Catching up

Where should I start?

A visit to the inlaws has put me behind in my posting, and as sod's law is universal, loads of interesting things happened during the interim.

Daughter slept through last night. But that long-awaited peace came at a heavy price. My little girl is now old enough to sleep in her own room! Having her in with us meant that every time we moved on our creaky old bed, Daughter was woken in her cot. And co-sleeping didn't work, because if I'm next to her, all she wants is milk.

In fact, it was on our way home when we stopped off overnight that I made the decision to move the cot out from beside our bed. Only twin rooms were available and there were no spare cots. This meant a night of hell for me - I only got three hours of sleep as I was milked for all I was worth! Every little noise from Husband across the room woke her too so as soon as we got back, I bought a baby monitor and some more bottles. Now, we're about to go into night three sans boob, and night two of own bedroom.

The Sleep Challenge thing I've been harking on about has worked a treat. I'm now trying to be consistent with how naptimes happen. Though I'm not setting specific nap times, I am reading a story or singing a song before sleep and so far it seems to be working.

Anyway, the baby monitor says that there is stirring in the other room. I will leave you until next time.

Joy

The last few days with Daughter have been a real joy. My siblings were here and as a result, my little girl has enjoyed being the centre of attention. We've had so, so much fun.

Daughter has been experimenting with happy noises - much to our delight - and getting much better at going to bed. I've found that the less I think about parenting and the more time I spend pulling silly faces, the easier life is.

So that's my goal - forget all about milestones, all about books, sleeping regularly, getting 'enough' sleep etc. As my wise mother told me, if Daughter is tired she'll sleep, regardless of where she is.

It is really hard to stop thinking about what she should be doing by which age when you're bombarded with messages telling you which formula your child should have at which age, which weaning foods are suitable etc. But today, Daughter stole toasted tea cake from my plate in a cafe and munched it without batting an eyelid. She picked up the food, put it in her mouth, chewed and swallowed. We promptly bought her some rusks after that, despite their 7+ month age-tag.

Even if I don't get enough sleep at night, I'm just going to zonk out during the day, even if it means I won't get everything done.

I know I swore I'd rip up the books before, but the 'information' about how you should raise your child is so structured into every aspect of our society that it's impossible to block out completely. I'll do my best to take it all with a pinch of salt from now on, now that I've seen how fun things are when you don't worry.

Day 7

And thus the 'Johnson's sleep challenge' is complete.

Last night was absolutely magic. No tears at bath time, no tears during the baby massage. Daughter fell asleep in my arms, went down for an  hour, then woke up. She calmed easily, then I put her down drowsy and left her to go off. I'll definitely be continuing this routine, challenge or no, as it really seems to work.

Sceptical as I was at first, I can definitely see why this series of actions has the desired effect. Everything about getting baby ready for bed is centred around love and intimacy, and as the night time is the longest that baby is away from you, I see it almost as a fuelling-up on attention and company until the following morning. Sure, the nice warm bath is great, as is the massage, but I think that ultimately, all Daughter wants before she goes off to sleep is to feel safe, secure and loved. I mean, don't we all? I certainly know that if I were so small and vulnerable that I'd want all the snuggles I could get.

I think people forget, as I've said before, that when they're dealing with babies they're actually dealing with tiny people. I have frequent arguments with folk about the 'cry it out' technique - also known as the Ferber Method. In my eyes, it's just barbaric. I explain my dislike of it by telling people to imagine that they're abroad with no money, no food, no passport and no tickets home. 'Crying it out' to me, is like being left unable to explain your predicament to anyone, yet instead of trying to help you, the locals just ignore you, and leave you to your own troubles.

It is such a comfort to have  found an alternative that so far, appears to work.

Night 2

Night two of the 'sleep challenge' was a total disaster. Daughter howlded through the bath and the massage, then continued to howl for three whole hours afterwards. We had a really broken night in general though so perhaps she had tummy ache or something...

Tonight I decided to actually look at the advice given. I promised myself I'd not do this again, but even at 3 months, Daughter is getting too heavy to rock to sleep, and as I'm weaning her onto bottles, I don't want to nurse her into slumber. The advice to put the baby down drowsy seems to be the way to go... I read the chapter of Black Beauty in which Jerry takes a girl and her boy to the hospital for free in his cab, then laid Daughter carefully on her mattress. So far, five minutes on, she's still fast asleep. Normally she'd have been howling by now so we will have to wait and see how this progresses.

Now, to dinner.

Growing up

Milestones, they call them. Developmental milestones.

The system* would have you believe that they are to be reached at a specific time by children who are developing at the normal pace. I've come to think of the whole thing like the A1 north-bound - everyone is pushing on in the same direction, but in reality, we'll not all reach Newcastle at the same time.

Most of us are travelling by car on or around the speed limit - we're hitting Newark and our first words as and when we should. But as it's an A road and not a motorway, all kinds of other traffic is allowed to travel our path too. You get tractors - steady and strong - classic motor cars which perhaps don't have more than 4 gears but are intolerably beautiful, not to mention the occasional and eccentric horse and cart. They won't get there as quickly as the rest of us but as its the destination that matters and not the journey time, it isn't really an issue.

Except.

People get competitive. We seem to be conditioned to treat all of these milestones as markers in a race. Daughter didn't smile until she was 8 weeks - 2 weeks older than most babies. Friend's toddler didn't gain weight as fast as expected which caused health bods to worry and question his development.

Things seem to have to happen to kids so quickly - they have to sleep in their own bed from day one, be away from Mummy from the time she's ready to go back to work, and learn to smile, to talk, to crawl all according to some sort of magical calendar. When we panic if our children don't reach these milestones at the same time - if not faster - than they're supposed to, is it any wonder they're growing up too quickly? We're competitive, so we push our children forwards in an effort to say to the world, 'We are better. Our child is better.'

Just a thought...

*I'm not one of these 'fight the system' morons, I just don't know what else to call the... thing (well, system) that our growing kids are supposed to adhere to.