired
They go to work late but don't get fired

Walk around the room, I eat around the clock
From dusk to dawn I like to rock
I'm filling diapers like they're going out of style
Still need to eat cause it's worth my while

Toys on the floor, doggies out the door
Mommy can't lie down to nap anymore
We got water in the tub with towels in a stack
But all I really want are boobies on the rack

No sleep till ...
No ... Sleep ... till Boobie!
No ... Sleep ... till Boobie!

Ain't seen a bottle since I started to suck
Formula went to the garbage truck
Born and bred to have breastfed joy
They call me Maxwell Charles but I'm Boobie Boy

Like a lemon to a lime a lime to a lemon
I sip the def milk from my mommy woman
Got rattles, stuffed animals, the tubby toys
Pacifiers won't trick the breastfed boys

Step off, Daddy, get out out of my way
I suck her boobies the whole long day
Waking up before I get to sleep
Cause we'll be rocking in this chair eight days a week

No sleep till ...
No ... Sleep ... till Boobie!
No ... Sleep ... till Boobie!

No (no) ... Sleep (sleep) ... till Boobie (Boobie)!
No (no) ... Sleep (sleep) ... till Boobie (yeah)!

No (no) ... Sleep (sleep) ... till Boobie (Boobie)!
No (no) ... Sleep (sleep) ... till Boobie (Boobie)!
No (no) ... Sleep (sleep) ... till Boobie (Boobie)!
No (no) ... Sleep (sleep) ... till Boobie (Boobie)!
No (no) ... Sleep (sleep) ... till Boobie (Boobie)!
No (no) ... Sleep (sleep) ... till Boobie (Boobie)!

On the Road

Max continues to snooze in his car seat as we finish our
meals at Sokolowski's University Inn in Cleveland.

My baby has become Jack Kerouac in just under four weeks.

Today we hitched a ride to Cleveland, which is about 130 miles east of our home. Hubby-daddy needed to travel to a ship chandler to fetch supplies he needed for work, and we needed to get the heck out of the house.

We actually have been dragging Max out and about from the very beginning. A lot of folks follow the six-week rule before they start exposing their infants to the wide world, but I figured that as long as I didn't let a lot of people hold him or touch him or breathe on him, it was OK to head out as soon as I felt up to it.

Really, this is one of the easier stages during which to travel with a baby, on short trips at least. Parents just need to be willing to do the proper planning, and stock the diaper bag with lots of diapers, wipes and extra outfits -- for the baby and for you. (Haven't you been peed on yet?)

Parents also must be willing to watch carefully made plans go to complete hell. Allowing for plenty of buffer time before and after any externally scheduled moment will help somewhat; forcing too much into too short a time span will bite everyone in the poopy butt. And a daddy who waits patiently in a parking lot while his baby is nursed or burped (forever) in the car gets a gold star.

Today worked out remarkably well. We happened to arrive at Turnpike rest stops right when Max needed to nurse or have his diaper changed, and the one time we had to nurse while parked on the street we were in a very out-of-the-way place. I'm really glad I remembered to bring a pillow, and nursing in the car turned out to be way more comfortable than trying to find some tucked-away chair in a public building.

Max did let loose his fire hose once, while we were changing diapers at our lunch stop. But I just cleaned him up, pulled out a fresh outfit, put the wet one in the plastic baggie I had stocked, and kept going. I was full of sauerkraut and blueberry pie at that point, so I was going to be happy regardless. (Hey, you eat what you want at a Polish cafeteria, and I'll eat what I want.)

Of course, Max snoozed for hours in the car. Most babies are vibrated off to dreamland in a moving vehicle, and sleeping is pretty much what he does for most of the day now anyway, so it works well for day trips.

As soon as a baby figures out he can be fussy on purpose, ruining the good time his parents are having, day trips become far more difficult to arrange. I say that while mommy is on maternity leave, take her and her baby as many places as you can.

Help a Mama Out

Life continues to go well here in newborn land, although I had hoped to blog more often. It's not that I couldn't find the time. I just often spend it doing something else.

