Eating, Sleeping and Pooping--sounds easy

And thus began the crash course in parenting. Indeed it was a crash course.

Once we came home from the hospital, there were no longer teams of people to call--it was Dan and me trying to figure out how to keep our newborn happy, healthy and alive. One of my friends said all we had to do was sleep, eat and poop. That may have sounded easy days ago, but now, making sure those three things happened was a challenge!

You see, Calvin likes to sleep. A lot. More than he likes to eat. More than he likes to poop. More than anything in the world. I didn't think it would be a problem--I had envisioned my screaming baby telling me when to eat and when to sleep; he didn't. Parenting class didn't talk about this.

Since Little C didn't eat enough, he didn't poop. (Our first day home resulted in zero diapers. Zero. I knew then that we might be in a little trouble.) We tried everything we knew to try to get our little man to eat. Three things happened: my body changed, C-Mo wouldn't eat and jaundice set in. (Which reminded me that he and I are still deeply connected and dependent on each other. That's why people call this the fourth trimester.)

When the home healthcare nurse stopped by for a visit on Day 4, it was like getting a scheduled visit from an angel. She weighed him (he had lost 1 lb, 3 oz.), tested him for jaundice (it was obvious! He could practically audition for the Beach Boys) and put us on a strict feeding schedule.

Two hours.

His feedings had to start every two hours--no matter how long it took to finish.

Dan had to trek to a friend's wedding rehearsal that afternoon, so it would be just the two of us. Liz + Calvin against the universe. For 17 hours, Calvin and I woke up to an alarm. I forced him to wake up--and stay awake so I could feed him. (Sometimes it was torturous--for me.) I gave him a supplemental feeding. (The home healthcare nurse called it an "after dinner drink." We knew he needed some "fast food" that he didn't have to work for. And, the bottle was going to be the ticket.) Then, I would put him down to sleep, pump for the next feeding, clean the equipment and accoutrements, and assemble what was needed for the next feeding. Usually, I had 20-30 minutes before the next round began. Enough time for a wee little nap. (However, that day the universe sent all of the door-to-door salespeople to our address. Every hour the doorbell rang. The phone buzzed. I got no sleep.)

When Dan came home, I sent him to bed because he had to drive to the wedding the next day. I told him that we needed him to stay awake tomorrow, because we needed him to come home to take care of us afterwards. By 5 a.m. I was standing holding our wailing baby, swaying back and forth in the dining room with my eyes closed, begging Dan to make a bottle of formula. I couldn't conceive of breastfeeding or pumping or anything except sleeping. I knew that I really could sleep standing up, right there, right then. Dan and I were both nervous about continuing this brutal schedule on my own for the entire day.

Dan took over for the next three hours and I got three hours of uninterrupted, glorious shut-eye before it all began again.