The New Parent Shut-In


It took me nearly three weeks to get down all the birth, hospital, and getting home excitement. Fortunately, that has not left me that far behind, as it turns out I don't really do much any more. As far as I can tell babies are God's way of saying, congratulations, you are now a hermit.

Interspersed are the beginnings of our Baby Fashion show, showing off all the outfits people made or purchased for us. If you don't see yours the most likely reason is that it is still too big. The second most likely reason is the baby spit up or crapped on it before we could get a picture. Be patient, they can't stay incontinent forever. Also, most pictures in this round feature Rylie, as I am going in chronological order and she was home a week before Kayla (one is Kayla.. can YOU tell which one?).



A typical day starts around 2-3am. Usually only one of the two little beasties starts crying. What we do at this point depnds how much sleep we have gotten so far. On an "optimal" night Candy has gotten to sleep around 10-11, while I stayed up later, say midnight-ish to adminster a final bottle feeding to both in an attempt to get them to sleep nice and hard. On these rare occasions that Candy has managed 3+ hours of sleep she will get up and feed both, with my drowsy assistance. If our luck is running really good we can get them fed and back to sleep in their crib in around 45 minutes.


As one might imagine, most nights don't go nearly so well. It seems as though the number of times both will simply feed and then crash into a deep sleep has been decreasing. We keep explaining this hyper-hungry behavior as growth spurts, although I am starting to suspect the babies are just taunting me. This thought crosses my mind most often in the early am hours. Anyway, it seems that on a more typical night Candy has been unable to sleep until 11-12-ish and I am just trying to get to sleep closer to 1-2am when all baby hell breaks loose. Exhausted, we tend to perform baby triage, grabbing only one baby at a time, feeding them in bed and trying to get them to fall asleep right there for just one precious hour for the love of God! This inefficient system is without-a-doubt extremely dumb, as it just leads to babies waking us up in shifts all night. However, when running on under an hour of sleep you do whatever it takes to get 10 more minutes right now. I would kill your grandmother for five. Don't test me.


Whether it was a good night or a bad one, we tend to right our ship by daylight and get back to dual feeding and babies that appear to remember how to sleep again. While still interrupted every 3 hours, I tend to get more sleep as Candy is awake a lot of this time, taking some of the extra burden I tried to take around midnight. Most days I "sleep" in to 11am, giving me a solid 6-8 hours of non-contiguous sleep. Funny how important that contiguous part is. At this point we get up, do the 11am feeding, and then worry about our own lunch. If we are going out we shower first. If not, then the shower, for me, is a bit more optional.



Hey, two of my roommates live in regularly soiled diapers, so I think I can skip an occasional shower when I haven't even seen the outdoors for days at a stretch. Don't judge. If you are visting, I probably showered just for you. Be polite.


All outings are 3 hours or less, as this is the nominal feeding period. On very rare occasions where breast feeding can be arranged "on-the-go" we can be out longer, but this has been very rare indeed. I should also note that 80% of our trips out of the house involve medical care of some variety, so the whooping it up has been minimal. Because of the extreme young age of our cohorts, our doctor has instructed us to keep their public exposure to a minimum. Don't want them to pick up a cold, or God forbid, the flu. With their tiny lungs and under-developed immune systems it could be life threatening. I believe twice now we have eaten outside, doing some patio dining: once at Sharkey's and again at Maria's.


Most days we have no specific outing planned and that works out well for the girls, as one or the other is a little extra fussy. There is almost no freak out so major that it is a big deal to handle in daylight hours, but it takes time. Time to feed. Time to change diapers or clothes. Then there is laundry (those new clothes got to come from somewhere) and dish washing (the bottles got to come from somewhere, too). Getting them to sleep again. Usually hours go by and the day is over before you know it. And you are tired from the lack of sleep, so this is just fine with you.



This leads to the new parent shut-in syndrome. I can easily go a day or two without leaving the house. Hell, without putting on pants... although I usually do just so I don't scare the kids. Or the mailman. Or my dog, really. Stuff I was hoping this time off would allow me to do has not come easily. Simple things like reading, writing, even computer stuff. If you always have a baby in your hands the only thing you can easily do is watch TV. Thank God for Tivo.



To finish the day: we usualy worry about dinner around 7pm. Most days we cook something, of various levels of complication. It could be frozen food someone else gave us (thanks everyone), a traditional store bought frozen meal, or something requiring at least a little bit of prep (Taco night!). By the time we get fed and the kids get fed and the dog gets fed and everything is cleaned up we are back to 9pm and about to start the whole cycle again.

I do recognize the irony. Candy was stuck on bed rest for 4 months. I am merely under house arrest. I go out of my way to allow her out of the house, as she really deserves to finally streatch those gams of hers. Yes, I have switched to 30s hardboiled detective vernacular. You don't like it I'll give you a belly full of lead from my twin heaters. Now, quit your malarkey or you'll be seeing cats pajamas in your poolside cabana, if you get my meaning.

I am quite certain you won't. I wouldn't worry about it too much.

Sleep deprivation does strange things to a mind. I find myself dancing to Candy's IPOD at 3am. Funky, funky dances. No, you will see no pictures of this.