I always had planned to extend an invitation for guest bloggers, so please don't feel like it's just a desperate, unshowered, overtired mommy begging for others to do her work. No, not at all.

I will keep posting, but it will be good to publish someone else's thoughts when I've suddenly realized what feels like one long day actually has been four in a row and Mommy Remix is getting a touch stale. In journo land, this is what we call having a well, from which we dip when it's a slow news day.

Please send your submissions to me via email at rckleiboemer@gmail.com and I will happily put them in the lineup.

You can write a full-length post or just a paragraph. Send pictures if you'd like. You have my full permission to be as snarky and foul-mouthed as I have been to this point, but no worse.

Topics could include:

• Your own family story
• What you do/did or don't/didn't enjoy about pregnancy
• Adventures in fertility, or disappointments and challenges 
• Why you don't want to have a baby
• What you can't stand about how parents raise their kids
• Thoughts on co-sleeping, nursing in public, crying it out, cloth diapers, etc.
• Hilarity of traveling with children
• How you keep your marriage and adult relationships going
• Public policy regarding education or health care
• What you like or don't like about your OBGYN or pediatrician
• Tips and warnings for new parents
• The best baby shower game or birthday party theme
• How you're raising your kids to deal with their peers
• To give or not to give an allowance
• Methods of discipline
• What phrase of your parents you swore you'd never repeat but did

For the record, Gabe often hears, "What the hell's the matter with you?" The more I say it, the more I like it.

And this post took me more than three hours to write, interrupted by two nursing sessions and one pee blowout that soaked both Max and me to the point of complete outfit changing.

Maxwell 101

In the three weeks Max has been on this planet, I've learned something about him almost each day.

Sometimes I have to unlearn, when what I thought was the beginning of a sleeping-feeding pattern turned out to be a fluke, or when I figured out an even better way to bathe him.

Some gems about Maxwell Charles:

The Poopy Face: When Max is about to fill his diaper, he gets a very concerned scrunch to his eyebrows and a tight lemon juice purse to his lips. This is quite helpful mid-diaper change, which apparently is one of his favorite times to poop some more.

Formal Dining: Max likes to take his meals in courses. He needs a quick hit of an appetizer, and then a little snooze. Don't bother trying to rouse him, he sleeps like a drugged cat at the vet after this first hit. When he does wake, he'll take a medium entree, as if he's trying to impress a date who happens to be a nutritionist. Just enough to get what he needs. I mistakenly thought this was the end of our dietary education and all that he needed. He seemed happy enough after such a nursing, albeit a short period that needed to be repeated two hours later, and he was gaining weight just fine. But we took an annex course recently. I learned that after a big burp and often a diaper change, and perhaps one more quick snooze or even 10 or 15 minutes of play time, Max then will order a huge dessert course. Not just one slice -- the whole pie, please. This is helping a great deal with engorgement, or what a I like to call Goodyear Blimp-ment.

He-Man: For as pleasant and often quiet as he is, my big boy is strong and vigorous. "Squirmy" is the word his father often uses. He holds his head up so well that we're already getting forgetful about holding his neck steady at all times. So far the occasional wild lean to one side hasn't hurt him yet.


Eau de Toilette: After my elegantly perfumed mother holds him for a bit, Max will smell like cookies for a good hour.

Zombie Brains: Max is at his most content when he is self-soothing by sliding an arm over his head and rubbing the back of it with his hand. This is the very in-utero position that precipitated a C-section delivery, and he still seems to like it very much. He just gently rubs his head for a few moments, staring off into space, and then will quietly lie there looking at me as if to say, "OK, I'm ready for whatever is next. Pick me up, woman."

I've learned a few things about myself in these past three weeks as well.

I apparently can physically operate on sleep recorded in minutes. I don't think I've hit a full hour yet.

I can do a great many tasks with only one hand, and I've renewed my great skill at picking up things with my feet. This is quite helpful when you have a 9-pound infant in one hand at most times during the day.

I am growing increasingly reliant on the wisdom of my cousin, whose experience with a newborn was just a year and a half ago. The threads of my sanity are knotted together by a few well-timed texts and phone calls.

Even though I am eager to watch his development and curious about the boy he will become, I also wish Max would stay this little forever.

