Reverse fun day

Day 5 - Punta Cana

Best night yet! My neck is starting to get a little sore from the gigantic mountain size pillows we have to use though. Despite going to bed much later Wesley's internal alarm clock still has him waking up between 6am and 6:30am. Lola has been sleeping in consistently well passed 7am. Wesley hit his wake up window which meant I had to entertain him quietly. Let me tell you, entertaining an almost 1 year old baby in a small dark room with one child still sleeping is no easy feat. I tried to cuddle him, back and butt pats, back rubs, walking and bouncing, voodoo, dark magic, sleeping potions… nothing worked. He just wanted to move.

I gave up and let him loose in the room. Lola woke up soon after. She asked if she could watch Moana and still feeling quite tired I felt this was the right daddy energy required activity so I set her up with the tablet and earphones and activated Lola silent mode. This might have been the decision that was our undoing for portions of the day starting with the morning.

When Sophie came back she thanked me for this dedicated mommy self love time, she's thoughtful and grateful like that which has a way of rubbing off on you. She doesn't ask for much ever so quite honestly this feels like the least I can do. Sophie then showers, we all dress, except Lola, she goes into meltdown mode about everything but really it's that she didn't finish her movie.

We've had decent success when we keep our cool and show a lot of empathy and understanding with her in these circumstances. I try to remember that she's still just a 3 year old learning to process and deal with these big emotions. Sometimes I succeed and sometimes I fail miserably. Today was a mix of both. Sophie and I both got a little riled with her as her outbursts were just endless feeding from one thing to the next. From the movie, to getting dressed, to brushing her teeth, to going to the beach first rather than the pool, etc.

It was all one thing but that one thing painted her emotional state for the next ten things. As an adult I get that. That shit happens to me sometimes too. Have a bad enough day or experience/event and it has the tendency to colour black into the other parts of your world. To mitigate this harm you have to learn some pretty sophisticated mental and emotional gymnastics and as an almost 50 year old man I still fail at this shit often. So it's hard for me to fault my 3 year old with next to no life experience to succeed every time.

We eventually exit the hotel room with very little feeling of success and head to breakfast. Our friends had already headed out to breakfast during the meltdown so we agreed to meet after. This was the next thing that pushed Lola over the edge. She wanted to see her friend. Luckily for us where we ended up getting seated right beside them. Mood changed instantly.

We ate side by side for a bit and then they headed off to get ready for the beach. Today we decided to flip the order, rather than hit the playa in the afternoon we would hit it in the morning instead. This turned out to be a decision that both dads liked very much. Once we exited the breakfast area we opted to cream up under a palm leaf umbrella. I did Lola while Sophie did Wesley. Then we helped each other get lathered up in sun shields and while we did that Lola played in the pool. As we were getting ready to leave she stood beside the umbrella with her legs spread apart and pointed out the water dripping to the ground between her legs. Yes amazing stuff kiddo. This prompted me to ask if she needed to go to the bathroom to which she replied with a hard pass.

Five seconds later a galon of “water” got dumped on the ground. I was none too impressed. She explained to me it was water but I wasn't buying it. I did my best to try and explain why we don't do that but I don't think it stuck. After #pissgate we headed back to the hotel cause I forgot my sunglasses. Once there Sophie took the kids down the main path straight to the beach while I grabbed my glasses and other supplies like snacks. At the beach we connected with our friends and setup shop under some trees for shade.

I can't seem to find my phone so I assume I left it at the hotel so I hoof it back and to my great disappointment it's nowhere to be found. I could have sworn I put it in my bag. Back to the beach I go and once there I empty my bag, dohhhhh phone was in the bag. Now I'm hot as hell from all the back and forth so I remedy the situation with a dip in the water which must be 80F. So refreshing and not cold at all, just perfect. I mellow with the movement and sound of the waves until a larger than normal wave starts to crash near me. I pounce at the opportunity and body surf that mofo back to Homebase. It was a good ride and I get a little cheer from my buddy chilling on a long chair.

