Monday, November 03, 2008

I Cry Too

Jacob had his two month appointment today. He's officially TWO MONTHS old now. He weighed in at 14 pounds, 6 ounces and is 23 inches long. Which means he's off the percentile chart for weight and in the 95% for height. He weighs more than a six month old. I have a whopper of a baby boy. My Dr. says I should be so smug.

Of course, the two month mark means that Jacob needed shots. I'm staggering the shots, so he only got two shots, one in each leg. My Dr. doesn't think that there is anything dangerous with immunizations so she doesn't think staggering is necessary but she's willing to allow me to choice how I want to care for my baby. It's hard though, I can see her side of the importance of immunizing on time but I'm trying to stick to my feeling that it's ok to immunize on a more relaxed schedule. Had she not keep talking during the end of our visit, I might have agreed to get all of them. I chose not to do the DTap and Polio vaccine today. I think I will go to the Health Clinic in December and get those shots (for free) and then go back to the Dr. for the 4 month check up.

The real tragedy of shots is actually giving them. The rotovirus immunization is an oral shot, and Jacob took that one well for a breast feed baby. He even smiled at the nurse when she was done squeezing it into his mouth. After that, she prepped his legs with alcohol then pinned his legs against her body and the table. I had to hold his little arms to his chest so he couldn't wiggle around. He was just fine with the first poke but then he realized that it hurt and his face just crumpled. He turned bright red at the second and cried so hard he stopped breathing. I could pick him up then but it took him a while to calm down. I held it together long enough for the nurse to tell me I could nurse him as long as I needed and for her to pat my arm and ask if i was OK. There weren't tears in my eyes but the trauma must have been evident on my face. As soon as she left the room, I started crying and tell him I'm sorry.

He's fine now, sleeping on the couch, chubby thighs sporting band-aids. I can't believe he's already two months old. People keep asking me how being a mama is, and it's hard for me to give an explanation. Is it wrong to say it's just natural to me? Sure, sometimes I wish that I didn't have to change a diaper or that someone else was here to pass him off when it's been two hours of fussy, want to be held, fighting sleep comforting. But the rest of the time, it's just something I have to do and it's not hard for me. But most of the credit for this has to go to Jacob. He is EASY. He sleeps well, he nurses well, he's a generally good baby. Sometimes I worry that my luck will run out and I will wake up one day to a baby who cries constantly or refuses to sleep at night. Maybe it will. But he's an amazing child, already I can see his happy personality coming though. I don't want to say goodbye to the newborn phase, but I just love watching him discover new things. Just this morning, he was laughing at elephant butts.

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