Ep. 45: Do Me a Solid, Baby

[Music]

Laura Birek: Hi. Welcome to Big Fat Positive with Shanna and Laura. This week we have our weekly check-ins, we have a new segment called Gripe Water, where we talk about the things that rub us the wrong way about parenting and babies and we have our BFPs and BFNs. Let’s get to it.

[Music]

Laura Birek: Hi, everyone. Welcome to the show. This is episode 45. Hi, Shanna.

Shanna Micko: Hello. Hello.

Laura Birek: Shall we jump right into our weekly check-ins? What’s going on with you this week?

Shanna Micko: Yeah, my baby is 17 weeks old.

Laura Birek: Gosh. It sounds like she’s getting so big. That’s a big number.

Shanna Micko: It’s a really big number and it means she’s four months old now.

Laura Birek: It feels too fast, Shanna. It’s like so slow and so fast at the same time. 

I don’t know how to reconcile that.

Shanna Micko: It’s just crazy and the speed with which they develop is amazing. It’s just like, a few short weeks ago she was just this tiny flailing little newborn, and now she can do all kinds of things: roll over, blow raspberries. It’s so fun. She’s so fun right now and last week I think I was complaining about how hard it’s been lately with the four month sleep regression and the fourth leap she’s been in, she’s been really struggling and I feel like a lot of that has smoothed out this week.

Laura Birek: Oh, good.

Shanna Micko: It’s been really nice and fun and just a joy to be with her. She just melts my heart.

Laura Birek: That’s so good to hear, because it sounded like you were having a hard time with that four month regression.

Shanna Micko: So was she. I felt really bad, because she was struggling really hard and so we’re both feeling better now. We’re on the up and up.

Laura Birek: How long do you think that lasted together in retrospect?

Shanna Micko: Two weeks.

Laura Birek: Okay.

Shanna Micko: I’d say the fussiness started maybe like three weeks ago and then got pretty bad for about two weeks.

Laura Birek: That’s not so bad. It sounds terrible.

Shanna Micko: There’s hope for you and everyone out there that…

Laura Birek: It’s so funny, because every time you go through something, I’m just like, okay, it’s coming up. I’m just like right behind you.

Shanna Micko: Exactly. So another thing that’ll be coming up for you soon is the four month checkup at the doctor, which we did and that went really well. She got her shots and she did really well with those. I was surprised she cried obviously, especially the intramuscular one, picked her up and the doctor made a funny face at her and she was like, hey, and I was like, yay.

Laura Birek: Good.

Shanna Micko: Because it could be so traumatizing when they’re just like so upset, but I feel like she was very tired and extra cranky for a couple days after getting those shots and I don’t know if that’s correlated at all.

Laura Birek: My mom says it is. When my guy got his first shot, she’s like, he’s going to be super sleepy and he is going to be cranky. Really?

Shanna Micko: Okay. So I wasn’t just making that up.

Laura Birek: You weren’t just imagining it. No. I think that’s really common. We were talking about that in my Mommy and Me class, because everyone was getting their two month shots right around the same time and it was pretty common. People were like, “Is it normal that my baby just slept all day after it and he was grumpy every time he woke up?” It’s like, “Yeah, that’s it. That’s how it goes.”

Shanna Micko: I have to say after she got the shots I was a little excited that I’d probably get a lot of napping time.

Laura Birek: I know right.

Shanna Micko: Like I think she’s probably going to be sleepy and she was, but then the cranky came on. But she’s better now. It’s all good and then the big thing that came out of that is the doctor instructed me to start introducing solid foods to her.

Laura Birek: Crap. Wow. That’s huge.

Shanna Micko: That’s really huge and a little bit earlier I was thinking back to my first daughter and I think I started with her around five months and I remember feeling like, ooh, I’m being a rebel by starting earlier than they suggest. They would say wait till six months. So he’s like just give her anything and everything. The only thing you have to wait a year for is honey. Give her little licks of stuff, just start introducing her to the tastes and textures and so I took that challenge and ran with it and we started.

