I'm a Dad!

[Despanan]

Okay, he's gotten louder. I guess the relative silence was a preme thing? Now he's keeping me up till 5am and I have to bounce him to get him to calm down. Like I'm almost on the verge of dancing some nights.

Chanting still works too...most of the time.

[dexeron]

Teach the kid to chant Nam-Myoho-Renge-Kyo. :P

Something that really shocked me when I learned about it was just how much of baby crying is actually literal communication. Since they have no other way to make their needs known, that's what they do. (I'm guessing you already know all this.) But I was super surprised to learn how early they can learn basic communication skills like some forms of sign-language, and it's kind of amazing how much this can effect things like crying. When a baby can make its desires known explicitly, without the frustration that comes from no one around it understanding, it's amazing how much less crying there ends up being.

That's not to say that there's anything at all wrong with not doing the whole "baby-sign-language" thing. Babies learn pretty quickly how to make their needs known, and parents tend to also learn pretty quick. Everyone should do what works for them. But I had to note just how interesting it is how much tantrumming and just outright irritability actually is just frustration at not being understood (the rest is often just being over-tired or over-stimulated.) I never did the sign-language thing with my kids, but made extra effort to understand how they'd communicate desires without full grasp of language. And between my two kids, there was only one tantrum, one time, and that was because of over-tiredness from staying up extra late. Once communication can be established, the difference is just night and day and a huge amount of meltdowns get headed off before they ever have a chance to start. It's kind of amazing how it ends up working.

[Rip]

I have two at once. From the day they burst forth from my wife's vagina, they have taken pride in being completely different people. The first one came out with eyes wide open and didn't make a peep as she looked around and took it all in, the second one didn't stop screaming until some point last week, but I'm pretty certain she's seen my face by now.

That's all humorous exaggeration of course: I keep my wife and children shackled in The Birthing Shed until one of them finally learns to sit up on her own. The wife is almost there!

In other news, it's almost 9am here and I've already been awake for six hours. I'm pretty sure my 23-minutes-eldest was just fuckin' with me this morning; she made the ISL sign for 'sleep is for the weak, bitch', like, three or four times, but I could tell she was only staying up to see The MacNeil/Lehrer News Hour on PBS, so I didn't have the heart to tell her that that shit has been off the air since 1995. Her sister meanwhile disdains television for the thrill of illegal backgammon.

Oh hey, politics still exists?

[dexeron]

[Samurai]

Parenthood is amazing because it completely sucks while still being amazing.

[Rip]

Also, and it goes without saying so I'll just say it, "Son of Despanan" may sound alright but it's nowhere near "The Twin Daughters of Rip". And that's even before the hunn'rd dollar adjectives.

[Phantomgrift]

I'm just glad people have stopped making jokes about when my child is going to start re-enacting "The Omen"...

[Sage]

The Twisted Spawn of Phantomgrift

[Despanan]

Well, he’s two months old as of yesterday...though he was born six weeks early so his adjusted age is 2 weeks. Gaining weight rapidly but still skinny. Crying more and in general being conscious more. I think he’s just on the cusp of starting to smile and coo.

[Rip]

Hm. Mine have already had two individual secret meetings with Vladimir Putin.