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Quick! Which end of the baby does this belong to?
If I showed you a list of things I cared about before becoming a father I can guarantee that someone else’s poop would not be in my top 10 list. But having a baby changes your priority list so that truly important thoughts like “How did Michael Bay manage to make The Transformers Movie suck and not suck at the exact same time?” gets mixed in with “Did the baby poop in the last 12 hours? And, almost more importantly, what kind of poop was it?”
Yes, there are “kinds” of poop. And they’re very important.
You knew that, of course. You probably even paid attention to it when you weren’t feeling well. But baby poop is a lot more important than your own poop. You see, a baby’s poop is about as close as one gets to actually having dashboard gauges on your little bundle of joy. If Baby has too much rice and bananas and not enough liquid and you get… well… you get nothing. Too much fiber and prunes and you get mud pie city in his pants.
When you have a baby these types of poop aren’t just some passing fact that is forgotten when the fan is turned off. As a parent poop becomes something you study and hold up to the light and clap and cheer about. Poop consumes your life when you have a baby. Poop becomes an actual conversation topic that you could go on about for days.
“Did the baby poop today?”
“Yes, he had a load in his diaper when he woke up.”
“What kind was it?”
“Brown and a little sticky. It was good poop! But do you think we’re giving him too much rice?”
‘Hmm, I don’t know. Yesterday he had pellets, but the prunes seemed to have helped. It wasn’t black at all, right?”
“Oh no, not at all! Say, remember that green sticky mustard poop he had when he was born?”
“Ohhh yeah! That was so cute!”
“Yeah… Ahh, good times… good times!”
“Those are the memories we’ll cherish…”
This sort of talk counts as foreplay in our house these days.
As a parent you’ll experience each end of the poop spectrum and everything in between. Our little Baby Coffee has had days where he produced nothing but screams and little poop marbles which were harder and more perfectly round than any space-age ball bearing I’ve ever seen. We’ve also had days where our little angel from heaven has shot water out his butt like it was a fire hose.
The trick, of course, is to regulate your finely tuned poop machine with every kind of food so that your baby doesn’t produce solid poop marbles through screams or poop slushies with giggles. Keeping baby’s poop consistent requires the same precision and balance that you normally reserve for regulating the chemicals in your swimming pool. It isn’t always an easy task and there are times when the science just doesn’t add up.
For example, we’ve learned that our Baby Coffee can turn a mere 3 spoonfuls of prunes into approximately 350 gallons of poop in about 24 hours. This, of course, makes no sense at all. This has also led me to wonder if I can sell baby poop as some sort high-end organic fertilizer to rich snots on eBay. So far my wife has prevented me from trying. She never lets me have any fun.
We’ve also learned that if we bring Baby Coffee anywhere within 50 feet of a banana or piece of rice his little backside clamps up like Alberto Gonzalez before a Senate Committee: we hear a lot of noise, but nothing substantial ever seems to come out.
You don’t truly understand any of these poopy predicaments until you actually become a parent for the first time. No book in the world can explain why normally sane parents get as excited over a little pile of poop in a diaper as they would if they just found a diamond in their Cheerios. We just do.
For those of you who not yet parents: you probably shouldn’t read this article. It might gross you out and prevent you from ever having children of your own or ever touching a baby again.
For those of you who are parents: have any of you tried fertilizing your garden with this stuff? Hmm….
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3 Responses to “The Wonderful World of Baby Poop”
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Paul says:
As always an awesome article! Mood poop. Black is bad, grainy is sick, green is confusing, pasty is good etc.
Our friends look at us like we are certifiably insane, and come to think of it at this point the cert might be cheaper than explaining the situation…
Great article Tom!
July 12th, 2007 at 11:52 am -
Vin says:
Great article, I had this same exact conversation with my wife regarding daily poop checks for our little one. Ah, the memories.
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Shana says:
I love your website! This last blog had me bursting out laughing! I can’t wait to have these same conversations in a few months!