The nose knows

After work yesterday I held my love close, enjoying the contact after a long day of separation. I inhaled--and recoiled. "You smell like...another woman!" I accused.

She cooed.

There are apparently studies that show that a baby can identify her mother's breastpad and will ignore other women's, and that women can identify their babies by smell alone. I wasn't so sure I believed that, since humans hardly ever use their sense of smell compared to other mammals, but now I think I do. Yesterday was Chloë's first day at daycare proper, and when I picked her up after work she did, in fact, smell like another woman. Actually, she must have smelled like at least three of them, since different teachers were there when I dropped her off, nursed her at lunch, and picked her up; and the smell might have been partly the place itself--and it was mixed in with the milk that collects in her neck when she gets bottles. But it all added up to Someone Else Has Been Handling My Baby, and I didn't like it at all. She got a bath last night. It was time for it, but I might have insisted on it anyway, just so she'd smell right again. We'll see whether I can handle the residual scent tonight, or whether her two- or three-times-weekly bath will become a nightly ritual.

Mother's milk, lifeblood

I had an appointment to give blood the day before I went back to work. I also had an appointment with a counselor that day, and I took Chloe to both. It made the counselor's day, she said, especially when I asked her to hold Chloe for a minute so I could put my appointment card away and get my jacket on, and the Red Cross ladies were delighted with her as well. (They were appalled that she was barefoot until I explained that she had had a big blowout as we came in and her socks got messy, and while there was a spare onesie in the diaper bag I hadn't thought to pack spare socks. I'd wrapped her up in her blanket, but they fetched a warmed one to put her in anyway until my ten minutes at the canteen were up. There are now spare socks in the diaper bag.) Apparently Miss Overlord plans to gather new minions by beguiling them with her charms, at least to start with.

The screening questions included whether I'd been pregnant in the last six weeks, but not whether I was nursing. I passed the hematocrit (which hasn't always happened) so I was allowed to give my blood. I didn't get faint or anything (which has happened), but I didn't feel quite well afterward. "Double up on your fluids for the next few days," the woman in charge of me told me as I was getting off the bed. I tried to remember how much extra fluid I was supposed to be drinking for nursing, add it to the regular 48-64 daily ounces, and double the entire amount. It was a lot. As Dad later suggested, I should have done it the day before; I felt vaguely ill the rest of the afternoon and not-quite-well into the next day. It may be permissible, but my body doesn't seem to like the double (triple?) duty. Other nursing mothers be warned.

LOLbaby

"Somehow, my minion, I thought you'd be...taller."

The first day of the rest of our lives

"This is the Bob and Tom show," barked the radio at 6 AM this morning, waking me for my first day back at work.

The morning from 6 to 7:30 was the Chloe show: waking her, feeding her, changing her, dressing her, and washing her face and neck (which she hates but is necessary because of the milk dribbles that collect between her second and third chins). Edith arrived to pick her up for the day. I kissed Chloe, then armed Edith with a full diaper bag and a handful of bottles and left her in the rain to figure out the carseat. (She said I could go. Honestly.)

The traffic on the way to work was unfamiliar--not that it was a lot of traffic, but I haven't been driving during rush hour for almost three months now. Work was also unfamiliar--they remodeled our office space while I was gone and only moved back earlier this week, so I had to inquire where my desk was. (Though my boss had marked it with my plant, so I should have noticed. But I had figured that plant was dead and so wasn't looking for it.) I'm pleased to be back at work. These last couple of weeks at home with Chloe have been nice, but the first ones were a bit stifling and soul-wearing, and I'm glad to get back to my old routine and be able to talk to other adults. Money is good, too, of course.

Edith said she'd call, but she didn't. I wasn't heartbroken, but I would have liked to hear how Chloe was doing. When I got home it was evident she was doing very well; she was happy and playing and had, apparently, slept most of the morning and been an angel. She was pleased to see Eric. She cried when I held her. Apparently she didn't miss me. That'll make tomorrow even easier.

