ILX Parenting 5: I'm a big kid now

white noise recording + arms-in swaddling ftw

at least for tonight

That's awesome that you and the kid are already recording white noise together.

xD

uh,

XD

Nice! How did the daytime naps go?

So Abby's been taking her naps late in the day now. She used to nap from like 11-1 or so, now she won't go down before 3 pm. Her naps are usually between 2-3 hours and if she sleeps until 5 or 6, things get particularly challenging at bedtime.

My wife works a lot of weekends, so last night I had to put both of the kids to bed. Joey nodded off around 8:30, but Abby was unstoppable. I'd get her down on the pillow and start in with her bottle, but she'd pry herself back up and go run around the room and play with her toys. I played with her intermitantly while I worked at getting her down until about 10, but the next thing I knew, it was 11 o'clock and my wife was yelling upstairs "Honey, I'm home"-type shit.

FUCK! I had fallen asleep before my baby and who the hell knows, she could have found a way to really hurt herself. I looked around in a panic and didn't see her. Finally found her dozing like a lamb in her little play tent and spirited her back into bed before my wife came upstairs.

I feel like the absolute worst fuck-up. When I watch my kids I'm not drinking or anything. I'm just an exhausted-assed dad who can't keep up with a 16-month-old girl.

yeah, the dreaded late nap, i feel you on that one

well that lasted about a night. Last night she pretty much didn't sleep for more than 10 mins from 8pm to almost 1am. White noise, swaddling, rocking, shhing, feeding, didn't matter.

yes yes but what of the daytime napping

Little late here, but I wholeheartedly recommend the Miracle Blanket. We swaddled our son with that plus another blanket until he was about 4 months (at which point he would just start breaking out in the middle of the night and screaming and he'd outgrown the co-sleeper anyway--on to the crib and his own room at that point.)

idk, she struggles mightily in the miracle blanket sometimes. I think it prevents her from pulling her knees up to release gas. the halo sleepsack thingy gives her a little more freedom of movement, but it also seems a bit less cool and breathable.

xp yeah daytime napping too. Everything.

whew, so it seems like maybe we're getting over some hump. Last night she slept for a four plus hour stretch, and tonight she went in her co-sleeper without a big fight. Just now she woke up and cried a little but she was easy to soothe back to sleep.

wtg babby

anyone have thoughts on alcohol (for parents) in the early months? I've had exactly three beers since she was born, which I drank during the day. I have this westmalle in the fridge that I'm kind of dying to crack open right now, but I'm afraid I'll be insufficiently alert to do my nighttime bottle/changing duties.

too late

You're probably fine having a beer or two. I drink moderately now and my parental adrenaline kicks in regardless when I have to get up and change a diaper in the middle of the night.

I do my best not get drunk anymore though. When my girl was littler, we had to take her to the hospital a few times, usually in the middle of the night. One of the first times, I had been drinking a little more than I should have been and it was really difficult for me to stay awake and on top of things in the ER. After that, I didn't drink at all for about a year.

Yeah, having the one strong beer went fine but was about the limit of what I'd want to do a diaper change under the influence of, let alone having to go to the hospital.

I didn't drink much during the babies, but more for the same reasons I didn't drink when I went skiing.

Just like my appetite for alcohol disappeared with higher altitudes and more physical exertion than what I was used to, after sitting up all night with an infant and then going to work the next day, I just wanted sleep and for once, I didn't need the bottle's help.

I will be 39 weeks this Thursday and still no nesting phase. If anything, there seems to be even more of an anti-nesting phase forming. There has been a complete drop in my energy level and I just want to sleep. The "nest", such as it is, will just have to do.

aw! so exciting.

the nest will be great! you will be great!

Thanks, Tracer :)

Now I am thinking that perhaps the lack of a nesting phase is due to having to go on the road soon after she is born.

At the start of my pregnancy I really enjoyed being in bed until week 16 or so. It has been feeling like those days again, so it's all coming full circle, winding down.

I have no real hunches or gut feelings as to when she'll decide to make her appearance and I am enjoying that. I always seem to have hunches or gut feelings about things and am usually right or have them so strongly I just feel I can count on them. But her arrival is a real mystery with no clues.

The due date doesn't seem to mean anything or weigh in more than any other day, maybe she will, maybe she won't. There were predictions she would come with the full moon but that came and went. Now there is a new moon prediction closer to her due date. She could arrive on my birthday which would be the best present ever. However, I love the idea of her turning what was a previously insignificant day into the most special day in my whole life.

It feels like she is running out of room and not liking feeling cramped. She goes back and forth between having her legs crossed and stretching them out to her side, rendering me completely lopsided every other hour.

Ok IDFGI, she's two months now, and she just will - not - fucking - go - to - sleep. We're a bit against co-sleeping because we've seen so many friends who still have the child in the room or even bed with them at a year or two years. I would try it if I knew that there was a way out.

the only way out for us was giving tit as often as kid cried at night. worked for all three. we did some cosleeping with #s 2 & 3 but yeah it's obviously not great for the fuck

How long did it take for the feedings to get less spread out? Lately she's started to cry even when she's not hungry (we try feeding and she doesn't eat). I know this might sound crazy, but I sometimes swear she's playing a little game with me where she adapts to my soothing tactics and thwarts them, and does whatever she can to fight sleep in the co-sleeper. For example, we started giving her a pacifier (which I kind of regret, but too late), and when she drops it by accident I put it back if she complains. But sometimes she drops it over and over again and I almost feel like she's testing me. Maybe this is just the exhaustion-induced madness setting in.

