Right on Schedule
During one of our first pediatrician visits (there are several the first few weeks, running together with hormones, painkillers and sleep deprivation) the doctor asked me how much I fed the baby. I had no idea what he was talking about. I was breastfeeding. How would I measure it? I took a stab at it and said that when I pumped, I got about 5 ounces in the same amount of time he nursed, more or less. He said, “Why do you pump? This is your pump.” At the time I was pumping so Daddy could take a turn feeding him, have a little father-son bonding time.
Turns out he actually wanted to know my schedule. Oh, I was grasping at straws again. I fed the baby whenever he seemed hungry, every couple hours. I started naming times, “6 or 7 am, 9 or 10 am, around noon or one, 3 pm…” The doctor probably thought I was a nut. “Your schedule. Every two and a half or three hours?” Sure. “Yes.” There were more questions I couldn’t answer, like how long he ate for at a time. My answer was 30 minutes (both sides) and the doc wanted it to be 15 minutes (per side.) Wait, I said it wrong, I meant total! Yes. Ok.
I still can’t answer a lot of questions correctly. He eats when he’s hungry, sometimes sleeps through the night, and poops at least five times a day. His eyes track together fine, he startles at noises, nearly crawls, pulls up. His fine motor skills are astounding. Last night he was playing with a puppy rattle and touching it gently on the face, the little ears, making such precise movements. He brought the puppy close to his face, gave it a tender kiss on the nose. It wasn’t a big open-mouth everything-tastes-like-noms motion, it was a little tiny perfect peck.
So I don’t know ounces and times. His schedule sorts itself out. I know that we snuggle in the morning, play together in the evening, read a book at bedtime. A couple of times a week we have a bath. He plays by himself on the floor or helps me do chores in the Moby. When he gives an activity the raspberry, we do something else. We love on him around the clock. That schedule means the world to me.
