Tue 13 Mar 2012
It’s amazing how much of a set-back it is for me emotionally when a wrench gets thrown into the little I feel confident about. The night before Allie had her bedtime fit and wouldn’t go down to sleep after I’d already done my bedtime routine, I was just telling Mr. W that I used to dread evenings because it’s her fussy time when I would feel the most helpless, but now that I knew her bedtime routine and had her sleeping through the night, nighttimes had become the predictable easy times and I looked forward to them. And then BAM, she threw me that curveball.
Yesterday, she threw me another curveball — the same one, actually. Mr. W came home from work and we all went out to our favorite neighborhood Greek place for dinner. The family that runs it knows us so I always feel comfortable bringing Allie there in case she acts up. She didn’t; she hung out and did her own thing, charming the patrons. We had women smile at her, one grandmotherly type came by on her way out to tell us what a pretty baby Allie is. We came home and because Allie had a couple of crappy 30-40 min naps after her nice solid 2.5 hour morning nap, decided to put her to bed early after a bath.
By the way, altho she’d always had fun in the bathtub before, this time and the time before, she decided she hated the water and would now scream and cry her way through the entire bath. (We’re still only bathing once a week.) I don’t know what’s changed, except her preferences. Anyway, I was saying to Mr. W what a great baby Allie is and that I had thought she was colicky early on, but that now I’m convinced she is an easy-temperament baby who just was overtired in the beginning due to my ignorance of proper babycare. Famous last words, again.
So the bedtime routine went as usual; she’d spent so much energy screaming at her bath that she fell asleep early nursing. After getting her to weakly eat from both sides, I put her to bed. In 8 minutes, the cat, in our bedroom, started his yowling thing. I was downstairs and couldn’t make it upstairs fast enough to stop him. I could only watch the baby monitor on my cell phone helplessly as Allie roused…rolled to her left side in her soothing position to suck her thumb, and then…it didn’t work. She started screaming. Since she rejected her pacifier, I have no clue how to put her back down at night anymore. I went up and picked her up, she stopped crying. I put her back down, she started crying again. I picked her back up. She kept crying. Mr. W finally came in and said he’d take over and that I was too stressed. I was just angry at the cat. He told me to go to sleep.
I was unable to sleep, but did observe the monitor a little. Holding her in the bedroom wasn’t lulling her to sleep, so he went downstairs and put her in the swing. I heard the chirping sound of the bird sound effects from the swing. She was down there in the swing for quite awhile. Mr. W said she fell asleep in the swing and after he turned it off, she remained asleep. He picked her up and walked her up to her bedroom, where she was still nodding off on him. As soon as he went in, she started screaming and crying again. I got up and went to them just as Mr. W came to me, with the baby alone in the crib crying, to tell me he was going to bring her giant swing up here so she could sleep in it. I asked to try to put her down the way I nap her, which was what worked at her last bedtime fit a week ago (the only other one since she was 6 weeks old). She probably had exhausted herself by this point, because she got into her sleepy position with her right cheek against my chest, left thumb in her mouth, and was soon asleep on me. The only hard part was that I couldn’t see in the dark to confirm her eyes were closed, so I tried to go by sound and the feel of her body, and waited it out a couple of minutes. Then I gently lowered her into her crib. She woke briefly but went right back to sleep on her back, barely moving. The rest of the night went all right, except that every time Dodo made a noise I’d freak out. Dodo only had to be pulled from the door once before morning and placed in front of his food in our room.
I woke up a little past 4am when Mr. W got up to go to the gym. He tried to sneak out of our room to do all his getting ready in the bathroom downstairs to let me sleep, but I decided that since I was already awake and anxious anyway, I may as well pump as I was definitely engorged. By the time I was done with the handpump, he was gone. I snuck downstairs, stored the milk, washed the pump parts upstairs, and went to bed after laying awake nervously for almost an hour. Even my dreams were of the nervous, stressful sort.
