Since Wednesday evening (during which Powergirl was up all night), we’ve crafted our lives around L’s routine of antibiotics, Benadryl and Ibuprofen. We also have taken turns walking the house at night, so the baby can sleep on our shoulders (she’s so congested, this is the only way she can actually breathe).

While the medicine seems to be working, this morning we received another curveball: The antibiotic is causing a nasty rash all over L’s body.

And so, a new cycle—with entirely different medicine—is about to begin.

Considering this is L’s first significant health hiccup, the entire experience has been a learning process for all three of us. Some thoughts (and questions):

• No matter how painful a double ear infection is, it must be ten times worse to have a double ear infection and not be able to communicate well enough to tell your momma or daddy where it hurts. The poor thing.
• We have called our health care provider’s advice nurses five times in the last 72 hours. Is this a lot? Is this standard? Are we being delinquent? I wonder.
• L hates hates hates it when I wipe her nose. Why? At what point will she not mind?

Oh, and one more thing. While I hate that the baby has been so drowsy and sleepy, I admit that I’ve thoroughly loved the way she’s fallen asleep on my chest the last few days. They’re a throwback to her first few months on Earth, when she’d nap that way all the time. I know she’ll get sick lots of times throughout her childhood. The chest-plants, however, are something we may never see again.

I was at the gym when bone hit table. When I got home, the poor baby had a pea-sized bump just above her right eye. Powergirl was on the phone with an advice nurse at Kaiser Permanente, trying to figure out what to do. To put it mildly, my wife was freaking out. At least she could talk; if the incident had happened on my watch, I probably would have hyperventilated before even thinking to call the doc.

Anyway, after Powergirl spent about 30 minutes on the phone, the nurse said we should put ice on the baby’s eye and get her to bed.

She then recommended something that sent us grown-ups into even deeper panic: She instructed us to “check on” and “wake” the baby every two hours to make sure our little girl was still conscious.

The mere suggestion that our daughter might become unconscious during the night sent the two of us into a tizzy. It was not until the baby scarfed down her bedtime bottle and clawed at my nipple (she is convinced it does not belong on my chest and tries to remove it at every opportunity) that we determined for ourselves she was fine.

(As an aside, we also determined that I’ll be decommissioning the changing table this weekend. Sorry, Pottery Barn Kids.)

Still, because the nurse made us paranoid, Powergirl and I took turns getting up every two hours to wake L and make sure she was still with it. The baby fared well through the constant poking and prodding. We, on the other hand, exhausted ourselves completely.

If anybody ever tells you that parenting an infant is easy, they are lying through their teeth. Not only is it physically challenging to do stuff such as chase a baby around the house and strap the kid in and out of car seats, but it’s also emotionally draining to prepare yourself for an onslaught of the unpredictable, then deal with it—everything from poopy diapers to bruised orbital bones and worse.

I’m not saying I’d change anything; my wife and I always will do whatever we must to provide for L and make sure she’s safe. Sometimes, though, just sometimes, it’d be nice not to have so much to worry about.

Other cities—New York among them—offer classes specifically designed for dads who spend most of the day at home with their youngsters. The problem: There’s not much of that kind of stuff out here; we live in a fairly remote part of Sonoma County and the few parent-child classes that are available meet least 30 minutes south (which isn’t exactly convenient).

None of these playgroups has particularly piqued my interest. In fact, most of them have turned me off.

Perhaps the biggest offenders are these classes titled “Mommy & Me.” The mere name of this class makes me angry; it implies the playgroup is only for kids and their mothers, since, of course, according to years of stereotypes, fathers are the ones who go off to work.

(Just look at the Web site! No pictures of dads are anywhere to be found.)

You’d think that in this age of political correctness, health care providers would change the name of the group to something like “Parents & Me” or “Mommy, Daddy & Me.” Alas, no dice; in order to participate in these classes, we dads have to check our manhood at the door and play second-class citizens to those parents for whom the class were designed: the moms.

I first learned about these types of playgroups in a seminar Powergirl and I took before L was born. Even then, I raised my hand and asked our instructor if the classes were open to dads. “Of course they are,” she said. When I followed up and asked how many dads actually showed up for the classes, she responded curtly: “They’re great classes. You should go.”

Translation: None. Zilch. Zippo.

Even if the classes are worthwhile (and they probably are), on principle I’m not going to attend a playgroup that welcomes my daughter but ostracizes me. Call me pigheaded. Call me closed-minded. Hell, call me stubborn. But L can make friends elsewhere.

Here’s a novel concept, Kaiser Permanente (and other assorted health care providers): Offer a class that respects and honors my existence as a stay-at-home dad, and I’ll be there in a heartbeat. Otherwise, stop pretending that your playgroups are open to everybody, because they’re not.

Occasionally, we’d hear an outright shriek, followed immediately by the soothing tones of a grown-up (A parent? The nurse?) trying to reassure the terrified child that somehow, in some way, this torture would be worthwhile.

Yes, Tuesday was L’s second trip to the immunization clinic, and it certainly was more eventful than round No. 1.

This more recent visit began with a smile. After a 45-minute wait (they were backed up with families seeking flu vaccines, apparently), Nurse Dian ushered us into our private room and managed to get L laughing with a combination of squeaky voice and dangly nametag.

It was mostly downhill from there. L downed her first immunization (a purple, grape-tasting liquid), but screamed successively louder for each of the three injections that followed. At one point, the poor thing cried so hard I honestly thought she was going to choke on her own little tongue.

In the end, she managed to endure all four of the vaccinations, and was asleep no more than five minutes after the fact.

Perhaps more miraculously, I didn’t even break a sweat.

Some history: Generally speaking, I’m a spaz when the baby is any sort of discomfort—such a spaz that I usually start sweating uncontrollably when I feel she’s threatened. During the first first visit to the clinic, we emerged from the little vaccination room and it looked like I’d gone swimming. This time, however, I kept my cool. Completely.

The secret was simply focusing on L. I didn’t look at the needles. I didn’t watch Nurse Dian put them in. I didn’t even ask if the nurse was finished.

Instead I gently used my forearms to pin the baby to the table and stroked her hair calmly as the nurse went about her thing. As soon as the baby started wailing, I shushed like a champion, reminding her that Kaiser Permanente’s take on Abu Ghraib would be over soon.

Don’t get me wrong, folks—I’m not taking any credit whatsoever for the baby’s quick recovery from this afternoon’s trauma.

I am, however, patting myself on the back for my ability to keep it together and, um, stay dry. If I can manage my emotions during a round of vaccinations, mastering the emotional ups and downs of onesie-changing has got to be next.