Everything I Ever Knew About Taking Care of Babies I Learned from My Pet Goat

It’s four in the morning and an angry, hungry bleating has awoken me.

I look at the clock and realize that yes, it’s that time. I get up and blearily mix up some formula, put it in a clean bottle with a fresh nipple, make sure it’s the correct temperature, and head toward the sound of wailing hunger.

I open the barn door and shove a bottle into a baby goat’s mouth.

Some thirty-eight years later it’s déjà vu all over again (as the late-great Yogi Berra might have said).

A hungry bleating. Mixing formula. Four in the morning.

Yeah, I’ve been here before. Just replace an animal’s stall with a baby’s crib.

I’m not complaining. I’m usually up anyway, or about to be. And I kind of enjoy this little morning ritual.

Like caring for our pet goat Peggy those many years ago, there’s a warm, satisfying feeling in feeding a baby animal. The plaintive noises cease, and I get to witness the sense of satisfaction on the little creature’s face.

As I’m feeding baby Jack, I reflect and realize there are a few other parallels in caring for an infant and caring for a baby goat.

First, there’s the cleanup. All that poop, for instance.

My god, the poop!

We wanted Peggy to be kept in a clean stall, so we frequently shoveled out disturbingly large piles of pellet-shaped goat poop. We disposed of urine-soaked straw and laid out a fresh bale. It was a messy, smelly job--not too dissimilar from changing a series of diapers. How quickly it all piles up.

How important it is to stay on top of it all.

Long family trips required arranging for someone to check in on Peggy. Baby goats need company. You can’t just leave them in the stall and ignore them all day. Often we’d sit in the barn with a book and a radio while we kept Peggy company. Other times we would harness her and let her get some exercise in the yard.

And we learned that baby goats can kick.

All of this has a certain similarity to caring for a newborn. Early morning feeding, mixing formula, changing diapers with alarming frequency, contact time, having certain limits in scheduling…

… and some kicking.

So a lot of what I learned about caring for a newborn I learned from our pet goat.

Mostly.

We also learned some things from the dog

It may sound a touch cliche, but owning a dog isn’t a bad way to prepare oneself for having a baby in the house. While many of the things I learned from the goat could also be applied to the dog, having a dog also impressed upon us further considerations about being away from home.

For instance, if my wife and I were going out for an event or chores, we knew we couldn’t be away for more than five or six hours at most because… dog. Max (the dog) would need to go out, or be fed, or just be reassured that we hadn’t abandoned him.

Now I’m not saying we treat our new son the same way and leave the house for five or six hours with him home alone. Good god, no.

What is this, 1970?

But we do have to take the boy into consideration when going anywhere.

Do we have enough diapers and wipes? Is there a clean blanket in the car? Are we going someplace that is stroller-accessible and has suitable places for either diaper changes or nursing? Is it an overnight stay? Did we pack the portable rocker? More clothes? More diapers? More wipes? Maybe some emergency formula and bottles? How about those diapers and wipes?

Do we have enough of those?

Leaving the house is not the casual affair it once was. Now it takes planning and preparation. Neither of us are complaining. It’s fun to take the boy places.

Once we get the details worked out, it will be fun to take Jack and Max places together.

These may seem like alien experiences at first–this sudden change in routine and thought–but not entirely alien.

The pet goat, some thirty-eight years ago, prepared me for this.

Not baa-a-a-a-a-d!

Cheers!