Three Cases of the Irrational Dad

No one has ever labeled me as laid-back. Efficient? Sure. Productive? You bet. Always on the go? Check. But never laid-back.

So, it may not surprise you that I'm occasionally a tad nervous, or, perhaps, irrational, when it comes to my daughter, Annabelle.

Now, in my defense, before the last 10 weeks, I knew as much about babies as you know about the mating habits of flamingos. I don't think that makes me a unique male. Most guys (dudes, bros, boys -- whichever you prefer) I know didn't do much babysitting in high school. Instead, we played sports, chased girls, and spit a lot.

Guys, then, are inherently at a disadvantage with this baby stuff. We're starting from square one and we're suddenly the head of a household. (Is there any phrase in the English language that can make you feel older? Excuse me, can I speak to the head of the household?) We're nervous, scared, and anxious because there's this perfect thing that we don't want to mess up in any way. We want our sons and daughters to be absolutely perfect for as long as possible. We want them to be happy, healthy, and quiet. Forever.

And because of that, we're irrational.

More specifically, I'm irrational. Thanks to my lack of baby knowledge and my, um, active personality, Bridget and I have already had a few interesting  (and unnecessary) moments with that screaming gal in the photo. In chronological order, here are the three cases of the irrational dad:

1. After a few weeks of life, Annabelle started to develop a rash on her face and her chest. "Oh, man," I said, when it got particularly bad. "What's wrong with her? Is she okay?"Bridget looked at the rash. "Yes, she's fine," she said. "It's probably just baby acne. Plus, babies get rashes all the time." I shook my head. "No, no, I don't think so," I said. "I think something's wrong. Can you call in the morning?" Bridget, to appease me, called in the morning. "They think she's fine." Two days later, the baby acne disappeared.

2. I was convinced Annabelle was blind. Two weeks ago, I was playing with Annabelle while Bridget made dinner. I was making faces at her and trying to get her to follow my finger. (Babies, I'd read, were supposed to be able to track things at eight weeks.) I moved my hand right. Annabelle stared straight ahead. I moved my hand left. She stared straight ahead. In fact, she was actually looking past me. "Bridget," I yelled. "I think Annabelle might be blind!" Bridget came running in. "What do you mean? Why would you think that?" I showed her Annabelle's poor tracking ability. "I mean, would we know? She had that hearing test, but we don't know anything about her eyes," I said. Bridget assured me everything was fine. A couple days later, we told our pediatrician about my irrational fear. She laughed. Annabelle's eyes are fine.

3. I woke up in a panic at 3 AM last Tuesday. I jumped out of bed, and went over to Annabelle, who was asleep in her Rock 'n Play. I stared at her in fear. She was so quiet, so still. There had to be something wrong. I leaned over and touched her hand. Nothing. I listened to hear breath, and slowly, softly, she exhaled. And then I exhaled. Bridget was awake by this point. Our conversation:
"Hun," she said.
"Yeah, I"m okay," I said. "I was just really nervous. She was just so still."
"Right," Bridget said, "she was sleeping."
"I know," I said. "I just got nervous because the blanket was there."
"Was the blanket near her face?"
"No, it was under her feet … I'm cool. I'll go back to bed now."

This parenting thing gets easier, right?

Dad's First Feeding

Yelling. Then crying. Then really loud yelling. Then spit up. Then more crying. Then more spit up, more yelling, and lots of tears, in that order. Then more yelling.

In short, chaos. Absolute chaos.

I fed Annabelle for the first time this week. It didn't, you know, go well. In fact, some would call it a disaster, a train wreck, or, in the parlance of our times, a dumpster fire. At least at the beginning.

It all started when I received a text from Bridget around lunchtime: "Guess what? I pumped today, so you can feed her tonight!" I was thrilled. No, elated. I'd read a lot about that first "Dad to baby feeding" and, now, it was my turn. I was going to get to feed my young. But I was also really nervous. I had never fed another human before. Sure, I'd given a date a bite of chocolate cake, but I'd never fed another person an entire meal.

I immediately turned to the most logical place to refresh my knowledge: Google. After getting sidetracked on a video about how to bathe a newborn (Belle hates baths, which is a story for another time), I finally found a decent site that talked about 45-degree angles and "not forcing it." Content with my superficial research (especially the angle thing, which seemed pretty scientific and impressive), I enjoyed the rest of my day at work and some early evening tennis. As I walked home in front of a setting sun at 6:30, I realized I was muttering to myself: You can do this, Mike. You can do this. 

I walked in, grabbed Belle, grabbed the bottle, took off my shirt in preparation for copious amounts of spit and vomit, and put on my game face. You can do this, Mike. I took a comfortable seat on my couch and held Belle at precisely 45.0 degrees. Here's the play-by-play:

Attempt 1: Waaaaaaaaaaaaah! (Baby translation: "Absolutely not. What the hell is this? There is no way I'm feeding this way.")

Okay, okay. She just needs to get adjusted to this, I think to myself. Compose yourself, Mike. You can do this.

Attempt 2: Waaaaaah. Bottle goes in for a second. Waaaaaaaaah! (Baby translation: "Did you not hear me 10 seconds ago? I said no!")

Attempt 3: Waaaaah. Waaaaah. Bottle goes in for a few seconds. Milk comes out! Hooray!  Waaaaaaaah! (Baby translation: "Look, man. You are not my Mom. You'll never be my Mom. Go write a blog post or something.")

"Honey," I say to Bridget. "I don't think this is going very well."

Attempts 4 - 8: A little milk goes in. Waaaaaaaaah! Waaaaaaah! Waaaaaaah! (Baby translation: "No! Give me the real thing!")

I decide to walk around and bounce Belle for a while because that always seems to help her relax. She calms down a bit. Bridget leaves the room because she'd read a baby won't feed when she can smell/sense that her mother is around. It doesn't make a difference. She can easily hear Attempt 9 from the other room.

Attempt 9: Waaaaaah! Waaaaah! Deep breath. WAAAAAAH!

I remove the bottle and look at it -- .25 ounces (maybe) of the 3 ounces are gone. Thirty minutes have gone by. Crap.

Attempt 10: Bridget holds the bottle while I bounce Belle. And ... success! She's sucking and gulping. "Honey," I yell. "You've got it. You're doing ..." Waaaah! Waaaah! Waaaah!

At this point, 40 minutes into the feeding, I'm close to calling it a failure. I'm ready for Bridget to come in with the big guns. (Pun intended. Whatever. I'm tired, so I'll use puns when I want.) And then, suddenly on attempt 11, something clicks. Her eyes soften, her breathing slows, and her lips curl. It's like the moment when a kid understands long division for the first time or a minor leaguer learns how to take an outside curve ball to right field. Success! Just like that, quietly, calmly, Belle grabs hold of my pinkie and guzzles 2.75 ounces of milk in about two minutes.

Bridget snaps the photo above and, out of nowhere, I have one my proudest (and most gratifying) moments thus far as a Dad. (Isn't she adorable?)

Then I realize it's almost time for Belle's weekly bath. Sigh. I think I need a nap ...