Parenting and Babies: Baby Talk Blog

As I hinted in a previous post about babies and sleeping, Cundy and I started off as attachment parenting purists, and I still think that's a sound approach overall. Where we parted company with the Sears crew though was around sleep. First, sleeping with our babies did not work, especially for Cundy, who's got a hair trigger consciousness: she wakes all the way up whenever either baby coughs three rooms away. We found out pretty quick (duh!) that Sleep Deprived Mommy was not always the Happiest Mommy.

But that's not all. We also found out that as our babies got older and became more socially aware, they preferred our company to sleeping. No surprise there, I guess, but the end result is a less well-rested child. And of course, Tired Baby=Grumpy Baby=Stressed Out Parents.

So we bit the bullet. We started putting H into his crib and--gulp--letting him cry it out. But guess what? As soon as he figured out the new system, which took a couple of weeks, he stopped crying. I think he just realized that bedtime is bedtime, and he (happily) accepted the inevitable.

The great plus of all plusses in this is that H and LC are so well rested that their personalities tend to be golden. They have their moment, yes, but they show none of that cranky, irritable Tired Baby behavior that we see all around us.

Since Happy Baby=Happy Parents, we win. The only real complaint I would make about his approach is that we're homebound from about 5:30 on (that's when bedtime starts) unless we get a sitter. But that's where I want to be anyway, most nights.

I'll talk about some specifc tricks and tips for good sleep soon.

By the way, due to customer requests, we just added Little Giraffe Throws, aka chenille blankets for grownups who are jealous of their baby's snugglicious nest. This blanket is a true reward for hardworking mommies and daddies.

Posted by Scott at 11:39 PM | Permalink | Comments (3) | TrackBacks (0)

I sometimes feel my life may summarized by this formula: When they sleep, all is well. When they don't...

C and I started off as koolaid-drinking Sears-ophiles. We believed that Dr. Sears' view of the world was the final answer to all things child-related. When he told us it was better for children to sleep in the bed with their parents (and even lay the baby-alone-in-crib-death fear on us, we obeyed. H slept with us for first three months. Perhaps I should say that H slept while we anxiously held our breath between every one of his. C was breastfeeding, so MAYBE she got some relief by not having to leave the bed to feed him every few hours, but mostly what we remember about that period is shell-shocked, mind-numbed, semi-psychotic sleeplessness.

So one weekend we dragged ourselves out of town and went to Athens, our beloved college town and place where we fell in love, and visited some old friends, Jessica B. among them. Jessica is the opposite of an attachment parent; she's old school. Her children sit up straight, say 'yes ma'am,' and go to bed when she snaps her fingers. (OK-a slight exaggeration...) Anyway, Jessica listened to our new parent blues for awhile and then interjected with a curt command: "Get this sleep book by Dr. Weisbluth. Just get it."

"But Jessica," I whined, "this guy doesn't believe in letting babies cry does he?"

She just laughed. "Do you want to be sane? Just get the book."

Well, we got it. The name of the book is Healthy Sleep Habits, Happy Child.

Get it. If you do nothing else for yourself this year, get this book. It saved us then, and it saves us still.

Cundy and I now have both of our children in bed asleep by 7:00 most nights. That means that she and I actually have an evening, and that our household has at least slightly better odds of running another day without major catastrophes.

And they're happy. To spend any time at all with my children is to witness beings who are right inside, as good old Dr. Sears says. I put this down mostly to C's exceptional day-in, day-out parenting , but the fact that they sleep 14-16 hours every day is a big piece of their mental and physical wellbeing.

Thank you, Jessica. We owe you.

Posted by Scott at 10:33 PM | Permalink | Comments (4) | TrackBacks (1)

My almost three year old son has a favorite suit. It is purple fleece with flowers on it ( a hand-me-down from a friend), and very well worn. We have had it for about 2 months now, and H wants to wear it every night - there are no exceptions. By mid afternoon he wants to know if the Purple Suit has made it into the dryer! He cries if we suggest another alternative to this Suit and will not really settle into his bedtime routine until the Purple Suit is zipped and he is stuffed into it - literally stuffed - which is the point of my story.

