One of the biggest motivations for writing this blog was because my mother told me several times that I should write down the funny things that they do because no matter how brilliant they seem now, they will be forgotten. She was right, as mothers tend to be about these things, and unfortunately the boys were 18 months old before I started. So all I can do now is try to recall some of the moments that would have inspired a blog post.
First entry in the series is about one of the first times that I was left alone with the boys and regular readers will know that it was bound to end badly!!
I can’t remember what age they were but I know that they were starting on a spoon feed so they must have been about 4 months old. They certainly were still at the stage where they were very dependant.
It’s important for context to note that I hate lazy stereotypes. By this, I mean things like assuming that men should just drink beer, watch football and leave raising the children to the womenfolk. If they are the things that define a man, I fail on everything except the watching football part of it. I have a couple of friends who regularly pull me up on things like carrying a man bag, wearing lip balm and playing an indoor sport [I don’t know how they can make a case for outdoor sport with Ireland’s climate!] because it doesn’t fit their idea of manliness. I say it takes a real man to wear pink and stand out from the crowd. This is why it was important to me to demonstrate that I was more than capable of looking after my own kids for a few hours.
[Have you guessed how it ends yet? Should I throw in a red herring to keep you interested?]
Anyway, the boys were fairly set in their routine so there was nothing to it but to stick to the schedule and everything would be fine. It was coming up to lunchtime and we used to change the boys before their meal to wake them up a little. Excuse me while I remember the good old days where they slept for 22 hours a day instead of running around tearing your house apart and demanding a biscuit every five minutes.
OK, I’m back.
I had put them in little bouncers that hung from the frame of the door to amuse them while I got ready for lunch. They are great little things, it’s like a cloth seat that is supported by a large spring so that they can jump up and down without fear of concussion. The downside is that should a child have a bowel movement while in the bouncer, the poop will likely be pushed up and out of the nappy with each little hop. Which is exactly what happened to Monkey Boy. By the time I noticed the smell it was half way up his back.
No problem, I thought – I’m a capable guy and I have tidied the likes of this up half a dozen times. It took a few minutes but I stripped him down, cleaned him up and went to prepare their lunch. By now, I was running a bit behind and they were starting to voice their displeasure at my tardiness. I brought in their lunch, picked up Fat Chops and started to feed him. As the nickname suggests he was the better eater of the two. Normally, Monkey Boy wouldn’t be too bothered about it but on this day he was either very hungry or ticked off at being left to wait. I decided to switch up and feed MB leaving FC to wait. That’s when the tennis match began.
It’s a truism that the more people you try to keep happy the more you fail. I picked one up, fed them a spoon of lunch and then swapped for the other. Lather, rinse, repeat. The screaming just got louder and louder and each yell scraped away another layer of calm until I was on the verge of panic. Determined not to fail, I decided to skip the spoon feed and just give the boys their bottle on the basis that it always was accepted gratefully and would keep them quiet. Of course, this day was the exception to that rule. They had worked themselves up to a crescendo and wouldn’t be calmed by the bottle. If I put one down to calm the other he would screech until I started worrying about out next door neighbours calling the police and a murder.
I needed help.
Imagine being a college student sitting at home, lazing a Sunday morning away watching TV and texting your friends about what happened the previous night. Imagine the doorbell ringing and when you answered being confronted with a tall man with a shaved head. He has bags under his eyes and is clearly under pressure. He is holding a baby in each arm, one trying to outdo the other in a shouting match. He asks, no pleads, for you to help him feed the screaming boys. Could you say no to him? Thankfully, neither could the girl next door.
Real men ask for help too!
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