Would you like to hear more about my baby's health?

On Saturday Milo began pulling at his ears. He also had a raspy cough. I thought, if he’s still tugging at his ears tomorrow, I’ll take him to the doctor Monday morning.

On Sunday, he still pulled at his ears. He was even so intent on his ears that he was distracted from nursing—very unusual. I decided that yes, I would take him to his pediatrician’s walk-in hours Monday morning. Better to get it checked out than wonder if I was missing another ear infection.

But then I sort of talked myself out of it. After all, he was in a great mood, and he didn’t have a fever or anything. Plus, I had my PT appointment Monday morning and couldn’t get him to walk-in hours anyway. So I made a deal with myself. If he slept super poorly Sunday night, I’d call the doc in the morning and get him in sometime Monday. If he slept well, I wouldn’t take him to the doctor.

And guess what? He slept through the night for the first time in months. He slept solidly, from 7:20pm to 6:00am.

I went to work, Milo went to daycare, and all was well.

Until 1:00 when I got a call from daycare saying Milo had a fever.

Damn.

A couple hours later we had our diagnosis: another double ear infection. However, since he’s only been off antibiotics for six days, our pediatrician surmised that this was still part of the last round of ear infections, that just never fully cleared up. Sigh.

Milo is now on his third (or second, if you count this as part of the last ear infection) bout of ear infections in two and a half months. He is on his fourth antibiotic. He’s just the saddest little bundle of snot you can imagine.

I did ask about getting tubes, as I hear nothing but good things. But he is still too young for that, and they typically don’t consider tubes until a kid has had four ear infections in a season. And the first six months of daycare are the worst. The doctor said we just have to make it through these six months, and he will probably start to get better. It was reassuring, but still—six months solid of feeling crappy all the time?

I wish I’d trusted my instincts. For the first time, I really felt like something was wrong that needed to get checked out. I just knew he had another ear infection. But I let myself get talked out of taking him to the doctor. Andrew wasn’t convinced Milo was really sick, we both had work, and I wasn’t able to come up with solid evidence that he needed medical attention. It was mostly a feeling. But I was right. And if I’d trusted myself a little more and gotten him to the doctor a little sooner, Milo might never have even gotten the fever.

There’s always next time, right? We’ve still got almost four months to go before we’re out of the ear-infection zone.

Sick? Who, me? I iz all better nao. Lets play.

What else?

When I arrived at daycare to pick Milo up this evening, I walked in to see him in the arms of one of his teachers, gripping his bottle and downing his milk. And his teacher wasn't even holding onto the bottle. And this surprised me.

I had this moment of shock and sadness. Shock, because I didn't realize that Milo could hold onto his bottle all by himself and didn't need any assistance. I suppose I shouldn't have been surprised by that; after all, he can pick up tiny pieces of food and bring them to his mouth pretty well, and he holds his little pink bottle as if his life depended on it. Why shouldn't he be capable of holding his bottle? The sadness hit me when I realized how much about Milo I don't know these days. If I didn't even know that, what else don't I know? What else happens during the ten hours a day I spend away from him? Can he walk? Read? Do long-division?

On the way home, I realized something else. Even if I was a SAHM, spending all day with Milo, I'd still be nursing. I still wouldn't know whether he could hold his own bottle.

So overreacting? Maybe. But I desperately miss being the one person who knew all those little things about him, the one person who knew him better than anyone.

I forgot something MAJOR!

I'm pretty sure I've already bragged about this to every single person I know, but I just had to add one more thing to Milo's eight month stats.

At eight months, Milo knows how to give high fives! I say, "High five!" and hold up a hand in front of him, and he reaches up and touches my hand. Then we get really excited and say "Hooray!" It is about the cutest thing you've ever seen.

Eight Months Old!

At eight months, Milo's weight hovers somewhere close to 16 and a half pounds. Pretty sure he's small for his age.

At eight months, Milo is on the move. He crawls, he pulls himself to standing, and he when we hold his hands, he walks and walks and walks.

At eight months, Milo has a love-hate relationship with food. When we started solids, he loved them and ate like a champ. Then he decided he didn't want to eat anymore. Now he's in an eating phase, and is generally content to try new things. I hope it lasts.

At eight months, Milo has eaten sweet potato, rice cereal, peas, carrots, zucchini, yellow squash, avocado, banana, apple, pear, Gerber Puffs, pancakes, bread and butter, cheese, yogurt, and golden beets.

At eight months, Milo prefers to pick up his own food rather than be spoon-fed.

At eight months, Milo loves his pacifier. Still. I honestly don't know how I would ever detach him from my boob without it.

At eight months, Milo has developed an attachment to a small, pink, sample-size bottle of Johnson & Johnson baby lotion. He carries that bottle everywhere. It is the closest thing to a lovey that he's got.

At eight months, Milo has a great sense of humor and loves to laugh. He anticipates what we're going to do when we play with him, and he shrieks with laughter when he knows we're about to act silly. It's great fun.

At eight months, Milo's favorite toys are his plastic stacking rings and these little balls that make a twinkly noise when he shakes them. But both of those pale in comparison to his little pink bottle.

At eight months, Milo has been primarily sick over the last month.

At eight months, Milo stands up in his crib. We go in to find him standing there, crying, unsure of how to lay back down and go to sleep.

At eight months, Milo is not a great sleeper. He does okay at night, though he still typically wakes once for changing and nursing. During the day, though, his naps are minimal. If he sleeps more than an hour total over three naps, we're pleased.