Laura Birek: Does she like it?

Shanna Micko: Totally.

Laura Birek: Really?

Shanna Micko: Yeah, she loves it. She really likes it. I have to hold her. She sits up pretty well with support, so I sit her on my lap. We started just with rice cereal that you put a little breast milk into and mix it up and some apple sauce and at first she was like, what in the hell is this and was making all kinds of funny faces? I put the phone in front of me with the camera facing us so I could see her.

Laura Birek: I was going to say I really hope you videotaped this.

Shanna Micko: I totally videoed it. She was just like, blah. But she did really well. I thought she would just spit everything out, but she didn’t. 

She ate everything and by day two, she was like eagerly opening her mouth when the spoon was coming toward her.

Laura Birek: Wow. Oh my God, she’s a girl after my own heart.

Shanna Micko: I’m going to be giving her pizza soon, ice cream cheese. So it’s fun. I like it. It’s something different to do. I like having things to do with my baby and sitting down and the ritual of the bib and the food and I love it.

Laura Birek: You love a good ritual.

Shanna Micko: Oh God, I love a good ritual. I do. So the feeding ritual is key.

Laura Birek: See, I’m a little nervous about starting on solid foods, because I’m like we’re in a groove with this breastfeeding. It just is so easy and I don’t have to think about it and it’s easy clean up, but I know it’s coming. But also, I want him to love food, because I love food. The thing that would be such a bummer to me is if I got a kid who just won’t eat anything.

Shanna Micko: That would be tough.

Laura Birek: I think starting him as early as possible and giving him a wide variety sounds like a good way to try to at least get him to have a good palate. That’s coming around the bend for us. I’m sure.

Shanna Micko: You start slow, you start small. It’s one of those things where you ease into it. It’s like first you start with little tiny portions, like one tiny bowl and spoon and you get used to cleaning that up and then they get older and the meals get bigger and messier, but you’re prepped for it by that point. You’re not diving into finger foods and everything, so it’ll be good.

Laura Birek: It’s not like I’m putting him in front of a steak dinner, right?

Shanna Micko: Yes, teaching him how to use a steak knife at four months.

Laura Birek: That would be dangerous.

Shanna Micko: That would be so dangerous. He would be up for it though. Kids love cutlery.

Laura Birek: He would love to grab that and then I would probably be perforated.

Shanna Micko: Perforated is such a nice way of saying sliced open. You’re so sweet, but that’s pretty much my check-in. What about you?

Laura Birek: So my baby is 13 weeks old and we had a pretty mellow week. At the beginning of the week, my mom came into town for 24 hours. She was like a quick visit.

Shanna Micko: That’s so awesome. She makes time to just come into town to see you for one day.

Laura Birek: She does that anyway, because she’s great. But this also was in preparation for a longer visit. So what she actually is doing is she came down at the beginning of this week for 24 hours and then was flying up to a meeting in Seattle and then she was going to fly straight back. So she like left her car here and she’s staying for a whole week next week. So that’s like the tradeoff. She would do that either way, but she’d come down for like two hours. She’s so obsessed with my little guy. It’s so sweet. They love each other. But it’s sort of the first part of a longer larger trip. But it was nice to see her and she came and the big thing she did was she let Corey and I go out and we actually went and saw a movie.

Shanna Micko: Oh my God, did you stay awake through it? That’s the first thing I can only think of.

Laura Birek: We did. We saw Captain Marvel, so I feel like I have to say Captain Marvel was a great movie, because we both stayed awake through the whole thing on three months of complete sleep deprivation.

Shanna Micko: That’s a good endorsement.

Laura Birek: So good going Marvel for making it good and Captain Marvel was fun. It was a fun like feminist movie, so I was really into it and it’s set in the nineties. No one told me it was set in the nineties. Did you know that?

Shanna Micko: That’s a surprise. No.

