I’m a MAN dagnabit!! Really…I am. Please?

The other day I experienced a bit of military male spouse angst.  There are times when you come face to face with the fact that your wife will being doing things that are traditionally in the realm of “manly” while you are going about your domestic duties at home.

This was made starkly clear to me as my wife, daughter and I were doing our usually morning Skype session.  I had the computer on the kitchen table so we could video chat while I was feeding my daughter breakfast.  At some point during our session a colleague of my wife’s came back to ask her a question. Since my wife wears a headset I never hear what the question is. Normally I hear her spout some medical terms and give some instructions as a response to said question. 

It was at this time that my daughter started to play with her food.  Turning my attention to my daughter I told her “Noooo…you need to put the nana (banana) in your mouth. Uh huh. Good girl! Yay!”  At the same exact time my wife responded to her colleague “Yup, you cock that back. Flip that switch to unlock the safety.”

She was talking about guns. 

I was talking to my daughter about “nanas”.

Right now I have a strong urge to go and kill some fuzzy little animals, eat raw meat,  and take a bath in motor oil. 

Pack Daddy

As I wrote in my last post my daughter and I took a little trip to visit my parents up in the Washington D.C. metro area last week.  We had a great time up there.  My daughter loved all the attention and the fact that she got to play with her grandparents all day long.  I was enjoying the break as my mom, as many mothers are prone to do, did not let me do anything.  No cooking, no cleaning, I wasn’t even able to change a diaper.  It was nice.

That being said, the actual trip, on the other hand, was a little tougher.  I knew traveling with an 18-month old, a fairly hyperactive 18-month old, was going to be a challenge.  I had visions of her screaming her lungs off for the entire 2 hour flight. Disturbing images of altercations with other passengers over my daughters refusal to settle down flooded my mind.  Fortunately, that wasn’t the case.  It turns out that the most exhausting aspect of flying with a toddler, as a single parent (temporary!) is actually getting through the airport.  Apparently kids need a lot of stuff.

Occasionally I have to travel for work and I usually pride myself in being a pretty light traveler. For a weeks trip I usually just have my carry-on roller suitcase (usually just half-full) and my computer bag (usually completely full, as my wife will attest).  This time, it was different.  It’s amazing how much extra stuff you need to pack when bringing along a person that weighs 1/10th of what you weigh (yes…I weigh about 10xs my daughters weight :-|)

This time my suitcase was completely full but half of the clothes packed was my daughters.  How can she use up half my suitcase?  She’s like 2 feet tall!  But that was just the clothes.  In addition to clothing I had to make sure I had a supply diapers for the flight, snacks, toys, books, changing pad, wipes, Sippy cups, bibs, rubber table mat, and various other baby paraphernalia.  All of this had to fit in a back-pack that was also holding my computer, DSLR Camera, digital video camera (like a Flip Video type), PSP (trust me…this was necessary), and various Daddy paraphernalia.  Add to that a stroller and a car seat.   So imagine if you will a man with a monster backpack, pushing a stroller, pulling a roller suitcase, and somehow bringing along a car seat.  I was doing my best Sherpa impersonation.

I actually had a pretty good system going. Baby was happy in the umbrella stroller I was pushing, back-pack on my back, and the car seat was strapped to the suitcase.  BTW, I LOVE my Swiss army backpack with all of its pockets, nooks, crannies, and compartments.  So I was pretty proud of myself for figuring out this system and actually cruising through the airport.  Then I got to security.

#*&%^#!!!!!

So, baby comes out of the stroller, off with her coat, off with her shoes, off with my coat, off with my shoes, computer comes out of the backpack, coats in trough in one bin, computer in another bin, stroller gets folded and goes through the x-ray machine, car seat gets unstrapped and through the x-ray machine, baby goes through the x-ray…err…scratch that last one.  At least I was smart enough to check my suitcase.  But what a PAIN IN THE BUTT!!

We get through security, put everything back on and back together, and it’s on our way again. Sherpa time!  So we get to the gate. That’s when I realize that the flight is going to be on one of these teeny, tiny commuter jets.  Which means we actually board the plane on the tarmac and not through a jet way. Which means we have to go down stairs and the climb up some more stairs to the jet.

#*&%^#!!!!!

Somehow or another we negotiate this last set of obstacles, get to our seats, strap the car seat in and get settled for our flight.  The flight itself was pretty uneventful and even got complemented on how well behaved my daughter was.  My secret?  My PSP with the movie “The Incredibles” loaded on it kept her hypnotic….err occupied for the entire trip.  I was able to relax and remember remarking “I never want to do that again!”

Then I remembered that we had to come home in a week.

#*&%^#!!!!

We’ll be Right Back!

This is a long overdue update.

I’ve been getting concerned inquiries here and there from various people due to my lack of updates to this blog.  Well, to those people I first want to thank-you for your concern and I also want to assure that yes I and my daughter are doing well.  The house is still standing, the piles have been contained, my daughter is still healthy (and alive!) and I still have my hair (though with a little more gray maybe).

The truth of the matter is that things have been going well enough that it’s become a bit boring.  Don’t get me wrong! I’ll take this boredom and routine over the “excitement” of the initial month of this deployment any day of the week.  I happen to like the fact that my days are more predictable.  The downside to all this is that there’s much less to write about.  I mean just how many posts about the digestive system of my daughter to you really want to read about (only parents will understand that sometimes your life revolves around the digestive system of your kid.)?

That being said, stay tuned.  My daughter and I have just made a trip.  We’re in the state of Maryland right now visiting my parents.  Yup, that means we just travelled and yup, that means I took a toddler with all her accessories on a plane trip with me.  Fun times! But that’s for the next post.

