Waiting For My Real Life To Begin

I spent a few hours at work, and called Sara in the very late afternoon to check on her and the status of our paperwork for Emi-chan. I heard Emi crying her little heart out in the background, so I packed up and headed back to the hospital. It turned out that she was crying because Sara was changing her while she was talking to me, and Emi pretty much hates all that booty stuff.

She did have a rough afternoon though, and had a lot of difficulty sleeping, which kept her quite worked up. She kept wanting to feed, more as a pacifier than because she was hungry, which kept Sara from being able to properly regenerate her supply, which in turn made Emi more irritated because the milk wouldn’t come when she tried for it. When I got back to the hospital, Sara had calmed her down a bit, and she was just chilling in the room, looking around at everything. After I was there for a minute, she got the hiccups again, and I got another quick video.

This time, no embarrassing incidents, and she added some uber-cute to the equation. She reaches out to grab my camera cord, and I, in typical new father fashion, melt like a snowman in Death Valley. I swear to god becoming a father is turning me into a woman, but that’s another story for another time. Then, at the end of the video, she waves again when I tell her to say goodbye. Once is a coincidence, but twice really makes me wonder whether she understands more of what we’re saying.

I know she’s becoming more observant and aware, both aurally and visually. Two days ago, I wore a red T-shirt and she spent a solid two minutes just staring at it. I realized then that she had never seen that color before. Everything at the hospital is white or pink, but nothing so bright as that red. Then yesterday, I wore a bright green shirt, and she again spent a good minute staring at it. So, to continue the trend, today I wore a bright blue T-shirt and sure enough, she again spent some time looking at it and trying to understand the color. You can almost see the gears turning in her head. She really is an amazing little girl.

Just a couple minutes after recording that video, Emi needed another diaper change, and as I was taking care of that the Babypocalypse began anew. It took a bit of a struggle to get her cleaned up, but once all was said and done, it was Daddy 1, Poopy Diaper 0. Emi was really worked up, so I took her for a walk again and sang her a couple of songs. One of them I made up a couple of days ago with kind of a soothing tune, and she seems to like it.

Nothing Earth-shattering lyrically, but it makes her happy which is all I care about. A couple of passes down the hall and her big blue eyes shut once again. I took her back to the room like a superhero returning from saving the city. I managed to comfort her restlessness and keep her asleep for close to four hours to give Sara a chance to rest and recharge a little bit. It made me feel pretty awesome to be able to calm her down and get her to sleep after being so fussy for so long. I don’t want to jinx anything, but it seems Emi and I are starting to form a very strong connection. I know I felt it as soon as I first met her, and it’s nice to see that it’s starting to develop in her as well. Nothing more tragic than unrequited filial love.

Sara met with the doctor for her checkup this afternoon while I was at work and she got the all clear. Seems things are healing very well and she’s been given the green light to come home tomorrow, just in time for her mom and sis to arrive. Also today, a few people stopped by the hospital to visit with Sara and Emi. First, in the afternoon, the wife of Dirk, one of the post-docs I work with at the GRC, stopped by to say hi and gave some gifts for the baby. Then, this evening while I was there, Mejima-san, Miyamoto-san, and Ohkuma-san from the research support depratment of the GRC where Sara works stopped by and brought presents for the baby. She’s making out like a bandit with this whole being born thing!

But now, I sit here at home, alone with the animals for one last night before my girls can finally come home to me. It’s not all bad though, because at least I have the memory of a day bookended by Emi’s favorite hobby, Napping On Daddy. It won’t be long now before I’ll have my whole family together at last. I’ve been waiting nine months. Just one more day. One more day…