Two Weeks In, 9 Things

It's still unreal that we are actually parents. It still feels a little weird to hear my wife say "my son ..." on the phone or for people to refer to me as "his dad ...". A little undeserved, I think, because in many ways I am still the same old self. Not much has changed about me personally, or at least not as much as I thought would happen.

Change is full throttle nonetheless. It's been a tremendous advantage that I only need 4 hours of sleep a night, and thus have not felt depravation. The only change has been *when* I go to sleep (earlier than I like). For the mom, it's not only about how little sleep she gets and how often it is interrupted, but also when she gets it, and worse because 9-hour nights were the norm. So to help her get more sleep, we came up with a plan: after his midnight feeding, I bring him downstairs and will service the 3am feeding with formula or pumped breastmilk. This way, she can sleep from midnight to 6am when the next feeding would be due. It's worked well so far.

OTHERWISE:

(1) At 16 days old, he weighed in 16oz over his birth weight. Not sure whether that's good or bad. As of 3 days ago, he no longer needs supplemental oxygen. Definitely a good thing. Celebrate small victories.

(2) He has a good sleep/feed cycle of 2.5-3 hours for the time being. When he awakes, it's pretty much feeding, then diaper changing, then clothing, then holding, the off to sleep again. Quite predictable, we like that.

(3) We hate co-sleeping, but more times than not, he can only go to sleep in our arms or in our "space". So we got one of those co-sleepers that you put in bed. But we can't let his nursery go to waste, so we'll shove him out of our bed the soonest we can.

(4) If you want, you can worry all day long about the baby. How he breathes weird, what sounds like congestion after he eats or when hiccups rock his whole little body, his peeling skin, or his crossed eyes. It turns out it's all normal. Actually, you muse at how worrying started pre-conception and sustained throughout the pregnancy. So quit worrying, check!

(5) We haven't used his name around home very much. He's still pretty much "the baby" and "he" and "him". I thought we'd be all over it with every breath. But it should be known that his nickname is "Mozy".

(6) Swaddling does wonders, if done right. Our first few attempts we terrible, but we got better. It's almost a contradiction: I thought freedom (of arms and legs) meant peace, but it seems restriction is what calms babies down. It's the same theory with boundaries and happiness.

(7) Friends and family have been so gracious to bring us lots of food or come prepare meals at our house. We have not needed to go grocery shopping this month yet. I wasn't expecting much from this idea, but have been pleasantly surprised at the generosity.

(8) My paternal leave is 3 weeks long (except for a few days last week). Her maternity leave is 10 weeks long. No idea how it will look when we both return to work. But we got time to figure things out.

(9) Our plan to be by our lonesome selves for the first 3 weeks did not pan out. Just a couple of days after we returned home, we were open for family and close friends to come see Mozy. For those traveling out of town, we have a plan: choose 2-4 days out of a given week in September or later when you want to visit. We prefer you arrive at Colorado Springs airport (COS), but we can also pick you up from Denver International (DIA). We have a guest room, so you can stay with us.