Laura Birek: I think it’s ’95, so people of our generation, it’s just like nostalgia bait. At the very beginning, this is not a spoiler, because this is in the trailer. She crashes into a blockbuster video. I could just hear everyone in the audience who was like in my demographic gasping, because they were just like, remember when we used to go to a store and rent movies. It was so funny. The guy next to me was freaking out.

Shanna Micko: Wow. He was really feeling it.

Laura Birek: He really was. He also talked through the whole thing. Corey and I don’t know what it is. It’s like we must have done something in our previous life that was like bad, but not so bad. You know what I mean? We didn’t get any really, really bad comic repercussions, but our punishment for whatever we did in the past life is that we always without fail sit next to, or in front of someone talking throughout the entire movie.

Shanna Micko: You must have done something atrocious in your previous life, because that’s bad.

Laura Birek: It’s like a very specific…

Shanna Micko: I will say something to people and I can’t tolerate that. 

Do you guys say anything?

Laura Birek: No, we’re just passive aggressive. We just like look a lot, turning our head a lot. Then when I have said something or sort of been like, could you quiet down? It never ends well. I feel like it puts people on defensive and they just talk more.

Shanna Micko: Then I feel weird about being confrontational.

Laura Birek: I’m not confrontational. Although I was thinking like, maybe we didn’t do anything that bad to get this to be our consequence. But it is a very specifically the worst thing that could happen to Corey type of consequence, because he’s such a movie fan and it just grates on his nerves so bad.

Shanna Micko: Well, that is one of the benefits of the streaming services, the Netflix and the Amazon, and being able to just watch it in your own home and tape your spouse’s mouth shut, so they don’t say anything the whole time.

Laura Birek: There are also people you know you can watch a movie with and then people you know you can’t. I love my mother for so many reasons, but it’s hard to watch a movie with her, because she talks and that’s her deal and not in the theater. To be fair, she’s not a monster. She does not talk in the theater. But if we’re watching TV, it’s not sacred. But anyway, so we went and saw a movie and that was great and then at the end of the week I ended up getting a kind of mild cold. So that was a bummer. Corey stayed home from work one day to let me sleep it off when it was the worst, but this was my first time sort of being sick and having to take care of a baby all by myself. That was an interesting challenge.

Shanna Micko: It sounds exhausting.

Laura Birek: Because you’re just tired and don’t feel good and they’re just like, look at you. Hey, let’s still do all the stuff we normally do and you’re just like, but don’t you understand, child? I’m so tired. So it was honestly not that bad and here’s the other thing. I was afraid to take Sudafed, because it is associated with lowering breast milk production. It’s a thing that people take to dry up breast milk when they’re trying to wean. I know that a lot of people take it and it comes right back, but I was also worried I wanted him to get as much breast milk as possible when I was sick so that he would be protected by the antibodies and I was worried about making it go lower. So I just didn’t want to do it. But if I could have just taken Sudafed or decided it was fine, I could have taken it. It’s safe for breastfeeding. It just might have affected my milk supply. I think I would’ve felt fine. I think I would’ve barely noticed it.

Shanna Micko: Yes, when you can’t get rid of the head congestion during the day, that is when it’s killer, like, ugh.

Laura Birek: Yeah, I did get some Afrin, which we’ve talked about before on the podcast.

Shanna Micko: I love Afrin.

Laura Birek: It’s three days only you can use it, but those three days are solid.

Shanna Micko: Milk it for all.

Laura Birek: But anyway, that was my week. Got to see a movie, got to be a little sick. You win some, you lose some.

Shanna Micko: Sounds good. Should we move on?

Laura Birek: Yeah, after a quick break.

Shanna Micko: All right.

[Music]

Shanna Micko: Our next segment is a new segment that we call Gripe Water, where we discuss parenting and baby-related topics that rub us the wrong way. Laura, what do you have for us?

Laura Birek: Okay. So I have a major gripe.

Shanna Micko: Ooh.

Laura Birek: My complaint today is about baby clothes sizes.

Shanna Micko: Go on.

Laura Birek: They are so fucking inconsistent. I’m sorry.

Shanna Micko: You mean across brands?

