Feeling Useless

Well, it's obvious to me now that there will be little sleep this night. So I thought that I'd might as well put up a post on my blog while Stacey takes a turn with Josiah.

Tonight he seems to be having a tummy ache. The poor little guy's belly keeps gurgling so loud and he makes the most miserable faces as it does. We took Josiah to the doctor Thursday and she gave us some formula specially formulated to lessen gas because this has been going on for a few days now. At first we thought it was working but apparently we were wrong.

Stacey and I feel so sorry for the little fella as it is obvious that he is miserable. We've burped him so much our arms are about to fall off to no avail. We've given him Mylicon in his formula for added gas relief yet again to no avail.

We've tried burping him several times throughout the feeding and manage to get some really impressive belches out of the little guy (Not to mention he'll rip some pretty loud ones from the over end as well.) but most the time it just isn't enough. As soon as he's nearing the end of his bottle his little tummy starts gurgling. Another odd thing it that this almost always happens at night. leaving Stacey and I exhausted come morning.

It stinks feeling so useless and at the end of your rope, and knowing that your little one is so miserable and yet there's nothing you know to do to help.

My Little Monkey Toes

Yes my sweet little boy is back home. His jaundice levels are way down and the nurse at the hospital said that he his now old enough that jaundice should no longer be an issue.

I've been meaning to post about this for a few days now but haven't gotten around to it until tonight. The first time I saw my son he was flexing his little arms and legs and consequently his fingers and toes!

My first thought was "My goodness he's got the longest toes!" Which he takes after me by the way, anyone who sees me barefoot usually comments that I have very long toes. I think that they are so cute. (His, not mine.) Especially the way he flexes them when I'm changing his diaper.

So here it is, the photo you've all been waiting for, baby Josiah's toes.


Aren't they cute?

Fatherhood?

Since most of those who read this blog also read that of my wife, Stacey, it should be known that I'm the proud papa of a bouncing baby boy!


Josiah James Kelley was born Saturday, September 13th 2008 at 3:22 a.m. He weighed six pounds and twelve ounces and was 20.75 inches long!

It was an extremely difficult labor and delivery for my wife Stacey, and I can honestly say that she went through it with a determination that blows me away! I am SO proud of her that I don't honestly know how to express it. She is the most wonderful wife a man could have and I love her more than she'll ever know. Yes, God has truly blessed me.

I find myself now in awe of the powerful feelings that grip me. I knew that I would love my new son, but I've never felt this strongly for anyone except my wife Stacey. He is the most beautiful and wonderful little boy I've ever seen. I can see my wife and I in his features as well as those of his grandparents.



At the same time, there's a part of me that's almost afraid of him! I fear that I can't keep up with the little guy's demands and meet his needs, and that intimidates me. How is it that one can experience such a mixed dichotomy of feelings?

I'm doing my best to embrace the overpowering love and protectiveness I feel for him while ignoring my fears and hoping they'll go away with time. I love this tiny squirming baby so much that I'd be willing to die for him. Every move he makes, every little gesture of expression that crosses his tiny face fascinates and thrills me. I am so in love with this little baby!

I probably sound like a fool, .............


I FEEL like a fool.

Anytime I was walking the halls of the hospital this weekend, I found myself fighting the urge to stop total strangers and tell them of this little wonder that God has put into my life.

Then, five minutes later, I'd be fighting down panic as I realized that I was now a parent. That it's up to me to be a father and provider to Josiah!

So I ask you, is this normal? Is this fatherhood?

Feeling Old

Stacey thinks it's hilarious, but lately I'm feeling old. Yes, I know, I'm only 32 years old, but now with a baby on the way, I feel like my life is over.

What I mean is this, now that I'm going to be a father, I have to be more focused on his life and future dreams than my own. The best, most noble use of my energy will be to focus on improving Josiah's quality of life. To me, it's very important that he have a Father who gives him his full attention whenever possible. I feel that there will be little to no time to pursue my own dreams.

I fear that I've wasted my life up until now. Ever since I've been a child I've loved to draw, and I always took it for granted that someday I would eventually succeed in making a career out of it. But the last several years life has become so busy and distracting for me that I've allowed drawing to fall by the wayside. I always intend to set some time aside to sketch but when that time comes I'm too tired (Or maybe lazy is a more honest word.)

Now, Josiah will be coming into our lives and I want to give him all the love and attention that I can. I want to carry as much weight in caring for him as I possibly can. I don't want Stacey to feel like she's being left to do it all on her own.

I know that I've never seen him or held him yet but I already love Josiah so much that I can't put it into words. I can hardly wait to hold him for the first time. I find myself standing around at work sometimes just wondering what color his eyes will be and grinning like a fool.

