Another reason to breastfeed.

Who's counting?

The merry month of May is upon us, which only means one thing – First Holy Communions. For the next three Saturdays parishes and towns across the land will be resplendent with little girls in expansive synthetic dresses with matching veils, slips, gloves, tights, tiaras, wands, bags and underpants all of which, if you were a truly responsible parent, should be fireproofed as the materials contained within are so hazardous your daughter is likely to go up in a fireball should someone strike a match with ten feet of her. Indeed the spray tans that will be so abundant are themselves so toxic; there should be chemical warfare suits provided for all.

Puffed and preened to within an inch of their lives the little girls will spend this most memorable day prancing around like fairy princesses on too much caffeine. As the day progresses they will experience the entire gamut of emotions from out-of-control hysteria (this starts at around five in the morning) to inconsolable tears (about half an hour later) with an occasional moment of piousness thrown in. The boys too will have their day in the sun as they loiter with intent looking like miniature South American drug barons with their white suits, slicked back hair and loads of cash.

These seven and eight year olds are deemed to have reached the age of reason and with a First Confession already under their belts are without sin and that is why they are allowed to receive the Eucharist (or eat Jesus, if you’re not very holy and possibly a bit disrespectful to the millions of Catholics who will remember this most holiest of days forever.)

I mention all this because my daughter recently discovered my Communion dress and appeared wearing it, veil, halo and all. She is only five and was sort of beaten into the dress which made me think that I must have been a tiny seven year old or my daughter has turned into a monster five year old overnight. She insisted on wearing the outfit all weekend as she discovered the dress scores high on the ‘twirlability’ scale, which was most useful as we watched Joseph and his amazing technicolour dreamcoat for the millionth time. My faith in her was restored when she suddenly broke from her girlie twirling to stage some frantic head banging that any Whitesnake fan worth their salt would be proud of.

My own Holy Communion was very memorable as it was one of the most miserable days of my life. Early in the proceedings I was caught by my aunt counting my money and was severely admonished for such unholy behaviour. I spent the rest of the day in shameful tears as is obvious from the few photographs that remain from the occasion. I wish I had had the wit to suggest that counting your money is part and parcel of the day and that even the present pope probably counted his but I didn’t think of it at the time, which is probably just as well as I shudder to imagine what the subsequent punishment would have been. Perhaps I was subconsciously demonstrating that by not answering back I had indeed reached the age of reason.

The five-year-old heavy metal fan has certainly reached the age of unreason – this happened when she was about thirteen months and I can confirm that she has become more unreasonable with each passing day.

The babies also seem to be displaying a lot of unreasonable behaviour. They will not smile for their mother. No matter how much cooing and tickling I do, they will not budge. However, The Little Girl in particular is like a fool she’s smiling so much for everyone else. She has smiled for Daddy (of course) and big sister and even her brother who cruelly slept through the event. She has smiled for the dog, for every stranger that has come to have a goo and it seems, for every Tom, Dick and Harry fly that has passed her way. I am considering a trip to THE NAUGHTY STEP to show who is boss but as she can’t even hold her head up yet, that is perhaps a little draconian. I will have to conjure up some sort of more age appropriate reprimand – the naughty bib perhaps.

To be fair, she and her brother did sleep for a solid six hours last Saturday night and at seven weeks that is truly something to rejoice about.

Perhaps the age of reason has come early.

Don't open the champagne

The little girl is having a laugh with me I suspect.

So, the doctor asks "Is she smiling yet?" I proudly announce that she is. I nudge the baby to give her a cue to throw the doctor a smile but she doesn't oblige. I glare at her but I can tell that she doesn't give two hoots. The doctor pokes around at her bits and declares her to be rudely healthy. I then swiftly take her in my arms and shove a nappy on her before she can pee all over me.

Since leaving the doctor's surgery The Little Girl has displayed nothing but a big fat puss on her face. I've seen this sort of behaviour before. She's saving her smiles for someone else and if she is anything like her sister that someone else will be Daddy. So, I'm keeping her away from Daddy. This may sound childish - not the sort of thing that should be coming from the mind of a responsible mother. I don't care. She smiles for me or she smiles for no-one.

Pistols are drawn and the battle of wits has begun...

NEWS FLASH!

The Little Girl smiled today. I'm not joking. I nearly pooped myself when it happened except that there are so many others around here doing that that I held off. However, The Little Boy was not so willing. He's very serious really. Has been from day one. He spends hours gazing into the middle distance contemplating life or whatever a six-week old ruminates about. I can't figure out if he's going to be hyper intelligent or really stupid. Could be both I suppose. Lovely Little Boy. Now I'm just preparing for the all night sleepathon...

A new dawn

Six weeks is apparently a milestone (or is it millstone?) in a baby’s life. It is the time that Doctor’s quote when you are visiting them distraught and deranged when your babies are five weeks old and you are tired beyond belief and your baby (or babies) is/are crying constantly and you haven’t had a shower in a week nor eaten anything other than chocolate biscuits and your partner has mentioned the ‘sex’ word to you in a moment when he really should have gauged the atmosphere a little better not to mention not having noticed that, as you mentioned already, you haven’t had a shower in a week.

But at six weeks everything will be all right again because at six weeks your baby smiles for the first time and they sleep through the night. (Also, you will find yourself thin again even if you were never before and you will all of a sudden want to have loads of sex – even more than you never wanted before.) To be honest, the doctor never said that last bit.

Yes at six weeks it will all be all right.

Tomorrow The Little Boy and The Little Girl are six weeks old and we will be bringing them to the doctor for their…well, you guessed it, six-week check up. Now, there are those who say that a baby does things at their own pace – you cannot just push them into a routine just ‘cos it suits you. You must feed them when they want to be fed and cuddle them when they want to be cuddled and they’ll smile at you when they are good and ready and not before.

Well, I had a few words with them today. Nothing-heavy handed or too pushy-parent vibe. I just mentioned that I would be very happy if they would both smile at me tomorrow. I also said that if they smile for anyone else first that might make me quite cross. If they smile for their father first, I’ll be EXTREMELY ANGRY AND HURT AFTER ALL I HAVE DONE FOR YOU! I think they understood where I was coming from. I also asked them to sleep through the night tomorrow night. They’ve had six weeks of the 1.30am and 5.00am and sure as it’s nearly 7.00am we may as well go again type feeds that could take anything up to two hours to complete. Now that is quite enough of that.

The doctors and the books say that all that shenanigans stops at six weeks.

I’ll let you know how I get on.