Laura Birek: Yes, right now my son is 13 weeks, so he’s three and a half months-ish and he just got out of newborn sizes. He’s wearing like Carter’s size three months, some other brand he’s three to six months. But then if I put him in another brand’s three to six months, he’s absolutely swimming in them. So it’s really hard for me to know. I have all these hand-me-downs. He has a lot of clothes he’s never worn before and he doesn’t really like getting changed. That’s probably his least favorite activity of the day. So it’s really, really painful when I grab a piece of clothing out and I try to put it on him and I realize it’s like too tight. I can’t get his little arms in or whatever.

Shanna Micko: Oh, no.

Laura Birek: Then I have to start again and it’s just because none of this shit is consistent. One brand’s six month or three month size is equivalent to the next size up in other brands and it’s so confusing. Have you had this problem?

Shanna Micko: I have. Our friend Jen taught me something. 

Maybe she’s mentioned it to you before, but Carter’s, which is one of the biggest kids brands out there, they seem very clear and straightforward with their sizing. It’s a three, it’s a six, it’s a nine and so you think, oh, my baby will fit in this when they’re three months old. Apparently, the secret with Carter’s is the three is like when the size expires.

Laura Birek: It’s like up to.

Shanna Micko: So like a three means they could wear it up to three months. I wasted a lot of baby clothes on my first waiting for her to turn three months and then she got there and I put them on. I’m like, well that’s too small now. That’s very confusing.

Laura Birek: It’s very confusing and again, I don’t know where they come up with these sizes, where the measurements come from. They’re really irregular and granted women’s clothing is pretty similar, we all know you go to one store and the size 10 fits you and you go to another store and a size 12 fits you and you go to another store and a size eight fits you. You know what I mean? But it’s so frustrating when you have this squirming little baby and you’re trying to get the clothes on and he’s crying and you’re just like, I’m sorry, baby. It said six months on it. I thought it would fit.

Shanna Micko: Well, I always thought that pounds would be more helpful, like this fits a baby 7 to 10 pounds.

Laura Birek: That’s what they do with the SNOO sack and they do that with like the Merlin Sleepsack. You have to be 12 pounds to wear the Merlin Sleepsack. I will say that because I have a long and lean baby, he’s like 50th percentile in height, which totally averages and then 10th percentile in weight. So that wouldn’t necessarily work, because he’s 12 pounds now and a lot of babies are like 12 pounds at five weeks. So the length is a problem, especially with footed PJs. Footed PJs are either like too short on him and he is pushing his legs out or they’re way too baggy and swimmy.

Shanna Micko: So you cut the feet off.

Laura Birek: Do you cut the feet off?

Shanna Micko: No, but thought of that solution for you.

Laura Birek: Thank you.

Shanna Micko: You’re welcome.

Laura Birek: Or just get the PJs that don’t have footies.

Shanna Micko: Yeah.

Laura Birek: I will say we were gifted this brand called Kickee Pants, K-I-C-K-E-E Pants that are super, super soft and they don’t have feet on them and they’ve been really great. 

So we like our Kickee Pants, but I do have to say, I don’t want to just spew negativity in the world. So I have to say I learned about something that is actually revolutionary that I want to share to get over this gripe, which is sizecast.com. Have you heard of this?

Shanna Micko: No, tell me more.

Laura Birek: Okay. sizecast.com, if you go to it, it says, “Stop guessing your kid’s sizes. Predict future clothing and gear sizes in your favorite brands based on your child’s unique growth chart.” You put in their birth date, so I’m going to do that, their sex and then you pick the height and weight percentile. You can enter exact measurements so you can do their height and their weight, or you can just do whether there’s tiny, petite, averaged. So I’m going to pick tiny for my guy and I go, and then it gives you a checklist basically, all the baby brands. It looks like there’s at least a hundred on here.

Shanna Micko: Wow.

Laura Birek: It shows you based on the date so like one month, two month, three months out what size in each brand you should have your baby in and you can print out a chart.

Shanna Micko: Cool. So what does it say about different things?

