Poop

You'll never learn to fully appreciate poop until you have a baby.

During those first few days, especially, finding a poop-filled diaper is like discovering a gold mine. Poop is a unit of measurement; you set your clock by it, recording how many of those little treasures you find per day, and the time in between. There are charts detailing not only how many poops they should have per day, but the exact color and consistency based on age and food type.

The day after Olivia was born, I felt like poop. I hadn't slept more than 4 hours of the last 48, I could barely feel my legs, and the rest of me felt like one giant bruise. It's taken me months just to re-teach my knees how to use stairs, and no matter how many showers I take I feel like a layer of some unidentified grime still clings to my skin. I wouldn't call myself OCD, but I have always had a perhaps unhealthy obsession with cleanliness. If I could get away with taking three showers, and maybe a bath, every day, I would totally do it. When it came down to the nitty gritty--literally--the environment and water conservation were not even on my list. If I didn't have a shower first thing in the morning, the rest of my day was ruined. I've never had anyone complain about my attitude during a certain week of the month, but if I didn't have a shower, I could make Smaug look like a cuddly kitten.

But I've finally found the one thing in the world I care more about than cleanliness. If my little treasure leaves me a few more presents than I'd like--well, one baby's poop is a mom's peace of mind. I know by the number of poops she has per day how well she's eating and, therefore, how well she's growing. And, to me, that's more valuable than gold.