Putting up with crap…

Fair warning.  This post is not for those easily grossed out by bodily functions.

So much for wishing for a better February.  That sure didn’t last long.  I should’ve known that something was up when the first e-mail I get from work is from an irate attorney.  Basically he didn’t appreciate the fact that I was doing my job and telling his client that they couldn’t do what they wanted and couldn’t say what they wanted to say.  It didn’t matter that their very own  prospectus/documents said that they couldn’t do what they wanted to either.  So not only was I protecting my firm from their sales staff (why can’t they just play by the rules?) but I was protecting their firm as well.  But, other than the arguing with another firm’s outside counsel (which ended up taking my entire day) it wasn’t a too terrible start to the month.

Yet.

So after work it was off to pick-up my daughter from daycare.  Upon picking my daughter up and speaking with our provider the topic of conversation always turns to my daughter’s bowel movements.  Bowl movements are a big deal and a big topic of conversation for us.  Did she go today? Hard or soft? Diarrhea? Color? Texture?  All this detail is important to us for some reason.  Well, actually the reason is that a few months ago my daughter was constipated and we believe it was due to the switch from formula to milk that caused it.  Since then we had been giving her soy milk to drink instead and have given her a supplement of Mira lax to help soften things up.  It seemed to work.  Well enough that we were slowly decreasing her dosage of Mira lax.  I decided to cut out the ‘lax even more when our care provider gave a report of a really, really watery diaper (and no…not #1) after not giving my daughter any Mira lax for awhile and then giving her one dosage.  I guess she didn’t need the ‘lax anymore.

So it’s at this point I get the bright idea (yup…another bright idea) that if my daughter is handling things well enough again that I could switch her to whole milk instead of soy milk.  So I did.  The first few days I didn’t really notice too much difference other than her stools were more formed but it wasn’t causing her any pain.  So, just in case I gave her a dose of Mira lax this morning with her milk before taking her to daycare.

Upon picking her up my daycare provider reported, “Oh she went today.”  Yes! It’s working! I think I’ve found the balance.  Not too hard, not too soft.  “Oh, and she was really gassy today too. Whoo!”  Eh?  Gassy you say?  Must be the milk.  Or if my wife were here would say that it runs in the family (while pointedly looking straight at me).  What?

Anyways, that should’ve been a clue as to what was to come.  Apparently my daughter had been poot ‘a tootin’ up a storm at day care.  Flash forward to dinner and I’m watching my daughter alternatively feeding herself and the floor fish and broccoli.  All of a sudden she gets really wide eyed and I hear pbbbbbuuuuurrrrrrrrr!!!!  At this point it’s still pretty funny as I imagined it to be one big and long fart.  Really funny as it’s coming from someone as little as her.  I mean, this was, well…like Blazing Saddles.

The thing is, like in the video above, the hits just kept on coming.  She was basically reenacting that entire scene. By herself.  Uh oh.

At this point it ceased to be so funny because this is the point when I realized she wasn’t just tooting.  The teary eyed, clenched fists, and straining face clued me in to that. 

Oh no.

But I thought she went already today!? How can she have more.  This isn’t fair! You’re only supposed to go once a day! It was the day care providers turn! Arghh. So there she is, sitting in her high chair and she’s just going.  I can’t stop her and I sure as heck am not going to pick her up until she’s done.  I’ve already resigned myself to the fact that there will be quite the mess to clean up later.  There’s no way that diaper is holding all of that.  When you’re in your highchair eating fish and you hear something splish…

Houston we have a problem.  Looks like we’ve sprung a small leak.  Crap. 

Mercifully she finishes so I pick her up and it’s straight to the bathroom.  She’s not really happy with stuff leaking down her leg and I’m not happy either.  Amazingly when we get to the bathroom she let’s out an excited squeal.  She’s going to take a bath! She’s excited.  Me, I don’t quite share excitement just yet.  I strip her clothes off, wipe down her legs, open her diaper… Ew.  I’ll spare you the details.  Into the bath she goes.  At this point I have a bit of time to survey the collateral damage.  Her pants, done for.  In the wash.  Diaper, in a plastic bag, into the trash.  Thank goodness tomorrow is trash day! Bathroom really stinks.  Light a candle but why do I still smell something…oh…Ew.  So the scene is now baby splashing away in the bath (rather happily) spraying water everywhere and dad not caring because he’s running around now just in his boxers trying to clean and disinfect the bathroom.

She got soy milk tonight before bed.

One Down

Well, we’ve made through our first month of deployment.  My wife is doing well, my daughter is still alive, and I am still sane (or at least not more insane than before).  Like the saying about flying, "Any landing you can walk away from is a successful one.”  So despite some of the bumps along the way I am pleased that one month has passed.  Just one month less for my wife to be away.

That being said I’ve gotta say that January of 2010 is a month I’d like to never repeat again.  It was simultaneously the longest month and the quickest month I’ve ever experienced.  Long due to the separation, quick because it’s just been so jammed packed with “stuff.” We experienced our first family separation and the pains that accompany it.  My daughter’s first trip to the ER.  The traumatization of my daughter by the bathtub of death.  The adjustment into single parenthood.  The semi-isolation that comes with being a male spouse of a deployed female service member (ain’t no husbands clubs).  All in all, we’ve been able to make the adjustments and have finally settled into a more manageable routine.  A big thank-you to my parents for showing up for a week to give me a break.  I’m just glad that the “initiation” is finally done.  Let’s just get through this already. One month down, five to go.  Here’s hoping to a better February.