One of those days
"They'll take away my pacifier when they pry it from my cold, dead hands!"
Our sweet, sleepy little boy today morphed into a wailing banshee, crying inconsolably more or less all day. We gave him his first pacifier in an ultimately futile effort to calm him (we're vaguely aware of some big philosophical debate about pacifiers. I suspect that, insofar as they soothe the child and silence the howling, we won't really give a shit). He took to it right away, clutching it in his iron grip, but even that could only hold him at bay for a few minutes at a time.
It's not textbook colicky baby yet (a diagnosis of which apparently requires three weeks of this sort of behavior), but it sure sounded that way. Colic, it turns out, is one of those purely symptomatic medical terms, like schizophrenia, for a phenomenon that medical science doesn't really fully understand. It's what your newborn has when they bawl and fuss for hours on end, even when they're not hungry, dirty or gassy. You've fed 'em, burped 'em, changed 'em, cradled 'em and they're still doing their best Damien impersonation.
Whatever the cause, 24 hours of it is psychically and physically exhausting. I can't imagine enduring months of this, as some parents do. It usually starts to diminish between 6 and 8 weeks, and most outgrow it by 3 months of age.
We did get some brief respites. As a rule, we sleep when he sleeps.
Well, mom moreso than dad. After all, I have a blog to feed. And of course, I can always sneak disco naps between diaper changes. But Oscar and I did get in a little quality sheep-counting time this afternoon.
Our sweet, sleepy little boy today morphed into a wailing banshee, crying inconsolably more or less all day. We gave him his first pacifier in an ultimately futile effort to calm him (we're vaguely aware of some big philosophical debate about pacifiers. I suspect that, insofar as they soothe the child and silence the howling, we won't really give a shit). He took to it right away, clutching it in his iron grip, but even that could only hold him at bay for a few minutes at a time.
It's not textbook colicky baby yet (a diagnosis of which apparently requires three weeks of this sort of behavior), but it sure sounded that way. Colic, it turns out, is one of those purely symptomatic medical terms, like schizophrenia, for a phenomenon that medical science doesn't really fully understand. It's what your newborn has when they bawl and fuss for hours on end, even when they're not hungry, dirty or gassy. You've fed 'em, burped 'em, changed 'em, cradled 'em and they're still doing their best Damien impersonation.
Whatever the cause, 24 hours of it is psychically and physically exhausting. I can't imagine enduring months of this, as some parents do. It usually starts to diminish between 6 and 8 weeks, and most outgrow it by 3 months of age.
We did get some brief respites. As a rule, we sleep when he sleeps.
Well, mom moreso than dad. After all, I have a blog to feed. And of course, I can always sneak disco naps between diaper changes. But Oscar and I did get in a little quality sheep-counting time this afternoon.
posted by Matt at 9:12 PM
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