i’m spending long nights with another newborn. naturally, these little meetings throughout the wee hours have given rise to a new set of unanswerable questions. [they have also given rise to very strange dreams in which i am a spy for the government, but that's another post.] here are a few of my life’s mysteries, in no particular order. [and if you have the answers to some of my unanswerables, please do share.]
- why are babies born nocturnal?
- why do babies poop either right after you change their diaper or whilst you’re changing it?
- why do people keep telling me “you look good”? why not just tell me the truth–”you don’t look as bad as i was expecting”?
- why should i wear something besides sweats?
- why does the baby have to rip open the part of my body that i also have to sit on?
- why can the baby sleep through her brother shaking her crib, throwing cars at her head, and screaming like a dinosaur during the day–but put her in a cozy bed in the dark of night and she wakes up every three and half minutes?
- why does henry call joe “daddy” but calls me “jess”?
- what is the strange clinking noise when the furnace comes on?
- why, exactly, do i need milk ducts in my armpits?
[p.s.--joe said to me the other day, "your blog is turning into one of those blogs: you know all about your family, stuff nobody cares about. where are the book reviews? the writing samples?" and he's right. i looked in the mirror and realized i was *gasp* mommy blogging. oh well. worse things have happened to me. and, in case you need a good book, i highly recommend the blue sword by robin mckinley.]
Question #1: I read in a book once that your milk is the richest and most nutritious at night and that babies come nocturnal because they need that richer milk they can eat in the night. So the real question is, why isn’t our milk the most healthy at 7 pm instead of 3 am? That would sure make things nice.
As for the other questions, I have no idea, but I’d sure like to know the answer to the 5th one as well. I’m 2 for 2 so far on hurting that part of my body during delivery so bad that I couldn’t sit down for 2 months straight on the second one! Yowzahs! (And having a mommy blog is fun and no uncool at all IMHO.)
I love your mommy blog…I can relate to it so much better than all that intellecutal stuff. I don’t get much of that watching Sesame Street every day! I don’t have many (okay, any) answers for your questions, but I agree that they’re good questions. You could probably get paid a lot of money if you could figure out the answers and know how to change some of them!
I don’t really know, but I’d like to take a stab at question #7. When Henry is around, do you always refer to Joe as “daddy”? On the other hand, does he only hear Joe call you Jess? The other possibility I came up with is, does he somehow get that you have a name and that it is Jess, but he hasn’t put two and two together about Joe’s name? One child in my nursery class always calls her mom Amanda because she figured out her name and I think she just feels smart when she uses her mom’s first name. Just ideas, but I really don’t know.
1. because in the womb they (you) were moving all day- keeping them asleep and they would wake up at night when the rocking stopped- they come out and keep that same schedule for a while.
2. to let us know they are there.
3. you probably do look good.
4. you shouldn’t, unless your going swimming and in that situation it might not be as comfy.
5. ouch.
6. try putting her in a room with lights and a TV on at night and she’ll think its day and in the day- put her in a dark closet and she’ll think its night.
7. Tiff had a good idea. Jules is in to this right now too. She calls me Sarajane when she wants to get my attention and “mama” is not working.
8. hum- rats?
9. how the feeding thing working out? better this time?
OK, so I don’t really know any of these things but you make me laugh and cry and smile- love the writing and wish you were moving here. and more picture please- after all that’s what people do on mommy blogs.
if you find answers, let me know. i hope things are going well, my mom always said just “hang in their the first 12 weeks”. after that you can try to resemble someone living. not a zombie. at least that’s how i always felt, a big, zombie with boobs. or a boob zombie? who knows, it’s just awful either way.