State of the baby

Chloë now holds her head up pretty reliably. We've got a booster seat thingy for feeding instead of a high chair--a seat that reclines, then goes upright, with an attachable tray--and she likes to sit in it now, buckled in, looking at toys or rattles or the mess on our dining table at mealtimes. She watches us put food in our mouths, though she doesn't seem interested in trying it herself yet; apparently her fist is tasty enough for now. I'm looking forward to starting her on solids, though with her tongue thrust issue she may be a late starter. (The books all say the time to start solids is after the baby has lost the reflex to push any objects in her mouth out with her tongue.)

She also now Miss Truly Drooly Julie. Alternately, Rabid Baby, because she froths at the mouth, mainly at night (we're not sure why). I'm surprised her chin isn't raw with all the moisture and all the wiping. I'm kind of afraid of what adding solids (well, as much as rice cereal and mashed bananas are solids) will do to this mix, especially since her chin fat folds already trap milk and create a nasty residue if we're not diligent about cleaning it out.

She's starting to be interested in toys and music; we've got a bright wobbly thing with a rattly chamber that turns (how do you describe baby toys?) and she likes turning it with swipes of her fist; and there's a pink elephant that hangs in my car that she adores. It plays music, a little bright "Mario Brothers"-type tune, and her face lights up when we turn it on. Which makes our faces light up.

Daycare

We went to our chosen daycare today, Chloë and I, to get the paperwork going since I go back to work next week. The teachers who had been there when we toured before were there. "She's grown so big!" one of them said. "She's like doubled in size!" Another offered to take her to the infant room while the administrator and I talked, and when I declined admitted she just wanted to hold the baby--"I love girl babies!" she said--so I let her take Chloë.

This daycare deals with a lot of Child and Family Services-assisted families; the administrator, Linda, seemed a little surprised to hear we would be "private pay." She asked how many hours we were looking for, and I told her around thirty-two, eight hours a day for four days a week. "The rate for Lucas County is $186.70," she said, showing me a sheet. (It was less for Wood Country. She didn't know why.) "But the best I could do for you is $130. I try to work with our private pay folks." I felt a little guilty about taking that price, since we could afford the other one; but I accepted, of course. I hadn't asked for a discount.

We've got to get a signature from the pediatrician and fill out a ton of paperwork, and get a cash or money order for the first week and the application fee (apparently they had a lot of trouble with bad checks and now don't take them), but we're looking in good shape to be ready for me to go back to work. And I pulled out the appropriate-sized pants from under the bed, so I'll even be dressed for the part. I have a box of Kleenex, too, which people are telling me I'll need. We'll see how it goes next week.

Hush, little baby

The bedtime modification experiment is still going very badly. I'm now trying to nurse Chloë to sleep at around 11:30, the theory being that once she's used to an earlier bedtime we can try other ways of getting her to sleep, but that doesn't always work anyway and usually ends up with the two of us falling asleep in bed. It's not horrible to have her in bed with us, but it's not the goal either and I'd like to be able to turn over in the middle of the night sometimes. (Though she's a very nice sleeping companion. She's a little radiator, for one thing. She likes to cuddle up with the closest R.I.N.D.S. like it's a teddy bear.)

Getting up early, on the other hand has been going fine, except that she has now started crying almost inconsolably in the evenings, which she didn't before. It's a little late for colic to develop (though not impossible, I'm sure) and Mom has suggested it's probably sleep deprivation, which I've been worrying about but not sure what to do about, since part of the problem is that we can't reliably get her to go to sleep. This includes naps, and when she's fussy putting her down makes her especially upset, and rocking tends to calm her but not lull her to sleep.

My main frustration with this process is that I don't know for sure what to do. It's not a matter of waiting for the correct course of action to take effect; we don't know what the correct course of action is. All first-time parents go through this, of course, but that doesn't help me feel any better about it.

Still, she does eventually get to sleep every night...somehow. And she likes to sleep in her swing; that's usually where she starts her naps. I wonder if they make them for teenagers.