I want to give him the world and the very best of myself. And because of that I feel like there will never be any time for my own personal interests or pursuits. And that makes me feel old.

Does this make me a bad person? Does it mean that as far as my own aspirations in life go that I'm a failure? These are the things that I'm struggling with, even as my pulse races at the thought of seeing my baby boy.

No I am not dead! I'm just busy. :P

I was very surprised this weekend, when someone whom I'd have never thought read my page, asked me when was I EVER going to post something new? So here I am back at the keyboard again.

As most if not all of you know by now, I'm gonna be a Papa! This is part of the reason why there have been no posts in months. You see, when we first found out that my beautiful wife had conceived a child I was told by said beautiful wife that if I told anyone that she was pregnant before she was ready to release the news that I just might not live to see the little one be born!

I agreed (mostly to save my precious neck) to not post anything on my blog and she put down the knife. But a day or two later when I was going to post an update here, I realized that my upcoming fatherhood was all I could think about! So that part of the reason I haven't updated in a while.

The other reason is my wife's blog. Since almost everyone that reads my blog, gets here from my wife's blog, there's nothing going on in my life that she hasn't already posted about. Plus, Stacey does such a wonderful job posting pics with her updates that when I go an look at my blog, I'm disappointed. Mine just seems so boring to me in comparison to hers.

It's not just that she has pictures on her blog either, Stacey has a great talent for photography, that she seems to be able to make the most mundane subject matter seem interesting. While I'm a decent artist with paper and pencil, photography is just not my forte.

It was a very short trip from these two things to just forgetting about my fledgling blog entirely. Soon we began purchasing things for the baby and planning to turn the old computer room into a nursery. That, coupled with being moved back to day shift at work, and an entirely different department than where I had worked for five years to boot! I just let the blog simply drift into limbo.

However, I vow to try and post at least something once a week if not more from now on. So now all my faithful readers, you won't be left in the dark. (All three of you.) :P

The Machinist

I read about this movie on the internet tonight and it slightly reminded me of myself. Christian Bale plays a CNC lathe operator with insomnia who fears that he may be going crazy.

Working midnights is really starting to wear me down. It's been three weeks or so and I'm a wreck. When I get home from work I can't go to sleep. My body thinks "hey it's daytime we're not supposed to be in bed!" Most days I can't drift off untill ten o'clock or so.

Then, once I get to sleep I simply cannot wake up! If left undisturbed by Stacey or the telephone I'll sleep ten or eleven hours untill it's time to get up and go to work again. Even if I've had plenty of sleep it's all I can do to drag myself out of bed.


I'm ALWAYS tired now. It's beginning to be that I am almost always in a bad mood and grouchy. The other night I went off on my wife for several minutes before I realized what I was doing and had to apologize. And it may sound silly but I find myself hating our dog Frankie. I simply do not have the patience to put up with him.



I'd say this is about how I feel right now.

I can't say anything to my supervisor at work about this however, because working midnights is the only thing keeping me from being laid off. As most of you who read my blog already know, it's an extremely hard time to be looking for a job in Michigan these days. There's nothing out there unless you want to work for minimum wage.

So I'm stuck. I feel like I'm living life in slow motion but at the same time it seems like time is just flying by. Probably because I'm sleeping all the time I guess. I'm assuming that it will get better in time as my body becomes more accustomed to it's new sleeping schedule. I HOPE it does anyway.

Stacey has been such a sweetheart through all of this. She's been very forgiving of my moodiness and accepts my apologies so gracefully. She keeps telling me to not worry about it when I sleep all day and spend hardly any time with her. I thank God for giving me such a patient and loving wife. But the problem is that I miss the time with her also.

I'm so glad to see her when she gets home from work but I'm so sleepy that I'm lucky if I get an hour with her before dozing off.

So, anyway thanks for "listening" to me rant about my problems. Those of you that are believers just please keep us in prayer and I'll owe you guys one.

The Graveyard Shift

So now I'm working midnights. For the next month I'm to split my duties between inspecting parts and supervising 4 guys running production.

It's a very slow shift. The nights seem to drag on forever sometimes and I feel guilty when I'm just standing around with nothing to do. I've been using the time to work on my book, (Page three is penciled and needs inking while here at work I've begun the rough sketches for page 4.) but I feel like I'm stealing from the company.

I mentioned this to my boss and he just blew it off saying that's how nightshift is, so I guess it's ok.

I find it amusing however to be supervising instead of supervised. I thank God that I'm simply back to work no matter what I'm doing.