Allie was awake in her crib, quietly kicking around and doing her own thing, super-early at something like 7:15am by the time I woke and checked the monitor. That’s 6:15a Allie-time. I gave her some time to see if she would fall back asleep, and when she didn’t, I got up, brushed my teeth and washed my face, cleaned out the cat litter (now that it was next to his food, I have to be more diligent), and went and got her. I noticed in the wee hours of the morning how it felt like I was afraid of her, like she’s the boss and I’m at her bidding, hoping she doesn’t bite my head off. It still feels that way now. I didn’t enjoy my time with her this morning like I had yesterday. I was just scared. I’m not sure what exactly I’m scared of, because it’s not like she could die or fire me or get terribly sick or get into much trouble at this age. But I just felt like I was insecure again. It remains so important that I nap her well, sleep her well, and there are all these external factors I can’t control, like garbage trucks, gardeners, neighbors’ noisy kids, a neighbor’s barking dog. Things are already tricky because of daily savings throwing me for a loop.
Allie didn’t settle right away when I soothed her for her morning nap earlier. She was tired and turned from side to side, rubbing her face in my shirt, but would pop in and out of the sleepy position. Each time she popped out, my anxiety level would go up. What if she doesn’t nap? What if all her naps today go crappy and she’s too wired to sleep tonight? What if what if what if… I couldn’t take the stress of things going “wrong.” I feel so emotionally exhausted and physically exhausted from just last night, and the prior nights of popping awake to shush the cat even though I should be getting at least 8-10 hours of sleep solid cuz that’s what the baby does. But I don’t; I get a few at a time between the cat, having to get up to pump, and the anxiety making me unable to fall right back to sleep after my night awakenings.
Good thing I have another therapy session coming up. I really am looking forward to Susanne coming onboard. These are all nothings to her, as I’m sure they ought to be. Mr. W has said a few times that he hopes Susanne is able to put Allie to sleep in a different way from the way I do, with the walking soothing lulling Allie to sleep before I put her down. I don’t know of another way that works; the putting down awake-but-drowsy technique just makes Allie pop fully awake and cry. Sometimes if I have an awkward or rough put-down and she wakes up more than just a little bit, she pops up wide-eyed, turns her head, and I know I’m screwed; she’s not going to be sleepy enough to drop into sleep. I’d have to pick her up and start the soothing all over again. Mr. W is unable to nap Allie unless she crashes from exhaustion on him, like she did on Sunday at Eddie & Michelle’s shower. There has to be a better way, but I’m not sure if the problem is with my ability to figure it out or do it right, or with Allie resisting any other way to go into her nap.
I need a break, but there’s no such thing. I’m down to 115 lbs, which is 3 lbs below my wedding weight. This isn’t a healthy sign.
Cindy, I feel like you think you have done something egregiously wrong whenever Allie cries…and you will drive yourself absolutely bonkers if you think like that. As hard as it sounds, and as painful as it is to hear her cry…you can’t think of Allie’s crying as a personal affront to you.
Babies cry, and they don’t cooperate, and they secretly scoff at us every time we think we have them figured out:-) It could be that she is tired or wants something, or it could be that she has a headache or a tummy ache or just that she wants to be held. Or not held. It doesn’t always make sense, and they don’t always even know why they are crying.
Whatever it takes to get her to fall asleep, I can promise you that you will find it. And then in a week it won’t work any more:-) The “going to sleep” habits change constantly for a long time.
One of mine spent about two weeks where she would fall asleep quickly and peacefully if you just rocked the mattress in her crib back and forth. And then just as quickly as it started, it stopped working. Then the other one wanted to be held to fall asleep, and then they just wanted to lay on pillows with a bottle.
You just have to roll with it. I know that some people are better at rolling with it than others, but babies will teach you to appreciate the things you can’t control like nothing else!
What gets me more than the crying is her not sleeping. The crying is only really bothersome at nighttime because I’m so worn down at the end of the day (unless she’s been crying all day, too). My blood pressure skyrockets when I look at the monitor and she’s only been down 30 mins or less and I see her start stirring, and cuss words come out of my mouth.
What’s so hard for me is that there’s always been a means to an end. Sure there are different ways to get to the same place, but I have the way I like the best and I do it, and it gets me there. With this baby thing, you think you’ve finally found a way, and all of a sudden, it doesn’t work anymore. And then I’m just totally lost, like “OMG, OMG, it’s not working, how do I get there then?” Then I research like mad for other ways to get there. Sometimes the research is worse than the not getting there this one time or other.
I don’t like not having roadmaps to place I need to be. It’s a really terrifying feeling for me. I feel unprepared, incompetent, and — I keep repeating it cuz it’s appropriate — lost.
