Field Note No. 15

TEETHING Part I: The Omen

Something is coming.

Not in a dramatic, thunderclap sort of way.  No.  This is quieter.  More sinister.  The kind of slow, creeping shift where you look around and think, wait… has it always been like this?  And the answer is no.  It has not.

The baby has started chewing.

Aggressively.  Intentionally.  Like a woman with a plan.

Not the usual “oh look, my hands!” situation. This is targeted.  Strategic.  She grabs things and brings them to her mouth like she’s testing materials.  Assessing durability.  My finger didn’t stand a chance.  She locked eyes with me while doing it, which feels important and also deeply unsettling.

There is drool.  An unreasonable amount of drool.

At first I thought, okay, cute.  A little shine.  A dewy baby.  Hydrated.  Thriving.  But now?  We are damp people.  Permanently.  Her shirt is wet.  My shirt is wet.  I don’t know whose drool is whose anymore and at this point I’m too tired to ask.

She is also… emotionally unpredictable.

One minute she’s smiling at me like I am the love of her life.  The next she’s fussy, twisting, vaguely offended by something I cannot see or fix.  Then right back to smiling, like that didn’t just happen.  I feel like I’m being psychologically profiled by someone who cannot sit up unassisted.

I have googled “early signs of teething” so many times my phone now just autofills it like, girl I know, it’s still teething.

We have prepared, which is laughable.  There are teethers.  Several.  A lineup, really.  Waiting on the counter like a group of volunteers who have no idea what they signed up for.  There are washcloths in the fridge.  Why? I don’t know.  It felt like something a capable mother would do.

I even bought infant pain relief, which feels like buying sandbags before a flood.  Deeply optimistic.  Slightly unhinged.

And still, no teeth.

Just vibes.  Bad ones.

At night, she sleeps… but it’s different. Restless.  Twitchy.  Like her body is workshopping something sinister.  I watch her on the monitor like I’m tracking a developing weather system, whispering things like “don’t do it” as if she has any control over what’s coming.

This is not the storm.

This is the pressure drop before it hits, when everything goes a little still and you realize you should have done more, but also there was nothing to do.

I am... damp.  On edge.  Being slowly outmaneuvered by a person with zero teeth and a very strong agenda.