Implements of Pacification

There are several accepted methods for quieting a screaming infant. All of them work some of the time, some of them work more often than others, but none are guaranteed to work on any given occasion. Below is a brief list.

The Pacifier

As its name implies, this is the go-to option for the average parent. Pacifiers come in a dizzying array of shapes that emulate, with varying degrees of success, the nipple that infants would almost universally prefer to the plastic contraption you are forcing into their wailing mouths. Equipment note: they also come in various sizes, and that’s important. Don’t make the mistake of inadvertently choking your 6-week new infant with a pacifier intended for a hulking 1-year old.

Pacifiers have also acquired a variety of overly cute nicknames such as binky, bo-bo, boppy, paci, nuki, plug, chupon, and my favorite—mute button (this is only a partial list—at last count there were approximately 573 frequently used names for this little device, some of which defy logic in their origins).

The most important skill to acquire in the use of the pacifier is the “quick insertion” technique. Finesse may make the motion more aesthetically pleasing, but nothing is more important than rapid response in heading off an approaching crying jag.

An interesting sidebar on the pacifier occurs with twins—well, at least with our twins—and it is a ritual known simply as the Daily Pacifier Exchange. It’s kind of like raising the flag in front of the school or turning the quaint little stop light in the bar to the green “Open” signal. In the morning, when both twins wake up, we bring them into the bedroom to ease ourselves out of sleep mode and into child care mode around 6:30 a.m. We put both twins on the bed, facing each other. One of them automatically looks at the other, reaches out, and takes the pacifier from the other’s mouth and holds it up for inspection. The other twin, also automatically, reaches out and takes her pacifier. After a cursory viewing and rotation, they each insert the stolen pacifier in their own mouths, and go on about their baby business.

I don’t know why they do it, and so far, they aren’t talking—literally.

The Blanket

Next to the pacifier, the blanket is the most common source of comfort for most babies. Like the pacifier, it has also acquired a number of nauseatingly cute nicknames: bankie, bookie, binkie, etc. (My first batch of kids came up with the variation of “bundy” long before Al Bundy became part of Americana).

Even before our twins were born, we had accumulated several dozen items, ranging from beautiful, hand-woven future heirlooms to practical receiving blankets. After they were born, we brought home a few dozen from the hospital, and then went out and bought about twenty more. As any parent can guess, many nights we searched the entire house unable to find a single clean blanket when we desperately needed it.

Stuffed Animals

This is a bit of a crap shoot. Before the kids arrived, we bought a collection of cute little stuffed toys, hoping one would become the beloved plaything each kid would cling to and probably wear down to a bald clump of material by the time they were old enough give up their infant security treasures. So far they haven’t made their choices. My wife, on impulse, bought a five-foot tall stuffed bear at Costco. The kids like it and really enjoy wallowing in it. I’m not sure they recognize it as a creature because of its overwhelming size, and of course, the real problem is, according to the first law of twins, we’ll probably have to buy another one someday.

Holiday Recap

I am a teacher. I am also, obviously, the author of this blog; and a husband, and a not-so-young-father of 10-month old twins.  Those four job descriptions, it turns out, are less than compatible. Now that I am once again on summer break, I am resuming my duties as blogger.

To fill the gap left by the previous nine months of distraction, I offer this collection of highlights of everything that took place between Halloween, 2011 and Memorial Day, 2012.

As you may imagine, it has not been that eventful.

Halloween

The practice of dressing small infants in ridiculously overpriced, and over-sewn, garments for the purpose of eliciting “aww, how cute” responses from neighbors and relatives has a relatively brief tradition. At one time, in a more genteel age—say the 1950’s (the real ones, not the seductively re-imagined, lushly art-directed and loads of fun, “Mad Men” 1950’s) mothers just stuck the little ones in a stroller and slogged about the neighborhood with a couple of clowns whom they had just costumed that afternoon. They would not have dreamed of wasting time, much less money, on an infant or child younger than about five.

But today, we paw through racks of prefabricated costumes for newcomers of literally all ages, fully aware that the $39.99 we spend will be a giant waste of funds that we could have spent on practical stuff like two cups of coffee at Starbucks (ugh), or a round of cocktails at the place we will wind up after looking at the bill for the Halloween costumes.

As is evident by the accompanying photo, I was not able to resist the peer pressure to dress up a couple of uncooperative 3-month olds as, yes, the cutest ladybugs since the beginning of time—the looks of abject terror in their eyes notwithstanding.

Baptism

Despite our astonishing lack of religion, my wife and I seem doomed to comply with a number of liturgical rituals such as a church wedding and a formal baptism. In the Greek Orthodox Church, baptisms rank just above Easter and just below the second coming of Christ in relative importance. It includes a full, triple immersion, an hour-long mass and an exorcism—that’s right, an exorcism. In our case, the priest had no sooner finished the Greek version of the exorcism when daughter number two promptly spit up all over him. No, it didn’t look like green pea soup. It was kind of beige, so I think the only thing he exorcised was the wandering spirit of an interior designer.

