Explosion

Patrick's always been a good pooper. He always goes at least once a day, and usually it's two or three times. Because he's so regular, I start to worry anytime he goes twenty-four hours without a dirty diaper.

Sunday marked one of those twenty-four hour intervals, and I had to resort to drastic measures to encourage him to poop: mixed fruit yogurt. The first time we tried this yogurt, he had the runniest poop he'd had in a while, so we decided it was probably best to save it for when he needed a mild laxative. Now every time he gets a little stopped up, we pull out the mixed fruit yogurt. We'll move on to prunes or peaches if that doesn't work, but we've only ever needed to buy prunes once. Ironically enough, that was the last time he had a major diaper explosion.

Until yesterday. All during dinner, he was straining like he was trying to poop. He was struggling so hard that I was certain I would have to pull out more mixed fruit yogurt again. It didn't seem to have really worked from the day before. I'm glad I waited, though. When I followed my typical after-dinner clean-up routine, I lifted his leg to find any Cheerios he had hidden under there, or up the leg of his pants, his favorite hiding place. Instead of finding Cheerios, however, I saw something much more disgusting oozing out of his diaper. He'd been sitting sideways while he ate and pooped, and the force of the poop had pushed it right over the edge.

I was so relieved I'd found the poop that way. If I hadn't, I would have picked him up and put my hand at that exact spot on his butt to hold him just a few minutes later. It was gross enough to see, but at least I was spared getting my hand in it. Matt couldn't figure out what was wrong when I came hurrying through the living room holding Patrick out away from me at arms' length under the armpits. Since then, Patrick has had two more massive poopy diapers that both fortunately stayed where they belonged.

Patrick has started using his index finger much more. He'll hold his hand like he's pointing often, and he's trying to use it and his thumb to grab things, like Cheerios (the pincer grasp). It's a good sign that he's continuing to develop. I'll hold him near the wall switch to turn on or off his ceiling fan, and he reaches out for it every time now, using that index finger to push the switch up or pull it down. He obviously loves helping out that way and learning how to use his index finger at the same time.

Today for the first time he also showed an interest in moving places on his own. He didn't scream for a few minutes while he was on his belly and instead moved his arms and legs like he was trying to army crawl. When I showed him what an army crawl looked like, he actually started squirming in imitation of me and moved a few inches--mostly backwards. I think he'll be so happy that he's moving that it won't matter if he starts out backwards. I did, and it doesn't seem to have ruined me! Anyway, I think within a matter of a week or two, he will be mobile, even if it is not traditional crawling yet.