Sunday, September 19, 2004

Jealousy Surfaces!

Poor Alex.

His fever has finally disappeared but not the rash has surfaced. All report say that the rash doesn't hurt or itch, but there has to be something that's making my little guy so damn cranky. I finally understood what my wife has been talking about this morning. Usually, I'm at work and by the time I come home in the afternoon, he's just playing with his toys - a little bit cranky, but certainly not a handful. But in the morning, as I witnessed with my very own ears and eyes, he'll just break into tears for no apparent reason. He'll just sit there and cry until you pick him up. While my wife was changing Zoe today, I held the little man but he wiggled to get down. Once his feet touched the floor, he walked over to my wife and hugged her leg, sobbing away. So it's a pretty specific need that he wants, and that is the Mommy.

We just don't know if he's still feeling ill or sick, but he is a lot more tired than he's ever been. When we put him down for his first nap, it's earlier than usual and he's not fussing about it. Usually he's too busy to be down for naps, but these past week he's just sucked on his thumb and went right to sleep. In addition to that, he's taking second naps, which has been phased out months ago. He's just acting generally very tired, and it's worrying for us because we do want him to be well and happy. He's got a Doctor's appointment on Monday, so we're hoping that he can wait till then. Since he's not got a high fever or any other threatening symptoms, we can't really take him to the hospital.

As for Zoe, nothing much going on with the little girl. She's slowly moving up to 4 ounces of formula with each feeding, but she's still sleeping a lot - but not enough at night. My wife's been a real trooper, getting up with her for the feedings whenever I work and even on the weekends, but once she goes back to work, I'll probably take on the feedings at night whenever on my days off.

We're starting to suspect that Alex is beginning to know the difference between time spent with him, and time spent on Zoe. Maybe not in a real tangible "Me vs. Her" sense, but I think he knows that we're all in the same room, and we're not giving him the attention and he knows it. We do strive to give them both equal time, but since Zoe is still a newborn, her needs do ultimately take priority. 11 months. If I haven't already, let it be known that that is not a great idea. Space those conception dates further apart!

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