At eight months, Milo is getting more and more hair. It's light brown.

At eight months, Milo has gorgeous gray-blue eyes.

At eight months, Milo is incredibly sweet. There's nothing else like the feeling of him resting his head on my shoulder.

At eight months, Milo babbles more and more. Favorite sounds include buh, dadada, wuhwuh, duh duh, mmmmuh, eeeeee. He also makes sort of grunty and shrieky noises, presumably to test out the ol' vocal chords.

At eight months, Milo climbs all over us during floor time. It's super fun to have a baby climbing on you; I recommend it.

At eight months, Milo seems to like daycare. One of the morning teachers always sings to him when he gets there, "They call him Mellow Milo." It's clear the teachers adore him.

At eight months, Milo is my favorite little guy. Some days I wish I could stay home with him all the time. Now that I've been back at work for awhile, I really miss the days of my maternity leave. It wasn't easy to spend all day every day with Milo, but it was a lot easier than spending all day every day without him.

Another First

Milo cried when I left him at daycare this morning.

I cried in the car on my way to work.

A Recurring Theme

Last Thursday Andrew got a call from daycare: Milo has a fever, better come pick him up. Andrew took off work, picked up Milo, and tried (unsuccessfully) to reach me for a couple hours. Eventually I got his messages, felt incredibly guilty for not being there for my poor sick baby, and rushed out of the office, just in time to meet them at the doctor's office.

Turns out Milo had another ear infection. Antibiotics were prescribed. Andrew and I sighed at the prospect of forcing unpleasant fluid down our baby's throat for the next ten days. We were also told to expect diarrhea with these antibiotics. So yay...

Over the next couple days, antibiotics were administered. Some went in the mouth, much was spit out. Frustration was felt by all involved parties. And, as expected, diarrhea was dealt with. We bought probiotics and yogurt in an attempt to combat the diarrhea, but Milo was pretty tired of various things being forced upon him and adopted a clamped-shut jaw policy.

Saturday evening, the fever returned with a vengeance. My baby was absolutely burning up. Pitiful. We called the nurses, who said to give him Tylenol and wake him up every four hours or so during the night to check his fever and give him more medicine. If the fever was still high in the morning, call back.

Fever stayed high through the night and the next morning, so we called back. They said that we could probably wait until Monday morning to see the doctor, but if something changed (like he quit eating or fever spiked even higher) we should take him to Children's Mercy urgent care. Or if we just got anxious and wanted him to get treated right away, we could take him in. When Milo threw up and wouldn't nurse, we took him to urgent care.

An hour and a half later, we had our diagnosis: still an ear infection. But hey! It's the other ear now. But shouldn't the antibiotics have been working on both ears? I asked. Maybe he wasn't getting the full dose, said the doctor. Damn, we said. Kid, you've gotta quit spitting that stuff out.

A different antibiotic was prescribed—this one just a once-a-day—but we had to start over with our ten-day course. Supposedly this new medicine tastes better than the other one, according to kids who are old enough to express their opinions. Milo might disagree.

There is nothing worse than shoving medicine down your kid's throat. I feel so entirely helpless, because he hates it and I hate it, but I know I have to do it for his own good. Why hasn't anyone come up with a better way to give babies medicine? I think a patch would be much better. Can someone work on that for me?

The Weight Is Over (see what I did there?)

I'm officially back to my pre-pregnancy weight. It only took seven and a half months to get there, but here I am. And yet, though it is so expected, I'm still surprised by how different my body is.

My belly is distinctly rounder and squishier than it used to be. No amount of sucking in really makes it go away. My boobs are way bigger than they were pre-baby, thankyouverymuch, breastfeeding. But because of the exercise (thank you, personal training), my buns and thighs and arms are more toned than they ever have been. I'm no Jillian Michaels, but it's a start.

Of course, I'm not yet at the finish line, weight loss-wise. I gained a lot of weight when we were trying to conceive, because I was frustrated and upset, and I'm an emotionally eater. So I still have about 15 pounds to go before I get to where I'd like to be. Shouldn't be too hard, right? It's not like we're heading into that time of year when there are cookies and pies and pastries at Every. Single. Turn.

Oh. Wait. Damn . . .

Milo's First Halloween

Some friends of ours gave us a hand-me-down Halloween costume, a kangaroo. It was cute (quite cute, actually), but I had this image in mind that for Milo's first Halloween, I wanted to choose his costume and—heck—maybe even make it myself, like the crafty devil I am. So I tossed around costume ideas, and eventually settled on '80s aerobics instructor.

But as I looked for inspiration to dress up my little fitness guru, I noticed that '80s aerobics instructors are not particularly cute or cuddly. And what good is a baby in a Halloween costume that isn't cute or cuddly? So just a few days before Halloween, we went to a local kids consignment shop and bought a cute pumpkin costume. Bonus? It was also cuddly.

The day before Halloween, we dressed Milo up in the kangaroo costume for a little photo shoot. The weather was gorgeous, Milo was in a happy mood, and we got some super cute photos.

On Halloween, we attempted a photo shoot in the pumpkin, but Milo was less than happy to be participating. It was also really windy and cloudy. We're lucky Milo is so good-looking, or the photos would have been a real disaster.

On Halloween night, we tagged along with some friends of ours who have kids that are old enough to trick-or-treat. It was fun, but it will definitely be more enjoyable when Milo is old enough to participate. I think he had a good time, though. Watching people is one of his favorite things to do.