Healthy Lungs on That One Luh

Dear Claire Bear,

I was going to write a post about the public health nurses (because by now you should know that I love to complain about annoying people) but I got sidetracked with crying. Specifically your crying. More specifically how everyone is amazed at the sheer volume of your crying. So I'll tell you all about the public health nurses at a later date.

I took you to the breastfeeding clinic on Friday to get you weighed and there were a couple of babies less than a week old there. They were so tiny! Some were smaller at a week or two old than you were when you were born! So anyway these babies were crying a bit as they were being undressed and weighed. Not screaming or anything just little kitten cries. More like what I assume mewling sounds like. It was kind of cute and didn't seem stressful to me at all (I'm sure they're mothers wouldn't really agree). When I started getting you undressed you decided you weren't in the mood to be naked so you screamed! None of those little cries for you! No sir. You were going to show them all exactly how strong your lungs were.

One of the nurses made a comment like "I bet you miss the days when she (meaning you) sounded like that" (meaning the tiny baby cries). I tried to think back, and even though your early days are a bit fogged in my memory (sleep deprivation and all), I'm pretty sure you have never once sounded like that.  You have never mewled. You have always screamed. Even when they first passed you to me, all wrinkly and covered in cheese, you screamed. Granted you have reached a higher decibel level as you've grown but you were never quiet to begin with. It's always been screaming. You scrunch up you're face and let 'er rip. Sometimes you keep your eyes open just enough to give us the 'look'. The one that makes us feel like we're torturing you and encourages us to do anything humanly possible to fix whatever it was that started you off to begin with.
We've pretty much got your cries figured out. The 'hungry' cry, the 'tired' cry, the 'no one is paying attention to me' cry. The 'pain cry' (absolute worst), the 'I hate the bath cry', the 'frightened' cry and the 'plain old fussy' cry.

With all this talk about crying you might think you are a fussy baby. You aren't. You're actually a pretty even tempered baby. Only a few crying fits a day. I guess since they're so few you really want to make them count! You usually start to cry with no warning and reach the decibel level of a jumbo jet immediately. There is no conversation when you are crying because it hurts our throats to try and out-volume you. However, you're just as quick to stop crying and give us a big watery grin too. Sometimes you can't decide if you want to laugh  or cry and the faces you make are hysterical. When you are smiling and laughing it's almost impossible not to join you. You've just started to laugh this week and I spend a lot of time trying to coax another laugh out of you. Next step. Belly laughs! I can't wait!

Love you little squid,
Mommy