Month 9: Stunt Baby

Life with baby has become a little more, er, “challenging” lately. Miles is no longer a cute little portable accessory. He’s still cute, but less portable – the child weighs a whopping 20 lbs! I laugh when I think back to the days when I couldn’t do bicep curls with the 8 lb. handweights at the gym. I could probably curl that with one finger now.

So, the constant weight lifting is one challenge. But the bigger one is that THIS BABY DOESN’T SLEEP. I’m telling you, he goes down for a nap and 20 min. later he pops back up like a Weeble Wobble. (Remember those?) He’s up at least once, if not twice a night again. (He teased me by sleeping from 7 p.m. to 7 a.m. for a week or two. Just when I’d gotten used to it, he was like, “Psych! The after-hours party in my crib is back on, Mama!”)

I swore I would never be one of those parents who drives their kid around in the car at all hours to get them to sleep, but wouldn’t you know it? There I was yesterday afternoon, doing just that.

It really makes you appreciate drive-thrus. I went 2 miles out of my way to the drive-thru Starbucks. Banking and fast food are no problem, but I really had to go to the post office. I heard there’s a drive-thru one about 45 min. north of us. Don’t think I didn’t consider it. But gas is expensive, people. And my library fines are through the roof due to lack of a drive-thru book return.

Back pain, no sleep, and, oh yes – constantly saving my baby from self-destructing. Miles morphed into Stunt Baby overnight. He crawls really fast now, loves to snack on electrical cords, and pulls up on anything within his reach. The kid thinks he can walk already. He pulls up on the coffee table, clears it of all objects instantly with his sticky little mitts, and then LETS GO.

At first I tried to catch him to keep him from hurting himself, but then – and I know it sounds mean – I thought, “Hey, he’s got to learn about gravity at some point.” So now I just let him go. Most of the time, he does these dramatic backward falls like a stunt guy in an action movie. He looks mildly startled, but doesn’t cry. Occasionally, if he’s tired or clips the side of the coffee table, there are tears for a few seconds. Then all is forgotten and he’s scaling Mt. Sofa again.

We’ve tried to babyproof as best we can, but you can’t wrap the entire house in foam. Nor can you block off every outlet, potted plant, electronic device, or door that might slam tiny fingers. Plus, we’re not about to start sleeping on the floor. Miles regularly tries to dive headfirst off the bed. Sometimes it’s all I can do to grab one chubby ankle before he slips over the edge. He thinks it’s a fun game. We call him “Bat Baby” because he loves hanging upside down like a bat in a cave.

Yup, this one’s all boy, people. I better start investing in helmets and mapping out the fastest route to the ER now. If I wasn’t so ... sleepy ...

TIP O’ THE WEEK: Keep reading material in the car. That way, if your sleep-resistant baby happens to fall asleep while you’re driving, you can pull over and pass the time with a book rather than risk the dreaded “transfer” (as in, car seat to crib). I have a 0% success rate with that maneuver.