Yes, that’s when many Chinese regard as the Ghost Month (鬼月), in which ghosts and spirits, including those of the deceased ancestors, come out from the lower realm into our human realm.

Well, it’s not exactly auspicious to talk about this, especially on a baby blog, but thought it’s a good opportunity for me to share my thoughts.

Darius has been pretty well-behaved in his first few days back at home from the hospital, and Cat and I were expecting a breeze to take care of him in the days ahead. However, Darius started becoming crankier and unpredictable beginning the lunar seventh month.

He would only be able to take short naps and get awakened by himself, and started crying soon after. We tried soothing him with milk feeds, diaper change and even the pacifier but there were several occassions which none worked. We could only carry him close to our bodies and walk around the house to gradually soothe him down.

There were also occassions when he couldn’t stay calm in the nights too, and he would always be looking at places other than the carrier (i.e. Cat or me), and giving us a fearful look. It’s most creepy when he would stare at the ‘empty’ space behind my back with his eyes wide open and giving a stunned look.

Cat and I are both Catholics so we shouldn’t believe in ghosts and stuff, but still, it gets a little creepy, especially this happens late at night, in a dark room, and only with Darius and me ‘alone’ in it. I would distract him with my voice and massage but his eyes will still get affixed to some particular direction.

I have been rational and scientifically motivated, so I thought to myself that as babies, especially newborns, their eyesights are still very poor so they will always see ‘confused, non-existent objects’ in front of them as their brains are still in the process of making sense of what their eyes see. So we shouldn’t be too particular about what our babies are seeing, as long as we keep providing opportunities for Darius to see and learn to distinguish our faces.

And talking about the fearful look, I was thinking that even if Darius did see ‘something’, it should still be a human-like figure (unless it’s in some unimaginative form or disturbing Darius with whatever actions/expressions) so he shouldn’t be too afraid, as he would just treat the ‘being’ as another human being. I doubt he would be able to distinguish what’s human and ‘what’s not’.

Anyway, regardless of what the truth is, we will just have to live with Darius’ increasing unpredictability and restlessness.

Meanwhile, we will just avoid letting our minds run wild whenever Darius starts looking at ‘unknown stuffs’…

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