So with no further adieu, let's make up for lost time with a long entry;
I honestly have to be one (out of two) of the luckiest parents on the face of this planet Earth. Since about two months of age, my little girl has slept peacefully on her own, all the way through the whole night. Sure, raising a child is harrowing, exhausting, and children have the innate ability to destroy your self worth, sense of smell, and best shirt in one mighty blast from the ol' baby cannon, but overall my wife and I never really had to add forced sleep deprivation to that already impressive list.
...
Until she got sick.
Now, before you worry, the little monster is better now, and next week I hope to have a post all about all the new wonderful noises she's learned to make right in your friggin' ear, but at the time it was pretty awful.
About four-weeks-ish ago, she got something called "Bronchiolitis". This is apparently Not A Cold. I have been informed by my doctor of this. The tone my doctor used to mention this to me had connotations of bodily harm if I confused the terms again. Likely followed by possible intervention from CPS.
The practical upshots of this condition were, as far as the baby's doting parents could tell, was that she had a cold.
If you don't have a child, yet, or never plan on having one, I'd like you to have some information before I continue, so we're all on the same page. Specifically, when babies are born, as I have previously mentioned (Essential Truth #6), they really aren't too bright.
In addition to not being able to walk, eat, flee from danger, communicate,
As if being smashed into the side of a Uterus and not in a pleasurable way wasn't enough, some of the many fluids that fill your fledgling bag of goo have filled the nasal cavity and associated passages. Over the next few days and weeks, this baby will be dealing with these issues the best, and most American way they know how. Through brute force.
When I say brute force, I don't mean that your child will be having long, drawn out, multi-episodic battles with things that look like this: (though this may happen with Japanese children I don't know I have never been to Japan)
Who are you to judge their culture anyway you racist?
Rather, what it does mean is that you will be spending the next few months of your life sharing your living quarters with mini-Darth Vader, only, instead of a mechanical respiratory mask specifically designed to look menacing when commanding a legion of clones, the baby has, you know, their own face.
(any and all parent who have kids on actual artificial breathing masks may contact me via notintheface@blearg.net for my physical address, which they may then use to find me and beat me to within an inch of my miserable life.)
Thankfully, this is a) Only a small fraction of a much fuller newborn experience leaving you with very little time to focus on it, and exhausted enough to sleep through most of it, and b) only temporary. Unless, of course, your child gets a cold (Edit: OR BRONCHIOLITIS OKAY I AM SORRY!). At which point your child suffers a buildup of mucus, and George Lucas starts cataloging your address to reference when James Earl Jones comes to his damn sense, gets some self respect, and won't do any more voice overs of shitty movies that ruin decent characters.
ahem
This time, however, the child's congestion comes accompanied by a myriad of symptoms, chief among which is the fabled "feeling like absolute and utter horseshit". Which, as you know is just plain not fun for anyone, no matter what age you are. I imagine that the only thing that likes feeling like utter horseshit is, well, horseshit, and that's only because it doesn't know any better.
Question : Based on the facts that you know so far, what is the primary way that a child will express displeasure with something such as, for a wild example “feeling like absolute and utter horseshit”?
a) Screaming at the top of her lungs.
b) Screaming at the top of her lungs.
c) Screaming at the top of her lungs.
d) Screaming at the top of her lungs.
If you answered “Screaming at the top of her lungs.”, you are correct! You are now fully fledged to be a new parent, and I highly encourage you to perform many dangerous and life threatening activities before you regain your senses.
Now, besides the predictable effects of you losing your hearing and your patience there is another part to the fallout of having a sick child screaming in your face whenever the chance presents itself (which is always).
Blessedly, she lost her voice.
Almost instantly, she went from 11 on the dial to “mute”, and life became bearable again. Now, I know that this makes me a terrible person, father, and generically a rotten human being, but there could have been no greater blessing to our family than my daughter’s voice being taken from her at that time. Her face still turned red, but instead of foundation shattering blasts, we were treated to a gentle breeze, not unlike that of a personal cooling fan.
For the next few weeks we were able to coddle and tend to our sick infant in the ways that parents should, rather than doing what instinct and sheer desperation was driving us to do.
There was a downside to this, of course, as there always is with a baby. And no, this time that downside is not the fact that the baby is covered in poop from her armpits to her toes.
The downside in this case was that the times when she was happy, she would try to make the adorable baby “coo” noise which is honestly about the only reason that this species gets fooled into even being in the same room as a member of the opposite species any more. This coo noise is that important. Seriously, without that noise even the most hardcore hippies and pro-lifers would not only run screaming, but be the chief lobbyists of the ZPG movement.
So, combine that with mini Darth Vader HIIIIIIIIIIISSSHHHH KIIIIIIIIISSKKKing in your ear (from the other room) and our house was not a happy one for a good few weeks.
As I mentioned earlier, she’s better now, and as such, I'm a tired guy. See you next time.