H is outgrowing his Purple Suit. Last week we noticed his toes crunched into the little footies. He said, " there is no room!" I would stretch the Suit down a bit from the top, adjusting the footies accordingly as he sighed and cooed contentments. This week, the Suit is growing even shorter, and H's attempts to wriggle around into it are failing him. So he says, " Mama, there is no room!" , and I reply casually, " I know, you are growing so much". Well, this statement did not sit well with him, and tonight, in response he shrieked, " NOOOOO, I don't want to grow anymore, I don't want to grow to be a big boy". He was almost inconsolable. I suggested cutting the footies out and extending our wear for several more weeks. He ignored this idea and wanted to 'have a little talk'.

After a long conversation with H about the Purple Suit, I realized that there was something else going on with his little mind and his big heart. He told me that he wanted to stay 'plain old H' and that he liked 'everything the way it is.'
I saw how genuinely happy he is to be who he is, where he is. His needs are simple and direct - a Purple Suit to sleep in, a bedtime talk in the bathroom, songs in the rocking chair, his hair stroked. I tucked him into his bed (Purple Suit secured) and stepped into the hallway, my perspective changed, my mind a little bigger, my heart much more open. I see that I can be happy with plain old me. This sounds a little cliche' as I am writing, but it feels like a revelation for me tonight. I'll figure the Purple Suit thing out tomorrow - a little scissor treatment maybe, or not - maybe everything is just fine the way it is.

Posted by Cundy at 9:06 PM | Permalink | Comments (3) | TrackBacks (0)

Every day now H gets more independent. He wants to take his own shirt off, have "privacy" (his word) when he uses (his own) potty, likes to climb in his blanket fort and tell everyone that it's "his area," likes to build and destroy his own block towers, likes to get comfy in my chair and flip the pages of a favorite book while subvocalizing his own version of the plot...

He's not a baby anymore.

What strikes me the most about all this is the way that his imagination is becoming more real to him. Tonight before dinner we played the shark pool game where the rug in the living room was the pool full of sharks and he runs squealing from sofa to chair and back, hurling himself into them before the shark (guess who?) gets him. The only props I used to get him in the spirit of the game were my vocal rendition of the Jaws theme (dum dum, dum dum...) and my hand as a shark fin coming toward him. But to him, there were sharks in that pool, and his life depended on his scrambling up into that chair fast enough.

Another imaginary scene he lives in involves the elephants at the zoo somehow squirting him. He absolutely will not abide elephants; he has fullblown elephant paranoia. Now, where he picked up this one, I don't know. The thing is that in his mind, elephants are just out to get him.

And like all children, he loves stories. I'm in charge of the final leg of our bedtime relay, and mostly what I do is read and tell him stories. We're on an Uncle Wiggly jag lately, and I usually read him a real one from the book and then make one up. Because I'm half-delerious sometimes when I'm creating these stories, I'll slip into some sort of stream of consciousness narrative that has Uncle Wiggly going to the bank to make a deposit or calling the plumber or whatvere else is on my semi-conscious mind.

Well, the very second I deviate from the Uncle Wiggly Universe as H knows it, he calls me out: "No, daddy, that's not the story!" It doesn't matter if it's a new story to him. What he means is that this can happen in that world, but not that. He really gets the logic of the story-world, and senses when I put something in that world that doesn't belong.

All of this verifies for me two truths about human experience: we make sense of the world through stories, and we don't trust stories that create confusion in our minds. Uncle Wiggly simply does not go to Starbucks.

So, as I tuck the little guy into his favorite Little Giraffe blanket and sing him my entire repertoire of three night-night songs, I vow yet again to do whatever I can to impart a "story" of the world and his place in it that makes sense to him and lets him feel at home here.

Posted by Scott at 10:03 PM | Permalink | Comments (2) | TrackBacks (0)