Thanksgiving

We had a quiet Thanksgiving, mostly just sitting around being thankful that we didn’t have to do another baptism.

Christmas

I have to be honest, I love Christmas. Over my lifetime, I have amassed thousands of ornaments. My wife has a nearly equal number. So naturally, we went out and bought some more for our twins. After all, this was their “Baby’s First Christmas.” Of course, we bought “Baby’s First Christmas” ornaments last year— when my wife first found out she was pregnant—but those don’t count.

We also have tons of Christmas decorations and lights. None of the lights work. But, like everyone, I keep them anyway, waiting for the Great Spirit of Holiday Lighting to appear, painstakingly test each mini lamp, replace the bad ones, untangle the hundreds of miles of wires, and miraculously re-insert them into the original packages, which I have also kept.

My wife, instead, hired someone to put up the lights for us. This is the ultimate act of emasculation for most men, but I was too tired to argue, even after I paid $234 for a 25-foot ladder on which I had planned to permanently disable myself after hanging half a strand of the non-working lights.

A couple of days before the big night, Santa Claus made a visit to our neighborhood. We bundled up the twins and hauled them out into the street to be photographed with the big guy. As is evident in the accompanying photo, they really loved it—the looks of abject terror in their eyes notwithstanding.

New Year’s Eve through Memorial Day

Not much happened in the first six months of the year.

One of the twins started crawling on Cinco de Mayo. Which was a little anticlimactic, since the other one had already been crawling since Ocho de Marzo.
The main thing worth celebrating was the fact that they both stopped waking up during the night. It may be philosophically nihilistic to celebrate the absence of an event, but you try six months of not sleeping and see how underwhelmingly positive your attitude is…or isn’t.

Oh yeah, they also went down their first slide, ate solid food, saw their first baseball game, got their first five-foot stuffed bear, sat in their first high chairs, went to the beach for the first time, got their first colds, and took their first bath in the bath tub.

They really loved it—the looks of abject terror in their eyes notwithstanding.

Burp Notice: A Formula Action Thriller

A famous quote from Benjamin Franklin observes that “Beer is proof that God loves us and wants us to be happy.”

Updating that for parents of the electronic age we might have, “TiVo is proof that God pities us, and wants us to know what we are missing.”

As parents of two very demanding infants, my wife and I often find ourselves sitting and holding the little ones who have finally quieted down for a minute, and catching up on hours of shows recorded during times when they were not so quiet.

One of my favorite shows is Burn Notice. It’s the story of former CIA operative Michael Weston who has been blacklisted and now operates as a kind of Robin Hood for hire, while occasionally carrying out contract missions in the shadowy edges of the world he used to occupy as a government agent.

Apparently the show was created by an ex-spy and much of it is comprised of tongue-in-cheek voiceovers that give step-by-step lessons in espionage, usually beginning with the phrase, “When you’re a spy…” and continuing with fascinating and usually humorous instructions on constructing bombs, tapping phones, etc.

What follows is an episode of my life written in that style.

Note: To get the allusion, you may want to check out at least the opening sequence of the show at:
http://www.usanetwork.com/series/burnnotice/?__source=gglburn+noticeBrandG_BurnNotice5.0&sky=gglburn+noticeBrandG_BurnNotice5.0

Act 1

Exterior. A quiet two-story house in one of southern California’s sprawling suburbs. As we dissolve to an interior, we see a middle–aged man intently mixing carefully measured powder and liquid in a small bottle.

VOICEOVER: “When you’re a dad, you will often be called upon to participate in infant feeding. While most mothers today embrace the idea of breastfeeding, the task can become logistically unworkable—especially with twins.

“That’s where we come in.

“The first requirement is a bottle. While some modern fathers go for the latest in gas-suppression technology and sterilized disposable liners, a simple bottle and nipple combination is still the device of choice for the seasoned professional.

“Next, you will need a nutriment. Breast milk, pumped and preserved by refrigeration, is ideal. But in a pinch you can mix an acceptable substitute using two ounces of powdered Similac and 120 milliliters of filtered tap water at 99 degrees Fahrenheit. The resulting mixture should be vigorously shaken for five seconds, unless you like having it regurgitated in the middle of the mission (and in the middle of your lap).

"The actual feeding is a simple, but time-consuming procedure. It can be uneventful, if you are dealing with a cooperative infant, or it can be nearly impossible if you are trying to feed a Tasmanian Devil.

"Which is why you should always have a back-up plan.

