A baby’s weight is expected to double between birth and five months. My powerhouse eating preemie is on pace to accomplish this in about two months. The medical professionals might say it has something to do with his special high-calorie formula, but in my arrogance, I’d like to think it’s really due to his exceptional eating and evacuation habits, as well as my wife’s and my ability to read his cues.
How We Know When Our Boy Wants a Bottle in His Gob
- The Ray Charles/Stevie Wonder – While held against a chest, he cranes his neck back, produces an odd smile, closes his eyes and bobs his head from left to right
- The Motorboat – Again held against a chest, he buries his head in said chest and rummages back and forth as quickly as he can
- The Chipmunk/Corn Cob – The same basic premise as the motorboat, but the back and forth is measured as he nibbles his way through the process
- The Baby Bird – Mouth open wide and staring straight up, like a little magpie awaiting a worm
- The Billy Goat – He’ll nibble on anything in his path; his bib, wrinkles in a shirt, his hand, my nipples…
How We Know our Boy is About to Make Room for More Food
- The Bucking Bronco – This involves vigorous flailing of the legs and arms until something emerges from an orifice
- The Raging Bull – He holds his breath until his entire being is a shade of red that makes you sure he is so angry with you that he could rip your head off in an instant. He farts and all becomes right with the world
- The Ski Jump – With his body completely stiff and angled forward, arms to his side and fists clenched, he strikes a pose that would cause a Nordic father to weep tears of pride into his vodka
How our Boy Makes Room for More Food
- The School Yard Bully – He puts his head back, gazes into your eyes until you’re so taken by how adorable he is that you just have to lean down and give him a kiss. As you near his face, he unleashes a burp that curls your eye lashes
- The Hiroshima – A massive eruption of gas
- The Nagasaki – Follows the Hiroshima and is, disastrously, larger
- The Bikini Atoll – (http://www.bikiniatoll.com, for reference) Only a wasteland remains by the time he drops his legs at the completion of this explosion
Some Not-So-Proud Habits of The Boy
- The Alka Seltzer – Formula bubbles from his mouth and continues for an uncomfortably long time
- The Exorcist – The formula issues forth from his mouth and nose so rapidly and violently that you aren’t sure if you should clean him or start praying for your soul
- The Vagrant – Sometimes, with an embarrassing amount of formula remaining in his bottle, he nods into sleep and can’t be awaken by any means. With the bottle dangling from his lips, he looks like a bum in a warehouse doorway who couldn’t manage to get the 40 out if his mouth before passing out cold