Laura Birek: Okay. For my guy, I’m going to pick Carter’s. Let’s pick some specific ones that we use a lot.

Shanna Micko: Do they have Cat and Jack, the target brand?

Laura Birek: Yeah, Carter’s Cat and Jack. Let’s do a Gap. How about Oshkosh B’gosh at four months? In Carter’s he should be in three months, in Cat and Jack he should be in three to six months, in Gap he should be three to six months and Oshkosh B’gosh he should be in three months. Those are completely different. In Carter’s it should be up to three months, but he’s four months old and then Cat and Jack is three to six. That makes sense. That’s a little more accurate. So it’s pretty cool.

Shanna Micko: What’s it called again?

Laura Birek: Sizecast.com.

Shanna Micko: Cool.

Laura Birek: You can go there and you can save it as a bookmark, so you can always sort of go back on your phone really quick if you’re in a store, look up I have this brand and my baby’s this age, how can we make this work? It saved me. I want it to save you from having a gripe.

Shanna Micko: Awesome. Thanks for sharing.

Laura Birek: Shanna, what is your gripe about this week?

Shanna Micko: Okay. So you know I started my baby on solids, because I just literally told you that.

Laura Birek: We just talked about it. Yes.

Shanna Micko: My phone is listening to me, which I know it actually isn’t blah, blah, blah. But I still think it is and almost immediately started serving me ads based on feeding my baby solids, which is fine, except this one really rubbed me the wrong way. It’s a company called Raised Real, real because I’m not real.

Laura Birek: Not artificial, but real.

Shanna Micko: No, it says, “Why is baby food so often a choice between sugar-laden goo or making it completely from scratch? At Raised Real, our nutrition experts have developed fresh organically sourced baby meals delivered right to your front door.” It’s got two completely adorable little babies with a box of delivered food and that just really rubbed me the wrong way, because I am not serving my baby sugar-laden goo.

Laura Birek: Who does? Where are they getting this advertisement copy from? Is there sugar in baby food?

Shanna Micko: No, here’s what I did. I went to Ralphs, because I wanted to start my baby on baby food and I bought some Gerber stuff, some Beech-Nut, like little purees and stuff, same stuff I fed my first. So after seeing this ad, I’m like 99.9% sure it’s not sugar-laden goo. But thanks for making me feel bad. So I double checked and the green beans, the ingredients are green beans and water, peas, peas and water, sweet potatoes, sweet potatoes and water.

Laura Birek: What the hell?

Shanna Micko: They’re just normal food.

Laura Birek: This is Gerber. This isn’t like a whole foods brand.

Shanna Micko: No, let me tell you. I got off my high horse about all that stuff the first time around. I will buy organic sometimes, but I was way more worried about things the first time around and this stuff it’s cheaper. It’s fine. My daughter’s turned out great without eating organic. So maybe I’m already sensitive to all of this stuff, but I’m just like, so now you know it’s one more thing as a mom that we’re not doing right. We can’t even give our babies little purees without being wrong about it. I’m not doing it real, Laura. I’m doing it artificially. I’m doing it bad and I need to spend money to get this box of perfect.

Laura Birek: It’s like HelloFresh for babies.

Shanna Micko: Yeah, I guess so.

Laura Birek: But you don’t have to make it. I’m sure not all baby food is created equal, but it’s also like you said, one ingredient or two in water and mush, like water and peas, any type of vegetable ground up and mixed with water to make it a little bit softer. I don’t think anyone’s feeding their newborns… What would it be?

Shanna Micko: Apples with a tablespoon of sugar and syrup.

Laura Birek: Ice cream.

Shanna Micko: Vanilla ice cream. But so then I started paying attention to these ads coming through and here’s another one for another service. They all just want to ship me their perfect food. This one the caption is, “Did you know that what you feed your baby in their first 1000 days will impact their LIFETIME and wellbeing?”

Laura Birek: Oh my God.

Shanna Micko: Where’s the research to back that up? Why are you making me feel shit about this? Hello?