"Fabricating a sudden “emergency” run to the store for diapers and wipes is good, but If you want to log some serious away time you may need to take on a second job. On-call heart surgeon is best, but night watchman or pizza delivery guy can work if you sell it right.

"However you deal with the demands of the job, one thing is clear: until the baby is burped, you aren’t going anywhere."

Blood Lines

Psychologists and Sociologists suggest that birth order in a family creates certain predetermined types of personalities.

The First Born is usually a quick learner who is more driven to succeed and more of a perfectionist. The Middle Child is more laid back and often a good mediator, sometimes more of a social person. The Youngest Child is usually last to mature, sometimes a bit of a trouble-maker and often a clown who tends to act without a thought to consequences.

Of course many factors can affect the personalities of children and change these stereotypes quite a bit, but most of us can look at these generalizations and recognize ourselves and our siblings.

Thinking back to my first three children, I see how these personality types hold true for the most part. My first born daughter was an early speaker and reader, always driven to be the best at everything, though not obsessively, but more so because she simply wanted to do everything and do it right. My middle son is more relaxed and even tempered (though he, like I, sometimes lets his Irish heritage come through in times of stress) and he tends to see things from multiple points of view. My youngest son was always bright and inquisitive as a child, but also a source of constant amusement, and less driven to succeed early on in his life.

Now that we have brought into being a new “batch” of kids, I wondered how the birth order dynamics would play out.

The accepted thinking is that a late born child will be more like a First Child—but of course, we have twins, and it would be almost impossible to have two “A-Type” personalities pop out at the same time.

I do see two distinct temperaments in my little ones, but it seems like they may have arrived slightly out of order. Although they were only two minutes apart, the “older” twin, Anastasia, seems more like a middle child: mellow and unstressed and somehow amused at the whole process. The “younger” twin, Christina, is aggressive and active, physically strong and demanding.

In terms of slogans, the younger one seems to be saying, "I want the world and I want it now!" while her older sister, through her demeanor declares, "I'd like at least a piece of the world, but I'll wait until after my nap."

Of course, they are only six weeks old at this point, but if my first go-round is any indication, these dispositions will probably follow them, at least in some way, as they mature.

We may indeed be prewired for certain psyches and characters; all I can do is help them grow into theirs in the most positive way I can.

The Art of War

Our household is very much like a WWE Tag Team match these days.

In one corner are the twins.

Although they claim that they don’t yet have the power of speech, I am convinced that they communicate through some inscrutable system of correspondence—maybe a little known native people's language like in Wind Talkers—and that they hold clandestine baby meetings in which they plot their covert ops, including synchronized diaper-filling and tightly coordinated screaming jags that have my wife and I scrambling to plug in pacifiers, warm up bottles, change diapers, strip off soiled (and I mean, SOILED) clothing and seek the ever- elusive baby blankets (see blog entry on “Baby Physics”) like a couple of really bad Whack-a-Mole players . Their timing is nearly flawless, and their execution, Navy Seal-like in terms of shock and awe.

In the other corner are my wife and I.

We are not yet as sophisticated in our battle plan as the pint-sized ninjas we are committed to care for, but we are learning.

In response to the twins’ attempt to weaken us with sleep deprivation—which, by the way, ranks well above water-boarding in terms of sheer torture—we have begun to use the old “tap-out” system. Some nights I get up for all of the feedings while my wife sleeps, and the next night she does the same for me. By this system we stay sharp (well, OK, as sharp as really tired middle-aged people can be) and ready to respond to the next infant assault tactic.

We are also well armed.

We now own two of every item sold at Babies R Us, including wiper warmers, clip-on pacifier holders for the strollers (we have three strollers by the way: one armored transport version for twins and two highly portable umbrella strollers, that hold up about as well as an actual umbrella in a hurricane) and other tools and apparatus (apparatuses? apparatti?) necessary to hold out until re-enforcements arrive. Yes, I know re-enforcements are never actually going to arrive, but the concept keeps us going.

Currently, the conflict can best be described as a stalemate; that may also describe either my wife or me, since we rarely are able to work a shower into the battle plan. For now, we keep in mind the words of Sun Tzu: "All war is deception." I think we have successfully deceived ourselves into thinking we are winning.

Baby Physics

Most people have heard the facetious question, “Which is heavier, a pound of feathers or a pound of lead?”

The first time I heard that old joke, I had to think for a moment, before I smiled and answered that, despite the striking difference in their bulk, (and the difference in being struck by them) they do, in fact, weigh the same.

Now consider this: which would you rather hold for two hours, six pounds of feathers or six pounds of baby. Yes, the two weights are the same, but the two tasks are not.

That’s what I mean by, Baby Physics.

There are certain laws of infant dynamics that become apparent the longer you deal with babies. Here is a short list:

The Law of Relative Mass

A baby held in one’s arms will double in absolute density every ten minutes.

