The Stages of Babyhood

A few weeks ago, I wrote the essay that would appear as the first entry in this journal, at the time of that writing my daughter was about three weeks old. The essay was written from my perspective about the first two days of her second week.

This is important to note because as babies get older their behaviour changes. There are several identifiable stages to a baby’s development.

Most pregnancy and early childcare books would have you believe that these stages are as follows;

Stage 1) Baby.
A baby, to these books writer’s minds, is your adorable offspring.
This is the product of your last nine months of exhaustion, and you have earned this joy. Babies are capable of making noises after a few weeks, and even smiling, isn’t that grand? Other things babies are capable of are recognizing their parent’s voices, focusing on black and white imagery, and melting the heart of the mother.

Stage 2) Walking.
The second stage, walking is characterized by a baby being able to walk. A walking baby is capable of making noises, eating solid foods, and, of course, walking. This is usually where these books wish you a fond farewell and good luck on your joyful journey into parenthood motherhood.

The realities, as you might be expecting, are somewhat more intricate than that.

I) Newborn
A newborn is characterized chiefly by being able to breathe. Note that I say “able” to breathe. They are not particularly good at it. Newborn babies snuffle, snort, squeak and sneeze. Newborns are also able to eat. You will also note that I do not use the word “capable” here at all. While it is possible for them to do so, “capable” is not a word that describes, in any adequacy, a newborn baby’s capacity for eating.
In short, breastfeeding is not as instinctual as you might want it to be.
A newborn baby is characterized by the two above activities, punctuated by a deposit or two of the most vile spackle on the face of the planet Earth, known as meconium.

II) Less-New-Born
A less-new-born is about two weeks old, Characterized by the above, coupled with a change in the colour of the poop. Instead of being meconium, the stuff yellows to a mustardy goop, which has the special property of being almost magnetically attracted to baby feet. Specifically socks. Never before in my life had I imagined we would go through so many damned baby socks. A baby at this stage is also capable of screaming until she turns a color reminiscent of the Kool-Aid man.
More than once I expected the Crimson Crusader to burst through my wall and demand that I return his infant, punctuated by a hearty “OH YEAH!”.

oh no!

I imagine that this is less an effect of the crying, and more some sort of latent ability of humankind, not unlike that of the noble Jackson’s Chameleon. A baby at this stage is capable of changing colours, starting with a bright blue and rapidly shifting through spectrum blending in with things such as brick walls, fire engines, and that elevator in The Shining.


III) Less-Less-New-Born.
This is the stage my daughter is at now. My daughter is now comfortable enough to say “goo” (which I assure you is not simply a sterotype, I honestly thought that my wife was the one making the noise, articulate as it was.), giggle, smile, and spray her urine at her parents as though she was prepping her changing table for use as a slip n’ slide.


I mention most of this, because it is important to know that human babies are extraordinarily Stupid. As mentioned before, the basic animal instincts of “eat, fornicate, and get the hell out of the way” are there, but babies just can’t do anything about it. You see, Mother Nature, in all her glory, finally gifted human women with the amazing ability to die less when they gave birth. “How,” you might ask, “did Mother Nature accomplish this glorious task?”. To which I would answer, “You know how men get laughed at for pre-mature ejaculation? That’s just a trial run, baby, have another vodka tonic.”.

Babies, when they are born, are dumped out of the comfort of the womb about 3 months too damn early. Effectively, the bun from your oven is still doughy on the inside. In doing this, your baby’s head is significantly smaller than it will be three months later, and instead of being split open like the Reach Toothbrush Fliptop Head Guy, a mother gets the lovely parting gift of simply being torn open like a packet of airline peanuts. Ain’t Nature lovely?

There are several interesting things to know about this. The first is that most of the world is blissfully unaware of this fact. They do not know to tell you that your baby is fundamentally useless to you or to even herself during this period. As a matter of fact, the biggest detriment to your baby at this time is herself. She’s used to being packed in a waterbed, a thumb always at the ready for sucking, and a heavy metal soundtrack playing right in her ear every single second of every single day. Instinctually, she knows that that is the way things are supposed to be. So when we American idiot parents lay a baby to rest in a quiet room on her back, she wakes up to think that she’s fallen out of the womb, and cant even look behind her properly to see the bed she’s laying on to correct that notion. Add this, to her noting that she’s all alone with no thumb in her face, her theme music is gone, and she’s all of a sudden feeling like something has gone horribly wrong.

You probably noticed that I mention Americans above. I do this for a reason, but really when I say that, I mean industrialized “modern”, westernized cultures. We have, for some inane reason, decided that we don’t really like the idea of continuing the species that much, because it’s just too inconvenient. The companies we work for don’t have the time to deal with their employee’s snot nosed brats or the time that those employees selfishly steal from them in order to attend the heat seeking knee gremlin’s every whim.
So, in order to maintain the standard of living to which you have become accustomed, namely, having the ability to eat Food, our children need to come second next to Work. For this purpose, these cultures have evolved a very special retardation of the brain that makes us think that a near-fetus should be able to sleep through the night in an environment completely unfamiliar to them. It’s like the whole of these cultures somehow turned into X-Men with the special mutant power of “Act Like Babies Are Supposed To Want To Get Left To The Dingoes.”.

This needless to say, is incorrect. So called “primitive” cultures do a damn fine job raising their young, and in fact, many have never developed a word analogous to “colic”. This is in large part due to the fact that mothers tightly bind their children (similar to the tightness of the womb) , wear them and go about their daily lives (swaying them like they would be in the womb), and allow them to listen to the cacophony of daily life (you see where this is going.).

Keeping all of those things in mind has made parenting a cinch since we figured them out. I can’t take all the credit, however. This knowledge was mostly gained from a book named “The Happiest Baby On the Block”, which I would highly recommend to any new-ish parent. The doctor who writes it is a horrible writer, and obviously tries to beef up the core thesis of his ideas with a bunch of words like “The Cuddle Cure”, but I promise that the actual information within is solid.

We learned about the existence of said book during prenatal classes while my wife was pregnant, and decided that we didn’t really need any of that hippy crap. Eleven o’ clock on the second day of that second week however, found us at the local Barnes and Noble, baby and bags under our eyes in tow. Please, if you’re a new or soon to be parent, do yourself a favor and buy this book. You may never need it, but I promise you that at 2 am, after your eardrums are bleeding and you’re pondering just how easy adoption is, it’s a truly friendly face.

See you next time!