Once back in the wives bring up the arrangement. They have been negotiating for a dedicated mommy time beach walk for a while now and once all the agreed upon conditions were agreed upon we all signed on the dotted line. The mother's went into off duty mode and headed out for their walk while we activated super alert dad mode, that's just regular mode in the mom models.

I’ve been wanting to try out a baby life vest we have on Wesley so on it went and out we went into the waves while my buddy helped the girls jump waves on the beach. Wesley really enjoys wave jumping in deeper water but not so much the splashing on the face. The vest does as promised, it floats and keeps his head out of the water. After a little while we go back in, and as I remove the vest and start to dry him I notice he's passing out live despite all the manoeuvres I'm making him do to get undressed.

I take off his diaper while he's laying on a big ass blanket and he's transitioned fully into a deep sleep. Sucks for him cause he's full of sand. I pick him up and he barely registeres movement as he falls asleep on my shoulder. We then head to the sand cleaning station, aka cold shower. I activate the stream and pepper us both with dashes of melted ice cubes. He's resilient and committed to his sleep schedule, he barely protests. Once I'm happy that all the sand is gone back to the towel we go.

I dry him up, put a new diaper on him and wrap him up in a warm towel and drop my we'd baseball cap on his head to keep him cool. Then I lie down on a long chair in the shade and he soon begins to snore, bit in a cute way. This basically renders me useless to my daughter but she's content playing with her friend and my buddy. Over 40 minutes go by before he stirs and awakes which is when the mommies arrive and clock back in.

I hand Wesley to Mom and my buddy and I head out into our down south office in the water. There we talk about addiction, health and diet. Mostly mine and how I need to reign in bad habits and adopt better ones for long term gains. We also crack jokes and share stories. When we head back in we hang out all together for a bit. By this time it's lunchtime so we pack our stuff and head to the beach dining option. Once there we battle people to the death for chairs and a table. We end up only securing two chairs and one table.

Picnic on the ground it is for the rest of us. We struggle to get food as the cooks struggle to make enough for the flock of human seagulls who keep pulling in. After the less than stellar lunch we head back to a pool. This ends up coinciding with Wesley's naptime so we lay him in the stroller and let the walk do the rest. Except when we arrive at the pool he's not out so I continue walking with him till he passes out which isn't long after. Lola on the other hand passed out after three steps.

Lola was the first to wake so we re-applied and then let her loose in the pool kingdom. When Wesley woke up we did the same for him. We took turns going into the water till eventually we all wound up in the pool. We tried to get drinks at the swim up bar but it was too crowded so we choose to grab drinks outside the pool as we left to get ready for our dinner plans. As we packed up Sophie spotted a mechanical bull setup in the kiddie area for kids to try. So we got Lola to try it. It was on easy mode which made for a very positive experience.

She then jumped on a trampoline for a quick minute before we headed back to the room to execute the cleanup protocol. Lola fought back with everything she had but ultimately she lost and she was washed. Back out we went for some Japanese style tapenaki which is the chef cooking in front of you often with a sense for the dramatic. This was our best restaurant eating experience so far. Wesley was a big fan of the chicken and rice. Afterwards we hit the buffet for some follow up dessert, crepes for most. Then we slowly walked back towards our rooms. On the way the kids hit the park in the dark. Trampoline and swing thrills were had.

We walked back to my buddies room where the girls spent more energy jumping from bed to bed while the adults chit chatted the night away. Wesley was sleeping in his stroller. Eventually we said our goodbyes and headed back to our room to Lola's constant protests. Back in the room she made her case to finish her movie but that was never gonna happen. Sophie successfully transitioned Wesley from stroller to crib and then from clothes to pijama.

We somehow managed to convince Lola that bed was the only option to which she agreed if all 3 of us slept in the same bed. We got ready for bed and I chose to let sleep in earlier neglecting my writing duties. We easily capitulated to her demand and fell asleep together in the same bed.

Later being the tenant with the smallest bed real estate I moved into a bigger piece of land in the other bed and had a mostly uninterrupted night sleep.

Life is beautiful!

January 28, 2025