Lost Alpha

NuNew's Journal Entry June 30, 2024

The day after Star was born, we got to take her home. I was still scared to handle her. Mom said Star was a lot tougher than I thought she was, but Star reminded me of a little baby bird. She was so fragile. When we put her in the car seat I wondered if she was too small for the restraints. Would they keep her safe? Rationally I knew they would. The seat was designed for newborns. But there was nothing rational about the fear I felt, and I could not help worrying. All I wanted was to be home where I knew we were safe.

Bringing Star home for the first time was anticlimactic. I spent all this time preparing so much and cleaning everything, but the reality was I only needed a few things. Myself, Hia, diapers and burp cloths, and somewhere safe for her to sleep which was not in the beautiful crib I bought.

The reality of being a new parent goes something like this. Star needed to be fed every four hours. First up would be me. I would go and get Star and then breastfeed her. It was important to make sure that both breasts were used. Feeding Star took 30 – 60 minutes. During feeding I scented her and when she was done feeding, I burped her.

After that, it was Zee's turn. He took Star changed her diaper, scented and swaddled her, took her back down the hall to her room, and "tried" to put her back to sleep. Feeding time, from start to finish, would take about two hours. Then everyone tried to sleep and if Star did not wake up, we could get 2 hours sleep and then we repeated this: 24 hours a day, seven days a week.

Neither of us liked putting Star in another room. It made sleeping impossible for us. Being new parents, we worried about everything. Was she breathing? Why was her face scratched? What was that sound on the baby monitor? Why was she crying? Was she fussy or did she need us? We were up and down that hall constantly checking on her and nobody slept. I remembered the setup in the hospital. They put Star in a see-through tiny crib next to my bed. That was perfect. I wanted that.

Within one day, we had a little co-sleeper crib that fit right next to me and was the same height as the mattress. Feeding time, no problem. I reached over and grabbed her. Putting her to sleep was easy, she slept better when we were all in the same room. Was she breathing? We could check as often as we wanted.

Another phenomenon that I noticed was my revulsion to vomit, poop, pee, and slobber disappeared. All day long Star drooled on me. It happened so much that I always had to have a cloth under her cute little mouth. Spitting up after eating was a 100% occurrence. Then there were the multiple random times during the day that white milky liquid poured out of her mouth. How did she look so cute even when she was spitting up?

At every diaper change, we scrutinized her poo. What color was it? What was the consistency? How did it smell? Yes, I smell dirty diapers now and I don't want to puke. My theory on how this phenomenon occurred was my body was pumping my brain full of so many happy hormones, that I was in a permanent state of blissed out. We loved our little cutesy wootesy baby so much that it altered our core identities.

When planning for Star, Hia and I decided we would go green and use reusable diapers.

All I have to say about that now is, "HA HA HA HA HA HA. Weren't we cute?"

What we did not account for was the endless loads of laundry we had to do a day. Did I mention that her clothes needed to be changed constantly? She leaked liquid all day long. Even with the burp cloths she still got it all over herself and us. We all changed several times a day.

Since I am not used to having much money, I rolled up my sleeves and tried to do the laundry myself. Which meant neither of us was sleeping. Between the feeding routine, the laundry, and feeding ourselves, we did not sleep. Let's just say Hia and I may have snapped at each other and had a couple of bitchy pointless arguments. One of them was over hiring a diaper service that picked up our dirty burp cloths and diapers and delivered new ones each day. Why was I fighting this, honestly? I don't even remember my reasons. Hia won that fight and it was the best decision we ever made.

Okay, I am exaggerating, but when you are getting a few hours of sleep a day, it does not take much to make you happy. Like when Mom showed up with a week's worth of pre-cooked food. I was so happy I cried all over her. Hia was not much better. My Dad had to tell Hia to back off. Alphaholes!

Just when we were getting the hang of it, bathing got added to the routine. But wait, there is a funny story here.

When we came home with Star, she had a piece of her umbilical cord still attached to her. We were told we had to take special care of it. It could not get wet. It had to be kept free of the diaper, and it needed to be examined daily to make sure there was no infection. Around two weeks give or take, it would naturally fall off then after a few days we could start bathing her.

Hia was not around for this part of the instructions, and I failed to tell him. Sorry baby.

It was day 15 when the umbilical cord broke off. Hia was doing the diaper change, and I was researching my latest obsessive fear on my phone when I heard, Hia screaming across the room.

"Nhu! Nhu!"

I have never moved so fast in my entire life. I thought Star was hurt or worse. When I got to Hia's side his eyes were full of tears and he pointed at Star. I looked at Star who was naked, covered in poo, and crying. I failed to see what was wrong.

"Hia, what is it? What is wrong?", I asked.

Hia pointed at her tummy. She looked fine. I was freaking out. How could I fix it if I didn't know what was wrong?

"Use your words Hia. What is wrong with Star?"

I may have yelled at Hia. Sorry Teerak.

"It's gone. It's gone.", Hia says.

He pointed again at her belly button and then realization flooded my body with relief.

Oh, thank God.

Then I started to giggle. I was not laughing at him, I was just, so relieved. Hia looked at me with wide eyes and swiped at his eyes. Like he needed to clear the tears out of his eyes to see me clearly because surely, I was not laughing at a time like this. Indeed, I was laughing, and I could not stop. Hia's eyebrows remained drawn, but he gave me this little smile that alternated between a frown and a smile. His face was so cute, and he looked so puzzled. Then he cocked his head to the side like a puppy and I howled.

"Is she okay?", Hia asked.

I nodded my head because I could not stop laughing.

"But Stumpy is gone.", he said.

We named the remaining umbilical cord Stumpy because it was referred to as the stump. 'When caring for the stump make sure to keep it dry at all times.'

Hia looked so forlorn when he said this, that it made my case of the giggles worse. I fell back onto the bed holding my stomach. Hia was not amused. He stiffly cleaned up Star, changed her diaper, handed her to me, and stomped off. He really stomped, out of the room. It was a miracle I did not drop Star because when he stomped, it was so cute, that it fueled a new bout of the giggles.

Oh, and guess where we found Stumpy? We noticed a smell, like old milk, and followed it to its source under the chair in the family room. Apparently, July had a little shrine to Star under there. We found a rattle, a sock, a used burp cloth (the source of the smell), and Stumpy. We figured Stumpy fell off when Hia was undressing Star, and our fuzzy little opportunist grabbed it and ran off with it.