Saturday, December 4, 2010

Which one of us is supposed to be crying?

After six months of begging, pleading, reading every book known to man, asking everyone I know for advice, and trying everything to get this kid to sleep, we're giving crying it out a try.  Basically because tonight he was just cranky, he took no naps, he is exhausted but kicking and fussing and just refusing to sleep.  You get to a point where you just say "Ok, we're putting you in your crib and seeing how this goes."  I told Ben that I was going to write a parenting book to trump all parenting books, the title of which is going to be "Do What You Want, Spend All Your Money On Books and Classes, Your Kid Will Sleep When They Goddamned Well Please."

Not that this is anyone's fault but mine that we have issues with this.  When Henry was born he had respiratory distress, it turned out to not be a big deal, but of course I was terrified that he was going to stop breathing in his sleep.  At night, the maternity ward insisted on bringing him back to the nursery, and for good reason-they said if my eyes weren't on him, then theirs were going to be, and I needed to sleep sometime.  Each night when they took them they had to give me a sleeping pill to keep me from waddling my recently disemboweled self down to the nursery to make sure he was still ok.  We started with him in the crib at home, when that didn't work, we moved him to the swing and I'd sleep on the couch next to him.  Turns out HE could sleep there, but I couldn't.  So we started co-sleeping.

Once again, I am not going to advocate one way of doing things over another.  I know there are people who wouldn't consider anything but cosleeping, and some that can't imagine their baby sleeping with them, and everything in between.  I did what worked for us, and what worked for me, really.  Maybe if I had pushed the crib thing we wouldn't be having this issue now, who the hell knows.

But the nights are just getting later and later-if he's with us he wants to play and talk and jab us in delicate areas with his elbows and feet (I don't know how he does it, but when he starts flailing he always repeatedly kicks my c-section scar, and for Ben, his genital area). He doesn't nap well at school and I knew we needed to make some changes, both for his well-being and so his day care teachers don't lynch me as an example to others who give in to their first-borns because we don't know any better.

It's been about thirty minutes and he's finally starting to settle, after some majorly intense screaming and crying (ok, the crying was partly me).  I have a big glass of red wine and some very comforting words from some other moms I know who are assuring me that he will not pack his bags and move out tomorrow, never to speak to me again.  I guess this is my first lesson in the whole "the right thing isn't always the easy thing" parenting school.

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