Laura Birek: If you starve your baby in the first thousand days, I’m sure it will affect their wellbeing.

Shanna Micko: Maybe that’s what they’re talking about.

Laura Birek: The first thousand days is a lot of days. How many years is that?

Shanna Micko: Yeah, how many days is that?

Laura Birek: Hold on. I’m going to do some math here.

Shanna Micko: I think my three-year-old just came out of a thousand years.

Laura Birek: 1000 divided by 365. It’s 2.7 years.

Shanna Micko: How much?

Laura Birek: 2.7 years.

Shanna Micko: Okay. Well, I’ve got to be ordering little spoons perfectly made tubs of perfection food for 2.7 years in order for my child to have any shot at life.

Laura Birek: Of course, you do. Yeah.

Shanna Micko: Spend a fortune doing it.

Laura Birek: That’s how it works. As a mother, you need to sacrifice your entire life and career and money to do everything possible to give your child an absolutely perfect existence without a single hardship, including eating Gerber. God forbid.

Shanna Micko: The other thing is I should be making this all from scratch if I were a good mother, like buy my own sweet potato and whip it up.

Laura Birek: That’s so interesting. It’s such a mind fucked that first ad you were reading. It does, because not only is it shaming you for getting the store regular Gerber food, but it’s also subtly shaming you for not making your own food, but pretending it’s helping you, right?

Shanna Micko: Totally.

Laura Birek: It’s like, can you believe people think you have to make your own baby food? That’s crazy. Just buy a really expensive organic product instead.

Shanna Micko: You can’t win, man.

Laura Birek: Did you look into how expensive it was?

Shanna Micko: No.

Laura Birek: It’s probably good. If you click on it, it’ll never end. You’re going to get all the ads.

Shanna Micko: I did click on it and it’s been relentless. It’s in my Facebook. It’s in my Instagram. It’s everywhere. I just don’t remember the cost. I guess if anyone out there is interested, it’s called Real Food or some shit.

Laura Birek: It’s probably fine food. I think that the problem is the advertising.

Shanna Micko: It’s probably great.

Laura Birek: The product is probably fine. The marketing is the issue, because we are constantly bombarded with these messages that we’re not doing it right. We’re not doing enough.

Shanna Micko: Yeah, mom shame should not be a marketing technique. But it is.

Laura Birek: It’s probably pretty effective though. Mom shame shouldn’t exist, but it’s tapping into a really deep seated anxiety that a lot of us have that we’re not doing enough, that we’re not doing the right things and there’s just so much crap about how everything we do right now sets them on a trajectory that’s good or bad and it’s so tenuous. Then at the same time, you’re freaking sleep deprived like no one’s business and all you can do is survive and then on top of it, you’re being shamed for not making your own baby food. That is a solid gripe, my friend.

Shanna Micko: Thank you. It feels good to have gotten it off my chest.

Laura Birek: Yes, I will say my cousin gave me a ton of hand-me-downs and one of the things she gave me was a baby food making kit. I haven’t used it yet, because my baby’s only three months.

Shanna Micko: Is that called the baby Brezza or something like that?

Laura Birek: Yeah, I think that is what it’s called. It steams some veggies and then it’s like a baby blender. It looks fine and it’s so funny, because she was like, “I never used it. Here, you have it.” So it’s brand new.

Shanna Micko: Exactly.

Laura Birek: It’s like a ringing endorsement. She’s like, “I didn’t have time for that shit.”

Shanna Micko: That’s the thing is that sounds appealing to me. I would love to give my baby fresh green beans every single day, but realistically am I going to use that and then wash it and do all that? I’m probably not.

Laura Birek: I will say my cousin had a full-time nanny and even then did not use it.

Shanna Micko: Okay. I’m feeling better about myself. Well, thanks for griping with me, Laura. I feel better.

Laura Birek: Any time.

Shanna Micko: All right. Let’s take a break.

[Music]

Laura Birek: We close every show with our BFPs and BFNs for the week. Shanna, do you have a big fat positive, or a big fat negative for us this week?