The thing is her mom is REALLY stretched to exhaustion right now because K is waking up to feed sometimes more frequently than every two hours, and sometimes takes at least 30 minutes between feeding and burping, so my wife doesn't get quality sleep at all. We started doing one bottle per night (that I give) just so she can sleep a stretch, but now it seems like K is finding ways to prevent that from working.

Isn't the dropping thing a game babies play on purpose? I mean 2 months sounds young to be doing that but I thought the dropping game was a thing. I'm sorry you are having such a hard time with this hurting. Sometimes it sounds like some babies are just much better sleepers than others right from the beginning. What you're going through sounds rough.

yeah I know what you & our only relief came when we surrendered to her every feeding whim, & with the other kids we did the same. but it was still super hard for a long time, like I think sleep kinda normalized after three months but we didnt really get full nights for like uh four+ years. we don't do cry it out fwiw

yeah my friend has a three year old who just slept through the night a couple months ago :/

for the first time, I mean

Well, she *HAS* actually been asleep for the last 10 minutes or so now. Maybe she just needed to tire herself out.

Sometimes I wonder if maybe we start trying to put her to bed too early. My wife is kind of big on that. If I had had my way, she'd stay up later but I'd probably be really bad about having a routine and a bedtime and it would have been bad news in the long run. We give her a bath usually around 7/7:30, she gets one last feeding (or really, cluster of feedings, like she keeps eating until she stops asking, a la Euler's baby), then I rock her, then we put her down. She'll often seem to be sound asleep but then wake up the second we put her down. But we've also tried not waiting until she's totally asleep to put her down so she isn't *startled* by the crib, and that doesn't help either. I go through the list (is the diaper dirty, is she gassy, is she hungry, etc.) and sometimes nothing works. I've tried arms-in swaddling, but she seems to hate it (she struggles mightily and often houdinis her way out). Maybe trying to get her to go to sleep is itself the problem. Maybe there's just no answer but keep sweating it out until she gets a little older and more adjusted. I have to admit that as tired as I get, I still laugh when I see the little bundle with her eyes popped wide open staring up and just refusing to do anything resembling sleeping, even though a minute earlier she had been yawning and nodding off in my arms.

And that's the thing too, I don't want to project too much awareness onto a 2-month-old, but she looks so aware, in a certain sense, of what she's doing. I mean she knows we're trying to put her to sleep, and she hates it, and she seems to fight it in this deliberate way that I just never would have expected a 2-month-old to be capable of.

Did I mention she sometimes fakes drinking the bottle?

You have a very intelligent baby, Hurting. I don't think you are imagining any of this. She is aware and it seems putting two and two together constantly. If puppies and kittens can make basic associations really early on, imagine what a human baby is capable of.

Yeah, I do think she's intelligent. :) And as I said, as crazy as it drives me, I sometimes look down at her moving her lips on the bottle nipple without sucking (after acting desperate to eat) and laugh at what a little gonif* she is.

*yiddish, literally "thief" but often used as a term of endearment for a child who gets away with stuff

<3

I know you are having a rough time but she sounds so CUTE!

Ok, well she did sleep from my post last night until about 1:30, at which point I had to change her because she was kinda stinky and then I fed her. After that she slept again til 4:30. So I guess you just have to be persistent and have some faith that things will eventually improve. I imagine plenty more bumps are coming.

omg knocked up??

oh dude what?

ha god no, it was a "plenty of bumps coming" joek

wow, I literally got it 24 hours later

- at this point i think sleeping is a way bigger priority than changing a diaper at night, she can live w/that and so can you

- sorry to keep hammering on this but what of the daytime napping? i know i sound one-note but imo you take care of the daytime and night time takes care of itself. this is easier said than done but at least in the daytime you're actually, like, awake and not hating being awake

(i realize this sounds a little bit like looking for the lost diamond ring under the streetlight because it's brighter there, even though you lost it under a car, but ime there is a pretty strong... synergy? between daytime sleeping and nighttime sleeping, and kickstarting that during the day when you're actually somewhat functional and not hating the entire planet is marginally easier)

Today the midwife almost kept it to herself that maybe there could be two babies instead of one. Talk about momentary freak out. Her vibe as she checked things out was alarming me so I insisted she tell me what was on her mind. However, after we spoke about it she felt more certain that there was just one baby. Had several ultrasounds and didn't quite fit the typical criteria for multiples through the pregnancy. Took me a few hours to get over it but I feel there is just one baby...now. Our baby is just a real mover and shaker.

This little scare has made me really want to deliver though. I have been really comfy in my pregnancy. It's time to meet her.

I had a dream last night that I was in some tourist-attraction historic house with K and there was this "baby bed" that was there for public use, so I put K on it. Then this group of hipsters showed up and also had a baby, and they were like "dude, we wanna put our baby on the baby bed." And I was like, "well my baby is already there," and they said "well yeah but it's actually more healthy and natural for the baby to be UNDER the bed." And I was like "what the fuck? You're just saying that because you want to put YOUR baby on the bed." Then I got into a physical fight with them.

Haha! and I could see that sort of thing happening, actually.

I have had very, very few pregnant/baby dreams. Insomnia had something to do with it. J. has had all the textbook pregnancy dreams.