By: Revanche

My kid and growth spurts: Notes from Month 3

May 13, 2015

I’m revising a friend’s advice on parenting for our family.

1. Don’t have more kids than you have hands
Don’t have more kids than you have adult bodies. Ages ago, as a child-free professional auntie, I liked a 4-1 ratio of kids to adults. I stand by that number.

2. Fight only the important battles
Also the ones about socks. Cold feeted babies are angry angry babies.

3. Always have fun
Laugh at everything that would otherwise make you angry. Bitterly, hysterically, whatever, just go with it. You’re both sleep mad.

We’re keeping hir turned away from the television but like an owl, hir head swivels around until it’s just about 180 degrees looking back to continue looking at it. The lights and movement draw hir eyes right now but it’s far too early for hir to develop a tv habit!  I’m considering being a heartless mom and moving the one tv into our room when ze gets older. For now I think it’s true that ze is just looking at the lights and movements.

The growth and development ze experienced coming into hir third month was astounding. In the space of four days, ze started paying attention to mobile toys, music, rattles, and trying to intentionally use hir hands as hands a couple times:

Ze very deliberately played a game with me and hir bottle one night: open mouth, clamp down on the nipple, spit it out, grin, repeat. Ze did this four or five times, each time sipping a few drops and grinning as ze spit out the bottle. Then finally, ze was done playing so ze grabbed my hand that was holding the bottle and very firmly moved it towards hir mouth and started drinking normally.

In hir little playmat with mobile things, ze had been swinging at the hanging objects aimlessly. One day, ze reached up with a fist, punching the air and then paused. Ze gently waved it at a ring. And again. Then started whacking the ring like a piñata!

Ze isn’t breaking any records but hir pediatrician is pleased with growth and ze made it through the first round of vaccines with about the expected level of rage, followed by a good long sleep. Weirdly, ze was more infuriated by the attempt to Baby Tylenol hir later that evening.

The search for a nanny had become a bit desperate. We hadn’t found anyone that really suits. The first mother’s helper we tried seemed alright at first but her competence seemed to taper off. By the fourth day, I was still repeating basic care instructions and it was driving me nuts. [When baby cries, check hir diaper. Why does that have to be repeated??] Then it was ok. Then it was not.

Ze has opinions and is very vocal about them. Yep, that means All The Crying. But also that the chirps and squeaks that impressed me so earlier turned into full near-words and now ze will lay around talking at you for minutes at a time. You don’t even have to be in front of hir, as long as ze can hear you respond.

Ze has more patience now. Before, the very second ze was GOING to have a dirty diaper we were in hot water. Totally not fair, btw. With the graduation to size 1 diapers, ze is also a bit more mature and patient about waiting a minute for a change.

Ze hasn’t quite doubled birth weight but ze is HUGE compared to birth size. Looking at pictures from the first week is a startling contrast. Luckily I am an obsessive photographer so we have chronicled the whole way here.

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