Things that squirt in the night

What a title, huh? Parents of newborns know what I'm talking about. The dreaded midnight poop. What do you do? Do you wake up the baby to clean him up and risk him staying up? Or do you leave him to sleep in poop?

As much as I love sleep, I cannot -- CANNOT -- let Taede sleep in poop. As much as it pains me, I must clean him. No matter what time it is.

Saturday night was such a night. A night where I had to make that hard decision. It was even harder to do given the fact that we're at my parents' house visiting for the week. At home the midnight diaper duty is relegated to Dad. At my parents' house, I'm in the bedroom with Taede while Dad's in the library with the big kids. It's all on my watch for the week.

So it's 2:00am and Taede starts stirring. I move to nurse him when I smell it. Damn! I think. He pooped. I wait a bit to make sure he's done. There's nothing fun about a "3 diaper change in 5 minutes" routine -- especially in the middle of the night. This is also an excuse for me to sleep a little longer. Like hitting the snooze bar.

I get the diaper stuff and start changing him on the bed (we have a waterproof mat that he sleeps on). It's dark. Sure, I have a night light, but it's late and my eyes are squinty and I'm tired. I have his legs clamped together as I pull them up to clean his bottom. This is always the scary part because the aiming is just perfect for a major disaster.

However, as I learned this night, his bottom does not need to be elevated for a major disaster to occur.

I get the first wipe done and I start moving to get the second wipe for another pass. I hear what I guess you can describe as a little fart, the loose kind. I see some poop kind of ooze out. Breastmilk poop is like very soft yogurt in the tube: very loose, kind of runny but with some consistency. Almost like bird poop where it's kind of watery on the edges but has some mass in the middle. So I see more poop and first I think: "Oh man, he's still pooping." And then I think: "Thank god it's a low pressure poop."

My fingers touch a wipe when it happens. I don't hear anything. There's no warning. I just feel the rush of air as I get pelted. With poop.

My kid shat on me! He SHAT on me!

It was like artillery fire. There's a clear line of poop starting on my thighs (I was sitting criss-cross on the bed) going up to my stomach and ending at my chest.

I sat there in shock. Not quite believing -- or perhaps not wanting to believe, hoping it's all a bad dream -- that I have SHIT on me at 2:00am in the frigging morning. I quickly finish and then looked at the damage. It looked like I was attacked by a flock of seagulls in formation. Taede is in a good mood, cooing and smiling since he unloaded on me. Luckily, miraculously, nothing gets on the bed. Believe me, I checked. I strip out of my clothes and tried to get most of the poo off my clothes before changing and climbing back into bed. I vow that if he poops again, he's out of luck.

I'm all pooped out.