Go to Sleep, MDG

When people ask me what the hardest thing about being a mom is, I usually answer with one word.

Sleep.

I'm a nine-hours-a-night gal.  I like my sleep.  Correction, I love  my sleep.  In fact, I have trouble surviving without it. Just ask J-Man.

No, don't.  Please.  He might be too honest and I can tell you that me without sleep is even worse than me without food.

So before MDG was born I tried to brace myself.  I remembered that with PDG we pretty much suffered for four straight months.  When he would wake, the only way to get him back to sleep was nursing.  On nights when he'd wake four or five times, that was a whole lot of nursing.  And a super sleepy mama.

With MDG I figured it'd be the same.  He'd wake a bunch.  I'd nurse him a bunch.  He'd fall back asleep.  And at four months he'd figure it out by crying some and life would be a dream.

Well.  Not quite.

First of all, MDG didn't fall back asleep.  He just didn't.  And he didn't necessarily wake because he was hungry.  It has all been very confusing.  When you're operating on minimal sleep, 2am confusion is pretty infuriating.

We've tried everything.  The bassinet, the pack-n-play, the swing, the carseat, the couch, our bed, swaddled, unswaddled, short naps, long naps.  They all would work.... sometimes.  And they all didn't work with any consistency.  Maddening. Belly-sleeping seemed the best bet once he got neck control, but even that was ruined by his learning to roll over only one direction.

Eventually we got to the week of MDG's four month birthday and decided it was time for some crying.  Let me preface this by saying that if you are against your baby crying and you can function as a family with resolving every whimper through the night, I fully respect your decision.  I couldn't.  My family couldn't.  So we buckled down for a little loudness in the hopes of "short term pain, long term gain."  And no, I don't like hearing my baby cry.  I just wasn't functioning.

We didn't let him go more than a half hour at a time, but he figured out bedtime right away.  That was easy for him.  Give him a paci, plop him on his belly, give him 3-5 minutes of squirming and a little fussing and he was out.

But, then came an hour and a half later and he'd be rolled onto his back screaming.  Then two hours after that. Then another hour and time to eat.  Then another hour.  Then maybe two more and time to eat.  Then another hour and I might as well get up and start my day.  Try teaching classes of 30 teenagers after that night.  Again and again. 

By the end of the week I was starting to think that crying it out was way worse than the rocking and nursing routine we'd had before.   How could that be?  With PDG it had worked like a charm. I had resisted, but the doctor had been right and he really started sleeping.  But MDG, not quite.

So when finally on the sixth night he woke once at 10 for a paci and then once at 3 to nurse and that was it, I nearly jumped out of bed with a song when my alarm sounded.  I bounced around my classroom.  I felt good. No, great.

Of course, it's been about six weeks since we started this venture and it's been two steps forward one step back the whole way.  He's weaned himself down to no feedings at night, but still clings to the rolling over and losing the paci troubles.  And that darn stomach bug threw a wrench in everything back in April.

I just keep telling myself he'll learn to sleep some day.  Or he'll be like his dad and eventually discover mindless charms like Aqua Teen Hunger Force or nerdy NPR podcasts to lull him to sleep each time he wakes at night.

And one day, I know because it happened with PDG, I will wish he still needed me at 2am.  I'll lie in bed with the silence of the sleeping house surrounding me, remembering when he fit in the curve of my arms, with no words to convey his wants, only eyes too bright for the hour of the evening and the satisfied smile of having every need met in a gentle sway.  I'll laugh at myself for missing this.  And then hopefully I'll reread these notes and get the nostalgia I need to take off my rose-tinted glasses and go back to bed myself.