It does help that people like you tell me to anticipate constant inconsistency, tho. =P Then I feel less like I’m too stupid/incompetent/inexperienced to figure this out.
I feel guilty for not “enjoying every moment” of this “precious time” like everyone keeps telling me to do…but I can’t. Maybe when the hormones start returning to normal, or I go back to work and I have Susanne in my corner, I’ll start feeling less frazzled. Of course, then I’ll have to figure out how to pump and store at work. There’s always something.
OK…those people? Ignore them, because that isn’t you. There are absolutely people who love the stage where babies are totally dependent on you and helpless. I get that.
But I am not one of those people, and I don’t think you are, either. At every single “milestone”, I rejoice at not having to do that again. And never once have I gotten sentimental about them growing up too fast or changing too fast.
You can love your kids and not like babies and not have to apologize for it. And you should also never apologize for doing something that works regardless of what the Mommy Mafia tells you is “right”. Most of the people offering advice don’t know any better than you!
*big hug*
Thanks. 🙂 I feel better, knowing you look forward to milestones passing, too (and not mourn the ending of the last phase).
It’s really hard when I’m doing the mommy thing 24/7 to get a grip and keep the perspective open. I have to remind myself that whatever’s happening or not happening on this nap isn’t going to ruin her. She just slept 30 mins on her 1st nap, so I wasn’t in the best place earlier, but now she’s been down almost 2 hrs on her 2nd nap, so I AM feeling better, altho still tired. I’m so much more optimistic when she’s been sleeping longer, altho this was a very restless nap (I’ve been reading baby help books on the computer with a window of her baby monitor up next to the book text window).
It helped tremendously when I read in a book that babies are “notoriously restless sleepers.” I remind myself of that all the time when she stirs. I just read that babies’ biological clocks finish maturing and tuning at about 40 weeks (10 MONTHS!) and that there’s little we can do about erratic naps or short naps before then, except to provide them the opportunities to nap and sleep, which I do like my life depends on it. I should make that last bit its own blog post so I can look back to “self-soothe” when I need it.
Before I was a mom, I’m someone with a reputation as super calm and super chill, it takes a lot to rile me up or stress me out, and I was ripe & ready for motherhood…. And then it totally bit me in the ass. I think the first 18 months of May’s life was a total blur of sleep deprivation, anxiety, anger, frustration, helplessness, and more. I got insomnia at night, my only time of rest. I was just a serious total wreck, looking back…
It’s not that you don’t know how to get this under control. You are the expert, and you will have to believe in that. You are an educated woman who is well read, well informed, and as good of a mom as the next nanny with 30+ years of experience. It’s your isolation that’s taking a toll on this. Babies have been like this for thousands of years, if you believe what your readings have told you – they need to wake up frequently and voice their needs for their own survival, they don’t sleep deeply because that’s how you avoid sudden infant death, they fuss and they fight sleep perhaps because they want to be held and be close to another human body for safety… What has changed is the way we live, and the isolation that new parents now face. When I was a child in Vietnam, I was tended by something like 9 adults, taking turns throughout the day. Some of them cared about me, others just did it because it was an assumed responsibility. When my brother was a colicky infant and my stressed out mom didn’t know how to handle it, she moved back home with my grandparents, and my grandma took over. When I couldn’t take the isolation in York and the stress any longer, I took the 7 month old baby and went to California for a month, where my mother inlaw basically pampered me and my father in law and brother in law helped watch the baby. Therefore, I think the source of all your problems is just this: you don’t have anyone to release you from the enormous new found responsibility. Your baby will continue to throw you a wrench from now until she’s verbal and walking, so we are talking about another 12 months of this, at least. I’ve learned to take the good days just at their face value – good days with no promises ahead. When the bad days came, I get into survival mode, I broke all rules, I took baby to bed, I nursed baby 20x/night to get her to sleep, I drove the car for 2 hours if needed be to keep her napping, I ran the vacuum cleaner for the duration of her nap… My sole goal was to get the baby her sleep, methods and rules be damned. Furthermore, my house was a total wreck. When I had guests who came to visit occasionally, and they asked me what they could do to help, I simply asked them to clean my house for me. That’s how I survived.
