Months ago, when we began to feed Micah fruits and veggies, Elliot picked up a container of prunes. Prunes (or plums, depending on the marketing) are one of the basic stage 1 baby foods that most babies can (and should) try. As everyone is aware, prunes are well-known for their laxative qualities. Since Micah is a regular pooping machine, I have maintained a healthy fear of prunes this past few months . . . until yesterday. On Monday, Micah did not poop the entire day (unusual, since my little pooping machine usually poops at least 2-3 times each day). When he woke up on Tuesday, he still had not pooped. We were due to start a new fruit or vegetable, so I decided to try the prunes – it seemed like an opportune time.
I decided to proceed with caution. I think the rule of thumb with prunes is “a little bit goes a long way.” I normally give him about 2 ounces of fruit with his oatmeal, and we often mix fruits for breakfast, so I usually give him about 1 ounce of a new fruit to test the waters. Because it was prunes, I decided to only give Micah 1/2 ounce of prunes, and I mixed them with 1 1/2 ounces of apples (which are known to cause constipation). My hope was the two fruits together would result in “zero impact.” All went well yesterday. Micah pooped 2 times, and much to my surprise and amazement, it was pretty mild.
Feeling emboldened by our raging foray into the land of prunes, this morning I decided to just give him the rest of the prunes in the container – about 1 1/2 ounces. He ate them up, and I topped him off with a bit of a pear-apple-mango mixture. He took a nice long morning nap, and off we went to playgroup. While there, I heard a loud scream, and when I went to Micah, I realized he had pooped. It was *just* barely a SUB – something I haven’t seen in almost 2 months. I cleaned him up, wiped down the clothing, and we went back to playing.
After playgroup, he napped on the way home. I sent him upstairs with Elliot, who had Micah playing in the hop and pop. All of the sudden, I hear a loud shout from Elliot “It’s a SUB, it’s a SERIOUS SUB!!” I ran upstairs to help, and Micah is COVERED in poop – it is just dripping down his legs. We cover up the changing table with cloth diapers and Elliot starts to clean him up and change his diaper. We quickly realize that a bath is necessary. While Elliot is bathing Micah, I went in to the bedroom to survey the damage to the hop and pop. Amazingly, there is no poop on the seat of the hop and pop. Upon closer inspection, I realize there is a puddle of poop on the base of the hop and pop, nearly 1 inch thick. There is also a puddle of poop on the carpet. I spent the next 20 minutes cleaning up the poop (my biggest fear was that Nugget would find this heavenly mess and dive right in). Ick! I don’t think we’ll play with prunes again – I’ve learned my lesson.
Yesterday (Micah’s 7 month birthday) was a very good day. We woke up in the morning, nursed, ate breakfast, took a nap, nursed again, went for a walk and played on the swing at the park with all the kids at camp, came back home, ate again, went to meet our friends at the pool, swam, nursed, chewed on a teething biscuit, napped, came home, nursed, played for a few hours, took a bath, nursed, had dinner, nursed and went to bed. Okay, maybe that doesn’t sound so exciting to you, but it was Micah’s first day eating three meals (and he ate EVERYTHING), he loved the attention he got from the camp children at the park while he was swinging, and he had a lot of fun hanging out with his friends at the baby pool. What better way can a 7 month old celebrate?