Shanna Micko: I have a big fat positive.

Laura Birek: Yay.

Shanna Micko: I had a really nice experience at Trader Joe’s the other day I wanted to tell you about.

Laura Birek: Okay.

Shanna Micko: So I ran into TJ’s with my baby and her stroller to do some shopping and I grabbed a hand basket and I’m walking around, throwing everything in the hand basket, throwing some stuff under the stroller and this one woman, a younger woman, very pretty was just shopping and she turned and she said, “Do you want me to go get you a little shopping cart?” Because she saw I was bogged down with my hand basket and I was like, “No. No. No. It’s okay. I don’t think I have too much more.” She’s like, “It’s probably hard to hand push the stroller in the shopping cart,” and I was like, “Yeah, I can’t do both anyway,” and she’s like, “Okay, well, your baby’s so cute,” blah, blah, blah. So I was like, that’s really sweet and I’m continuing to shop and I run into her in the next aisle and I’ve got even more stuff in my basket now.

Laura Birek: Because you always think you’re popping in for two things and then you end up with a hundred things.

Shanna Micko: Yes, there was a classic case of that. Definitely. But the wine bottles were really weighing down my hand basket.

Laura Birek: Necessary.

Shanna Micko: I passed her again and she’s like, “Are you done?” I was like, “Yeah, this is my second baby. I’m not going to have anymore,” and she’s like, “No, no, no. Are you done shopping?” I was like, “That’s embarrassing. No, I just have a couple more things.” She’s like, “Here, just put it in my cart. I’m going to walk around the store with you. So you don’t have to carry this and I’ll help you finish shopping.”

Laura Birek: Aww.

Shanna Micko: I was like, “You’re so sweet.” It was so sweet, but I was feeling kind of a little bit awkward and on the spot. I didn’t actually want to walk around with a stranger and make her do that. But she was so sweet and I was like, I don’t know and then this Trader Joe’s employee who was stocking stuff on the shelf right behind me overheard our conversation and he popped up. He’s like, “I can help you. I have all the time in the world. Let me carry your basket.”

Laura Birek: Oh my God.

Shanna Micko: I was like, “You guys stop it.” She’s like, “Come on. Come on,” and he’s like, “It’s okay. It’s okay,” and I was like, “Fine. I will accept the help.”

Laura Birek: Yes.

Shanna Micko: I just accepted the help and I went with the Trader Joe’s guy, because that just seemed less awkward to actually have an employee help me in. So he took my basket and I was like, “I think I just need one more thing,” and he followed me around and of course, I found like 10 more things. I was like, “Here, throw this in. Throw this in. Throw this in,” and he just did the rest of the shopping with me and carried my heavy basket until I checked out.

Laura Birek: That’s really sweet.

Shanna Micko: Isn’t that sweet?

Laura Birek: It’s nice. I like Trader Joe’s. They just seem like a nice company.

Shanna Micko: I know. They really do.

Laura Birek: Yeah, that’s nice. I think it’s hard for me to accept help too, but the truth is you needed some help. You couldn’t juggle all the things and also it behooves them, because it meant you got to shop there longer, right?

Shanna Micko: That’s true. I probably put more stuff in the basket than I would have, because it was getting too heavy, because it hangs on your forearm as you’re walking and pushing with the other hand and it gets really hard. But it was so nice and then of course, I’m such a cynic, Laura. Part of me I left I was like, why was that lady being so nice to me? Is she trying to sell me some MLM or sell me her Mary Kay or something like that? It must be. She’s too good to be true and she’s probably just a really sweet, wonderful person.

Laura Birek: You never know. She might have kids of her own or she might have personal experience or she could have a single mom or something.

Shanna Micko: She did. She was like, “I know how it is.” I was like, “Do you have kids?” She’s like, “I have nieces and nephews.” Aww. It was just so nice, because I feel like as a mom, sometimes you’re overlooked or you’re struggling and people just pass you by and so it was surprising and really sweet.

Laura Birek: You feel like a nuisance with the stroller, right?