But I know that won't happen. I'll just enjoy now as much as I can.

The Booby Trap

I am so making this "boobie beanie" for my baby.

I've got some news for you, Public Citizen. These are my boobs, not yours.

This advocacy group is admirable in many ways. I share many of its rants against pharmaceutical companies and their powerful lobbies in Washington, D.C.

But one of its recent efforts -- to stop hospitals from distributing free infant formula to new mothers -- is rubbing me in a way no nipple cream can help.

Public Citizen: Call to action
News report: MSNBC

I hate marketing. When I sat through my first educational session at my OBGYN, the nurse was surprised I didn't add my email address to the promotions list when she handed one more piece of paper to sign. "They send really good coupons," she said, to which I replied that I had enough crap in my inbox on any given day.

I will buy the products I need and want, and I will do my best to do so when they are on sale. Most of the coupons and promotions are for magazines and toys and other junk no one in my family will miss.

The rest of the "educational" material was decent enough, although I was informed enough on my own to already have decided to breastfeed once the little mouth makes his debut.

If my hospital happens to give me some free formula after I deliver, I will take it. I have three options of what I will do with it:

1) Store it in the cupboard for an emergency supply, in case my actual breasts become unavailable or if the freezer takes one of its frequent dumps and ruins any stored milk;

2) Give it to another mother I may know who is using that brand of formula; or

3) Donate it to a food pantry.

Public Citizen claims birthing centers should be free of marketing and that the formula give-away discourages breastfeeding.

Yeah, I can see that. There I am, all dopey from my epidural, just waiting for one little can of powdered nutrition to change my mind on one of the most important decisions I've been considering my entire pregnancy. I wouldn't put it past Sherwin Williams to put a color chip card in the goody bag to convince me to paint the nursery a different color that very evening.

If there is a mother in some delivery room somewhere who has such little resources or planning that she has nothing else to feed her baby than the first can of formula she gets for free from the hospital, the lack of a freebie isn't going to be what forces her to breastfeed.

Hospitals do recommend mothers let their little monsters latch onto them for at least six months, touting endless benefits to boob-giver and boob-taker alike. I wonder if Public Citizen would complain about marketing influences if the take-home swag included a free box of bra pads. How about a lottery ticket for a breast pump? Not so high and mighty now, are ya?

The reason only 14 percent of us moms are exclusively breastfeeding up to month 6 is because every other marketing effort in this country "has us chasing cars and clothes, working jobs we hate so we can buy sh*t we don't need." So sayeth Tyler Durden in "Fight Club."

"SAHM" is all the rage, but not all of us can be that. If it's not our actual careers, callings and contributions to society motivating us to work for a paycheck, it's credit card debt and health insurance premiums and putting food on the table for everyone else. Breastfeeding is a serious commitment for moms working apart from their little bottomless pits consuming the yield.

Pumping and storing milk while you're at work is a pain in the ass, let alone the breasts. At my last newspaper, a friend and coworker had to do it in a wall-carpeted room we used for audio recording. Can you think of any place an employee at Burger King might be able to pump milk with dignity and adherence to health codes?

Very little in our society truly supports breastfeeding mothers. Doing it in public is hardly acceptable, and don't think for one second that someone won't complain if you whip out your baby's natural meal at a restaurant.

Encouraging breastfeeding is noble, but targeting the breastfeeders is misplaced. Taking freebies away from women who have decided -- for their own reasons, medical issues, schedules and conveniences -- to feed formula to their infants is just mean.

Instead, how about the following:

Run full-page ads inside porno magazines and on racy websites that urge men who are staring at titties all day long anyway to grow up and stop laughing if they see a woman's breast mid-feeding.

Most mosques have a basket of saris or other wraps for visitors to cover their legs and heads. How about a basket of those lovely breastfeeding bibs/tents at restaurants or libraries or other public places moms may be when junior squalls to be fed?

Circulate a petition to encourage workplaces to designate private pumping areas. Or better yet, LONGER PAID MATERNITY LEAVE.

Hey, you said you wanted my boy to be healthy and well-fed. Put your money where your mouth is.