It’s been a while since my last post. We’ve been settling into our new life with Freddie and enjoying ourselves in the process. It has to be said, we’ve been helped along enormously by the fact that Freddie is a sleep monster! This guy loves the horizontal lifestyle, waking only to feed on the cream of the breast - Ahh, the good life. Sadly we seem to have missed out on the opportunity of complaining about sleep deprivation due to expected but non existent crying through the night. Naturally as parents of a new born we’ve managed to turn this good fortune on it’s head and find the fault.. why isn’t he crying? some thing’s wrong! He must be seriously traumatised or suffering exhaustion from the birth… The visiting midwife smiles and says, “he’s a baby what else would you have him do but sleep?”
The list of Fred activities besides sleep and ‘going to the mountains’ aka breast feeding extends to one other key item; ‘nappy soiling’. Welcome to the fascinating world of cost effective(?) risk management - HA! - There’s no telling when the mystery trumpet player will strike with his mustard. Abstract as that may sound, there’s great value in the humour which arises from the often absurd situations of having a new born baby in the house. There’s absolutely no theory or structure to the when and whereabouts of the next poo, fart or wee and all three of them have there own surprises and dangers:
The poo is a yellow ochre (hence mustard) slightly sticky, seed like texture, which smears over baby’s bum and back (only… if you’re lucky) enough to need several good wipes. Try juggling this goo like substance with part dressed flying limbs jabbing distraction at you. If you can get away with keeping the socks on AND clean, you’re a god damn pro. Next up, the fart, often louder and bolder than thought humanly possible attributing to the only remaining logical explanation; that a yet to be introduced trumpet player left the band and found refuge somewhere in your flat… Equally misleading, the fart does not strictly speaking require a nappy change, but as this stink bomb is not dissimilar to the sound and stench of the mustard delivery, us parents are often left confused - Should we change him and risk waking him up or leave well alone and risk nappy rash? It’s a trixy business in which baby has the upper hand!
The wee. This is the most entertaining of the three hazards. Often delivered as a surprise attraction half way through a nappy change ie; once the area has been cleaned, the skin cream applied and the new nappy laid in place ready for fitting. Suddenly you may find you’re presented with an impressive fountain of wee released from the equivalent of an uncontrolled water hose jetting over baby’s outfit, your clean shirt and the glass of boiling water waiting beside the changing mat, patiently cooled in preparation for sterilising baby’s weepy eye and newly formed belly button whose dried up umbilical cord recently fell off. Perfect.
Bear in mind that all nappy soiling hazards are further complicated by the fact that there are no hard and fast rules to when baby will do his business. You might think it would make sense to change shortly after a feed, but I can guarantee that as soon as you’ve changed him, he’ll fill it again within minutes. So a cost effective practice this is not. We have been flying through disposable nappies. I’m dying to get into natural nappies after the first month, I’m aware this WILL cut our costs in disposables, but then I’m not sure if our washing machine is up for the challenge… ?