According to this law, a six-pound three-ounce child, after a time span of an hour, will weigh about 125 pounds (Don’t bother checking my math; if you don’t believe me, go visit a friend who has an infant and offer to hold him or her for a few minutes. Warning: stand between your friend and the door, and under no circumstances agree to “watch him/her for a minute” while your friend runs to the store for diapers and wipes. You will never see your friend again)

Murphy’s Law of Liquid Dispersal

Anything that can be spit up, will be.

This, of course applies to breast milk or formula—kind of an equal-opportunity maxim—but it also embraces anything that a baby ingests: a collection of viscous substances of uncertain origin, including baby cheese (you’ll know it when you see it). A related corollary states that the volume of the spit up will vary in direct proportion to the darkness of the color of the clothes being spit up-on, and the expense of having them dry-cleaned.

McGurskey’s Third Law of Nursling Acoustics

A Baby’s cry is nominally ten decibels more intense than the engine of an XF-84 Thuderscreech (generally considered to be the loudest airplane ever built) when they want something.

Of course, when they REALLY want something, it gets a little louder.

Swee’ Pea’s Corollary: Contrary to normal laws of acoustics, decibel volume tends to increase rather than decrease with the inverse square of the distance between you and the baby. No one has been able to explain this anomaly, but no one who has ever tried to ignore, even for a minute, a baby’s cry, will dispute it.

The First Law of Excrement

No diaper can hold baby poop.

For this reason, diaper makers will almost never make any definitive claim to feculence control on their packaging. They usually restrict their come-ons to the categories of “comfort,” “ ease of handling,” and some vague claim to “added absorbency.” Well, at two o’clock in the morning, when your cherub unloads on your pajamas for the third time in a week, you may be thinking of words other than “added absorbency” to include in your scathing email to Kimberly Clark. But, to be fair, one look at the stuff little ones produce and you have to cut the diaper guys a little slack. Just remember the joke about the optimist who gets pooped on by a bird, who then smiles and says, “Thank God elephants don’t fly.”

Houdini’s Law of Fluctuating Resources

No quantity of baby supplies is sufficient.

Prior to the birth of our twins, we received generous gifts of baby clothes and paraphernalia . At one point I think I counted forty-seven baby blankets. Yet, most nights, when I have finished feeding, burping, changing, re-feeding, re-burping, re-changing, comforting, rocking and crooning the twins back to sleep, I cannot find a single blanket to wrap them up in before laying them down—not even the blankets they were wrapped in when I picked them up to start the routine. I am not sure where blankets, burp cloths and onesies go to hide—probably the same place as the single socks that mysteriously vanish from the dryer. Of course, they magically reappear on laundry day (which is every day) in greater numbers.

This is only a partial list. For a complete index see Spock’s General Theory of Baby Dynamics (that’s Dr. Spock, not Mr. Spock, and if you’re old enough to know the difference between those two, you probably look like me, only not as tired).

Relativity

Becoming a father in the “September” of my years has created its own set of oddities. Among them: newly defined lines of relationships within the family.

I was married to my first wife for 22 years and we raised three children: a girl and two boys. Three years into my new marriage my twin daughters arrived. This redrew some old boundaries.

My youngest son, who used to be the youngest child, is now the “middle” kid. My daughter and sons now have something they never had before: little sisters. And where there had always been “my three kids” there are now “my five kids.”

The age differences are also a little bizarre. My first three children were 24, 26 and 28 years old when their new siblings were born, so there will be a generational gap between the two “batches.”

In addition, my two children living farther away—on the other side of the country, in fact—are understandably ambivalent to the idea of my suddenly having two infants who threaten to occupy my time and attention, coupled with the further skepticism that comes from the concept of having half-sisters—siblings who share one parent instead of two. My former middle child—my older son—and his wife have accepted the new arrangement more warmly, partly because they live close enough to visit on a regular basis, and partly because they are a couple who anticipate having a family of their own shortly and may be more receptive to the idea of a growing and evolving family.

Personally, I have discovered that a truth I learned many years ago still holds.

When I had one child and we were expecting a second, I wondered if I would ever be able to love that second child as much as I did the first. When the second little one arrived—and later the third—I learned there was no problem at all. Love is one of those qualities that, ironically, grows more abundant the more we expend it. If anything, each new addition to the family added a new dimension to the affection I felt toward each child.

The same thing is happening again. As I re-experience the joys, as well as the challenges, of fatherhood, I find myself remembering tender moments from my first time around, and I feel even closer to my older children.

Hopefully they will all tap into this curious and poignant phenomenon of renewed love that comes around only rarely in life.

It may be true that we can’t pick our families, but we can choose to focus on the joyous aspects of kismet and grow from the sudden outpouring of love that accompanies new life.