Vampire Baby Feeds

So innocent looking...until nightfall

Unfortunately for all parties involved, Ryan has three quick trips that he has to take in July (which stinks, but is much better than the almost-six-months-straight he had to travel before the baby), and the first trip was over the Fourth. I was a bit nervous (admittedly), but the plan was for me to hole up in the house, prove to myself that I could do it alone, and simply survive the 36 hours he was to be gone.

Tuesday evening before Ryan's trip, around our 11 p.m. feeding, E.V. started acting fussy. It was strange; besides our first night home, she's been such an angel. She was naturally waking up every three or so hours to eat, barely crying and sleeping soundly despite our loud TV, vacuum, dogs barking and visitors talking. In fact, we thought Vampire Baby had been totally vanquished, and had begun to relax a little bit. (Big mistake.) It was a manageable night, although much less predictable and enjoyable as the few nights preceding it. As Ryan headed to the airport in the morning, I thought, "What an odd night. Good thing Ryan was here." (Big mistake #2.)

Vampire Baby lives. Thankfully, when she didn't return to her normal, pleasant demeanor by mid-morning (and I could no longer chalk it up to a bad night), I consulted my wisest friend for some answers. Google responded that it was probably her first growth spurt, which he mentioned usually happens between one and three weeks old. Hmmm. Tuesday at 11 p.m.--TWO hours shy of being EXACTLY one week old. What can I say? The girl inherited my sense of promptness!

It was a bit easier to deal with Vampire Baby once I knew why she had appeared again, although instead of simply being a creature of the night this time, she was HUNGRY. Every time she looked at me, it was as if I was just a giant floating bottle, and her fangs (I swear she has some hiding in that perfectly cute little mouth of hers) would appear every time I walked in the room. Every hour and half or so, she was ravenous. She needed a victim, and unfortunately for me, I was the only sorry sap in sight. Needless to say, it was an exhausting Fourth of July. In fact, I hate to admit this, but I didn't even step outside to watch the fireworks in the distance and had to be satisfied with hearing the pop and sizzle from my living room couch.

Besides feeding Vampire Baby, I tried to keep her happy in the true vampire fashion (thank you, pop culture for preparing me to deal with such a creature). During daylight hours, vampires prefer the curtains to be drawn and the lights out. They rest best in enclosed areas (Vampire Baby prefers her pack 'n play the most), and should NOT be held by humans unless said humans are ready to be fed on at a moment's notice. I crept around the house (which we've purposely NOT been doing thus far), living by the mantra "Don't wake the baby!" so as to let sleeping vampires lie. Overnight, expecting NOT to sleep (since vampires are naturally nocturnal) helps one survive. Also, due to this nocturnal nature they tend to hunt even MORE voraciously at night, so expecting to be supper (and a midnight snack...and a 2 a.m. snack...and fourth meal...and etc.) allows a victim to accept their fate more easily.

Thankfully for me, the wise Mr. Google also mentioned that growth spurts last only two to three days, so as Ryan returned yesterday evening, it seems that the last vestiges of Vampire Baby's First Feed started to dissipate. And although last night she DID have that "I want to suck your blood" look about her in the middle of the night, she was semi-back to herself. However, I did happen to notice that as I rocked her to sleep early this morning, she stared at us in the mirror on the wall, quite perplexed by what she saw. Perhaps because she failed to see her own reflection? Maybe...

No sleep when you're alone with a baby? Not so fun...