Charlie seems to have reached the stage of life wherein if he’s held for more than four minutes by Not Me, he freaks the fuck out. While this is totally developmentally appropriate for an almost-six-month-old, it’s inconvenient and a little heart-breaking. Part of me does think, “Hooray, I’m his person!” The rest of me is aware that he probably only likes me for my boobs, and that I can’t take a shower without him being consumed by a deep and abiding sadness. Well, let me rephrase: I can’t take a solo shower in which I actually get clean without him being consumed by a deep and abiding sadness. I take plenty of showers that he handles contentedly; these are the ones following his atomic, up-the-back poos, wherein he and I both strip and hose off. I don’t get clean during these, only wet. I recently visited another mom-friend who has a baby Charlie’s age. I was pleased to hear that I was not the only one who’s been bathing every night without actually being able to use soap or shampoo on themselves in a meaningful way.
Back to the matter at hand: Charlie has developed a low non-mom tolerance. Probably what needs to happen now is that I let Andy be the default parent for things like putting Charlie to bed, soothing him at night, feeding him puréed pears, etc. But the part of my brain that is saying, “Yes! I’m his person!” is the same part of my brain that says, “Well, I should probably just never leave the house again or take a cleansing solo shower. Otherwise my baby might think that I don’t love him. And if he thinks his mother doesn’t love him, he might grow up to be a drug addict or a murderer or a writer.”
On that note, what do well-adjusted people grow up to be? Accountants? Pediatricians? What kind of adult am I even supposed to be hoping for over here? I can only get as far as “non-murderer, and also maybe astronaut-president-baseball star-surgeon.” Feel free to leave well-adjusted career aspirations in the comments.