Shanna Micko: Hell, yes. I’m like bumping into stuff, getting in the way, I can’t maneuver it straight.

Laura Birek: Well, that’s lovely.

Shanna Micko: So that was my BFP for the week. What about you?

Laura Birek: Okay. So my BFP is something I learned at my Mommy and Me from my Mommy and Me teacher. My baby is not great on napping and Taking Cara Babies said this and I read naps come after nighttime sleep is solidified and Taking Cara Babies says naps don’t get solidified till like five months, so don’t worry too much about it. So when he would nap for like 35 to 40 minutes, I think that was a nap. I was just like, okay, it’s a nap, but I was informed by my teacher that that’s called a cat nap. If they nap less than an hour, that’s not considered like a proper nap. Did you know this? I didn’t know this. So he would wake up after 35 or 40 minutes and be awake and I’d be like, all right. That was our nap. Let’s go on with our day. But it was hard, because I wasn’t able to do anything. By the time you get them down, 35 minutes is not a lot of time to get anything done. I was getting no me time, so I told this to my Mommy and Me teacher and she said, no. No. He has a 35 to 40 minute sleep cycle. That’s what he goes through one full cycle REM whatever, all the whole thing. She’s like, so what you want to do is string two sleep cycles together if you can. She said what you need to do is go in right before he wakes up and be ready to console him, be ready to shush him back to sleep and she said it could either be you put your hand on his chest and rock pretty hard basically. The minute you see him start to stir, or you might have to pick him up and actually bounce and shush and whatnot. I have to tell you, I did that this week and I got the greatest naps. It saved my life.

Shanna Micko: Wow.

Laura Birek: He was napping two hours in the morning and actually one morning what was interesting was that the first nap was always still 35 to 40 minutes. But then when he went down to for his second half of the nap, he was out and he would be out for like an hour and a half to the point where I have to start worrying about waking him up to make sure he’s eating enough. One day I went in, it had almost been four hours since he had eaten and so I was like, I need to wake him up and eat. I know feed on demand and whatnot, but I’m trying to get all his calories in during the day, so he doesn’t wake up at night for too much and that’s been working for us.

Shanna Micko: Right.

Laura Birek: So I was like, okay, kid. I got to wake you up. I’ll just open the door. I’ll open the blinds, the blackout curtains. I’ll turn off the white noise. I’ll just start making noise. It took him another 15 minutes of me pounding around, opening the closet, getting stuff out of the closet till he finally turned. I was like, damn, kid. But I think he was exhausted and then the witching hours have gotten better now because of that. So by the end of the day, he was so freaking exhausted. He was just so over tired. That’s why the 4 to 7:00 p.m. witching three hours was so bad, because he was just exhausted. Poor little guy.

Shanna Micko: Poor guy. Oh my God, what a great fix and a great tip.

Laura Birek: I know. The first couple days I had to actually pick him up and bounce him and sometimes it took a while. She said if it takes more than 10 to 15 minutes, you’ve lost it. But one day it took 15 minutes before he went back to sleep and then he stayed asleep for like an hour and a half, so it worked.

Shanna Micko: Cool.

Laura Birek: Then on Friday I went in at 38 minutes and right when he started to sort of move and I started put my hand on his chest and shimmed him and it worked great.

Shanna Micko: Perfect.

Laura Birek: Yes, hallelujah.

Shanna Micko: Yay! That’s so awesome. Oh my God, I think our listeners are going to love that tip.

Laura Birek: Tell us if you tried it and if it worked for you, please. You can reach us at bigfatpositivepodcast.com or on the social medias at Instagram, Twitter, Facebook at BFP Podcast. Or we actually have a community group on Facebook you can join too. Just search for Big Fat Positive Podcast.

Shanna Micko: Big Fat Positive is produced by Shanna Micko, Laura Birek and Steve Yager.

Laura Birek: Thanks for listening and thanks for talking Shanna. I’ll talk to you next week.

Shanna Micko: All right. Talk to you then. Bye, everybody.

Laura Birek: Bye.

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