Sick, Skinny, and Toothless

I've mentioned before that I'm a terrible mother to my baby, and I'm regularly reminded of this by well-meaning family. That they tell me this doesn't surprise me, because on other occasions I've heard things like "I didn't like you at first, not at all. I said, 'she's too gringa for him. She'll never last.'" and "My kids are really ugly. They're so dark-skinned." and (to a cousin of the family) "Your older daughter is very pretty, but the younger one is kind of ugly, isn't she?" I've even heard a relative tell a mother her baby was ugly. Tell a mother her baby is ugly!? Isn't that a universal taboo? Not here!

So, I've been ready for the criticism. Here are some of the recent critiques directed at me.

He has ONLY two teeth. He's coming up on 9 month now, so he'd better hop-to. I mean, yeah, I agree that he'd better grow some more teeth at some point. It would be a sad thing to go through life with only two itty-bitty teeth. Can you imagine the teasing? He'd have a heck of a time getting a date. But I'm not concerned that he doesn't yet have a mouthful of teeth. My lack of concern, however, is just a sign of my negligence. I was recently told that not only is it alarming that he doesn't have more teeth, it's also a direct result of my bad parenting. First, I should have started giving him solid foods at three or four months to encourage the onset of tooth growth, because tooth growth only occurs if there is sufficient demand for it. Had I given him chewing gum, I assume, he'd have a whole shiny set of teeth by now. And second, he "isn't getting enough calcium". His near constant nursing plus all the food he eats (and holy smokes does this kid eat!) apparently have left him with a calcium deficiency, which his body has dealt with by putting tooth production on hold.

Nearly our whole household has been sick this month. We're nine people here, and all of us have been sick except the 96-year-old-strong-as-nails grandmother and my been-on-another-drinking-binge-for-two-weeks alcoholic-father-in-law. Go figure. The rest of us able-bodied young folk: sick. This includes my baby boy. And yet, even though all of us are sick, it's clear that he's sick only because I refuse to dress him in sufficiently warm clothing for the near-arctic temperatures we're experiencing. I'm totally nuts in thinking it's hot here, and my refusal to bundle my baby in hat and coat is clearly the reason he now has a runny nose. Poor darling.

Finally, he's not nearly the chubby wonder he was during the first seven months of his life. That's right, Mr. Tubby Rolls has slimmed down. Oh, he's still a heavy weight. The Internet informs me that he's still in the 98th weight percentile for his age, like he has been all along, but he recently grew longer and has been very active with his standing and walking and wounded-soldier crawling all over the house. So, you know, he has a neck now, and I no longer have to excavate the body lint out of his fat rolls. Still, this is a sign that I'm not feeding him enough and he's malnourished.

So there you have it. Bad mother.

On the upside, his great grandmother tells him he's very pretty and she will teach him to sew and that he'll be very good at making tortillas. So there's hope for him yet!