Oh my goodness, SHOTS!! You think you're ready for them, that you have steeled yourself for the inevitable crying, that you are strong and tough and prepared....
...and then they stick needles in your little baby's dimpled thighs, and they have already told you to hold his arms to keep him still, but you didn't realize that would mean you are actively participating in his pain, and he screams a scream you have yet to hear and turns a shade of mottled red you have never seen and and the nurse says not to worry because he won't remember anything but you now know that you will remember it all and they're surprised when you pick him up immediately after they take out the last needle and they say "oh, I guess you can console him before we put the Band-Aids on" and you're thinking that you couldn't have let him cry another minute, even if he is bleeding (wait, he's bleeding?!) and then the nurse says he may be cranky for 24 hours and have a fever (?!) for 24 hours or so but don't get alarmed unless it gets really high (?!) and then your baby can't really be consoled, which is not like him, and falls into an exhausted asleep mid-cry while you are paying the but the whole ordeal has rattled you so much that you don't realize until you get home, after stopping to get yourself a drink at Sonic because you aren't really consoled yet either, that you put the baby in the car seat but didn't buckle him in so you might as well have driven with him in your arms for all the good these unemployed safety measures would have done you.
And you're both exhausted and you both sleep fitfully and you both just wish this day would end but only one of you really knows why and bad planning now means that tonight is the night he has to go to a babysitter who is not related to him for the first time while you go teach and you worry that the trauma of this day will never end, much like these sentences and much like the din in your head out of which they are coming.
Oh, and Jacob weighs 12 pounds, 12 ounces (75 percentile) and is 23 1/2 inches long (50 percentile). Here he is, looking sad but not as sad as he looked after the visit.
1 comment:
Shots are TERRIBLE. I hate, hate, hate them. Two tips I read -- that babies feel less pain if they are held (I'm not sure my doctor will let me hold the baby in my arms for shots but I'm going to ask), the way studies have shown that wives feel less pain if holding hands with their husbands. Also, distraction (something you, like I, have probably completely mastered by now) is supposed to help. I'll be singing and acting like a maniac during the next round of shots. They totally stink. And did you notice how unmoved the nurse was? I said "this must be hard to do," and she said, "not really, you get used to it." HEART OF STONE!!!
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