Adventures in Diapering

In the great baseball movie Bull Durham, the aging catcher Crash Davis says at one point, "Sometimes you win. Sometimes you lose. Sometimes, it rains."

How true that is. (Of course, in our world, usually it rains when you actually have time to watch your favorite baseball team play their fiercest rival, and you stare in dismay at the little "rain delay" icon on the bottom right-hand corner of the television screen.)

But since this is a blog about life with a new baby, let's get a little scatalogical, shall we? Here's the life-with-baby version of that quote. "Sometimes, you change the baby after a messy diaper. Sometimes, you change the baby right before he creates a messy diaper. And sometimes...well, sometimes you're right smack dab in the middle of changing the baby's diaper when all hell breaks loose."



Let's just say that David was pretty nimble (and lucky) to avoid the geyser of poop that erupted from his son this morning during the middle of a diaper change. It was a mess of rather epic proportions when you consider the source. Thank goodness for baby wipes. William,wriggling his arms and legs, looked extremely pleased with himself for causing such an incident. I swear, he smiled. He didn't seem upset in the least to be partially lying in a puddle. Yuck. Did I mention that I'm thankful for baby wipes? William pulled a similar stunt in the ladies' restroom at the outlet mall a couple of weeks ago, but he must have been saving up for this one.

What did the good Dr. Wyckoff have to say about this?

"It shot out like a fountain or something," he said, a trace of amazement still in his voice three hours later.

But he was not deterred from his task at hand, even though it had just unexpectedly increased in urgency. Two diapers later, William was all clean and dry.

See, these are the things that they need to teach you about in those pre-birth classes that everyone takes. No one ever mentions those things. You learn about using tennis balls to massage your back when you're in labor (note: we never did this, nor even thought about it) and where they insert the needle for the epidural (note: you're better off just not knowing). And in the hospital, you have doctors and nurses and people to take care of you, but when it comes to volcanic messes, well, you're kinda on your own. Luckily for us, David has the natural agility that cannot be taught. No extra laundry for him!