beer is gross, or i love my little anemone

baby m is one month old. holy crap.

my broken beer palette

i was so excited to be able to enjoy a guilt-free drink after safely depositing baby into the world. i hoarded a Belgian gem - the Trappist Westvleteren 8, you know, one of the best rated beers in the entire world, for almost two years to savor.

after a particularly arduous bout of feeding this kiddo and right before kickoff, we poured the bottle into the Westvleteren chalice. the color was perfect, the bubbles were perfect, the aroma was perfect, and the taste...i hated it.

WHAAAT THE EFF?!?

yes. i have apparently lost tastebud sensitivity with regard to the hoppy, bitter, fruity, smooth nuances of one of my favorite beverages - beer. i had Dan open an American blond - too bitter. a wheat ale - too bitter. a Bud Light - TOO BITTER?!!?!

i was near panic. as a last ditch effort, we had a Yuengling in the fridge, and it tasted palatable. i can't believe i just wrote that.

i'm terrified to open a bottle of Rioja and discover that now i like reisling or white zinfandel or boone's farm strawberry hill.

must. keep. trying.

things i never thought i'd do, but have now done

• wear Crocs in public. shame. 
• worry about running out of tucks medicated pads
• not care about 12 ounces of milk barf covering me from neck to thigh
• not care about 12 ounces of baby poop covering my lap about an hour after a milk barf bath
• hate having giant boobs

misguided

on principle, i purchased a device called a Boppy. the Boppy is a breastfeeding pillow shaped like a horseshoe. the theory goes that you put it around your waist and the baby will be supported comfortably while you feed her and not have to hold her whole weight up. millions of these Boppys are sold, and they have cute name. 

i could not, on principle, purchase the competitor to the Boppy, despite it having better reviews, solely because it was called "My Brest Friend Nursing Pillow." Seriously? My Brest Friend? this rivals Nads hair removal cream for top horrible product names of all time. 

so, i have a Boppy. sad part is: it totally blows. the thing won't stay around my waist, so it creates a little bowl space where the baby keeps falling in against my belly (albeit this space is convenient for corralling milk barf in a tidy pool). i have to use a second pillow to prop the Boppy against me, so between the burp cloth, the blanket covering the couch to protect from milk barf, and two pillows, i am toting around a Bed-in-a-Bag just to do some nursing. 

with a well-timed Target gift card, i splurged on the "My [insertstupidnamehere] Friend." And, of course it is my freaking best friend. damn. 

troubleshooting

remember when your computer didn't work and Windows would pop up one of those "troubleshooting" choose-your-own adventure screens? that shit never worked. just re-start the junker. 

luckily, newborn babies are much easier to read. 

• cry 1: feed me
• cry 2: i have to burp or poo or fart
• cry 3: i keep hitting myself in the face and would rather be sleeping, so please swaddle me 
• cry 4: my diaper is cold and wet against my tooshie

easy. 

granted, we seem to have an easy baby. no food allergies, colic, or other ailments thus far. she even slept 4.5 hours in a row last night. hooray! (my boobs were pissed.) 

parenting a newborn is basically just troubleshooting on a three-hour cycle. i was reading three different medical/science-y texts and all of the doctors said a variation of the same thing:

theory: after millions of years of evolution, the human frame has gone from hunched-over, wide-hipped cave person, to tall-standing, narrow-hipped condo person. what this has done is shortened our gestation period from 12 months to 9 months, because the baby has to fit out of our narrower hip opening. so, all human babies, according to this theory, are three months premature. 

it makes sense, really. newborns can't hold up their own heads. their eyes can't focus as the cones aren't fully developed. they have reflux because the keep-puke-down muscle isn't strong enough. they're not social learning yet (i.e. babies don't exhibit human social emotion, like pleasure or manipulation, until after 6-9 weeks or so).

someone asked me about how it was going, and i related it to taking care of a really squirmy and demanding plant or ocean creature, like a venus fly trap or sea anemone. the reflex of clamping shut is like baby's clamp on my nip. plus, you have to tend to both, feed them, clean them, and adore their little interesting perfect biological construction, but neither are cognizant or aware like you'd prefer, well at least prefer for the tiny human. even a kitten or puppy has 100-times the situational awareness after a week of life than a newborn.

i spend most of my troubleshooting hours admiring the warm perfect baby. her biological adorableness in the form of tiny perfect fingers and the heartbreaking and sincere wails where her little lower jaw shudders as she inhales for another cry. i love when she slumps, milk drunk, onto my belly and snoozes for 20 minutes. it's so cute when she cries loudly, lets out a big burp, and immediately is silent and serene, staring at the lamp, because all is suddenly well again.

this phase is more about us enjoying baby rather than baby enjoying anything. we have an adorable little bundle of squirmy who would really rather still be in the womb. she's a blank canvas. she is a biology miracle. she is not quite ready for the hard lessons or learning of a social being yet. i envy her.

so, our task as the parent of the newborn is simple: enjoy the innocence and keep the baby alive until her own life begins. i am enjoying every little minute watching her and wondering who she is going to become

i think the next set of phases that include "don't mess her up,""don't let her manipulate you," and "don't hate her just because she's a hormonal teenage monster" are going to be much more challenging.