If I were you, I would take Allie and crash my parent’s house on the weekend, if they welcome it. It’s very different from them visiting you on the weekend. Sleep through 2-3 nights free from worries about Dodo, for once. Babies also react differently to different energies in the house, so who knows, Allie might just sleep like an angel there. All my friends who have gotten back to work couldn’t get out of the house soon enough, and reported feeling very relieved. If and When nany S gets Allie under control, it is not that she’s better than you – she would be an excellent nanny of course, but not better. Babies and kids always give moms the most craps. Always. You will see later on that Allie will pick you to have a melt down, will test your boundaries the most, etc.. So what works with the nanny might or might not work with the mom at all (my autistic nephew used to behave like an angel all day long in school, and then saves a big load of meltdown for his mom, as soon as he got through the door, so people used to say, this kid is pretty mild… until you spend 48 hours in his household, and watch what he does and doesn’t do when his mom is around – and his mom is awesome). So, just know that you are doing the right thing, doing your best, and if your best causes you to freak out and stressed out, it’s just a natural response to the situation.
P.S. reading helped me a lot with the stress. I think I read Philip Pulman trilogy or Harry Potter books in those days.
Idlehouse, thank you for all that. So many things you said struck chords in me and made me feel better. I was also very “together” and felt ready for motherhood, ready to sacrifice personal freedoms, ready to deal with sleeplessness…and of course, as you know, it’s kicking my butt.
I had a conversation with Rebecca recently where she said the exact thing you said: our current society isolates new moms and we have to be supermoms to handle all the stress of a newborn ourselves and not have help. In the old days, women helped each other in a society, and tribal societies still do that today. We’re too “civilized” to do anything other than pretend we’re handling it all perfectly fine on our own two shoulders.
I’m not sure I want to go to my parents’ for a weekend. For one, there’s too much crap to lug around for Allie. I hate packing and unpacking. Two, my mom would rather play with the baby than nap her. In visiting their house a couple of times with Allie, the most recent time I’ve found it impossible to get her to nap. She’s just too aware of a foreign environment.
I’ve come to terms with that Susanne may be more effective than I am, and I am perfectly fine with that. My ego doesn’t need to be preserved; I just need my baby well. But I see your point; just cuz Susanne can do stuff effectively doesn’t automatically create magic for me. *sigh*
I’ve been thinking about what you write re reading books. I think I need a break and even if it’s just mentally, such as reading a book for an escape, it’s better than eating/sleeping/breathing baby and reading baby books. I’ll have to look on my shelves to pull out some fun stuff I’d started reading during pregnancy but never finished.
no one every put May to bed for the first 2 years of her life, so I woulnd’t expect your mom to get Allie down for nap. All babies have their first few days to adjust, but if you keep on coming regularly enough, they’ll get used to the environment. When I was traveling to CA yearly, I ended up buying stuffs on Craigslist and leave them in CA, so I don’t have to lug things around. I’m just throwing in the idea out there. If comes a day when you are desperate enough to consider this idea, then know that anything can be done and redesigned for success.
Also, I’m not trying to soothe your ego when i talked about Susanne vs. you. I don’t think you have carried that child in your womb for 9+ months for naught. You would be the person most in-tune with your child, and if the baby quiets down with another person, you never know the real reason for sure – the baby might just deem it’s not safe enough to act up, hence she goes into self preserving silent mode. My sister, who was left in care of a relative, was abused in early years (toddlerhood, I think). She came home the most well behave child, because she did what was told, she sat by herself for hours, she rocked back and forth. She hardly cried, she didn’t scream when she got thrashed. That was what people said was good girl behavior. I came back home after being pampered for 3 years at my own relatives’ home, and I was a problem child, because I asked questions, I resisted authority when it didn’t make sense, I screamed when I got thrashed. So which foster family fail us?
Some moms on Kellymom once told me this story: her baby was a really stinker, couldn’t sleep properly until he was verbal enough (near 3) to tell her that he couldn’t sleep well because of these pains in his legs. She said some babies have growing pains, and apparently her son had it. I’m humbled by these sorts of stories, and so I try to keep in mind that when my baby acts up, she is trying to tell me a life & death matter, hence my anxiety and crazy responses are rational and justified. It’s ok for you to continue as is. Just take care of yourself whenever you have a chance – go get a 1 hour massage, resume exercising (I used to walk for 3+ hours with a napping baby in my Ergo pouch), set future goals, get a calendar and cross off each day you’ve survived until the next milestone is reached.