Sleep On It. Please.

It’s been a long week. Dealing with antibiotics and crankiness and ear infections is one thing. Sleep? That’s a whole different ball of parenting wax. First, the good news: Charlotte’s fever is gone and she seems a lot better. She still has a lingering cough and her appetite is still a little so-so, but we’ll take it. She shouldn’t have to go on the stronger antibiotics, and for that we’re very, very grateful. In the meantime, not too surprisingly, we reinforced some less-than-great habits while Miss C was sick. Obviously, when your sick baby cries, you go to her. You do anything you can to make her comfy so she can sleep and heal. Of course, smart babies/toddlers learn real fast that having Mommy hold you all night is WAY BETTER than sleeping by yourself! So, even when you feel better, a bit of crying isn’t too bad of a trade off for co-sleeping. Let me clarify something: Mommy is NOT a co-sleeper. No, she needs her space to sleep, not to mention freedom from the terror of having baby roll out of bed. So, once Charlotte was back to healthy, we worked to reestablish sleep habits. The past 3 days have involved heart-wrenching, soul-deadening bouts of cry-it-out sessions. The baby sleep book says, for Charlotte’s age, limit crying and hysterical screaming to one hour for naps, and there’s no limit at bedtime. Guess what? My tenacious little darling cried the FULL hour during each “nap.” Going to bed was slightly easier, with 25 to 45 minutes of crying. For added fun, Charlotte is pure baby as far as not understanding language or being able to talk to us, but she’s pure toddler when it comes to her weight, strength, climbing ability, and ability to manipulate. She climbs up to a standing position in her crib and cries and cries. We go in, lay her back down, leave, and then return to repeat it. And repeat it. And repeat it. I’m fairly certain that we shouldn’t go in and help her back down, but she truly is a little iffy on getting down from a standing position on her own. Eventually, she decides getting up for the 3,466th time is not worth it, and she whimpers a little longer and eventually falls asleep. Listening to your baby scream and cry is one of the most awful sounds—or feelings—in the world. And of course, I wonder if I’m doing the right thing, if Charlotte will be emotionally scarred, if she’ll ever forgive us for, as the baby sleep book so eloquently puts it, “giving her the opportunity to learn to fall asleep.” Well, it sounds good when the pediatricians say it. Charlotte then wakes up a couple hours later. At this point, in light of what she went through while sick, I go in and give her a quick rock and cuddle before she starts full-blown, hysterical crying. Call me naïve, but I really don’t think she’s being manipulative at these times. It’s usually a coughing fit that has woken her up, and she’s visibly disoriented and out of whack. A little snuggling with Mommy calms her down in less than 10 seconds—this is not the case during the day. Am I reinforcing bad habits? I dunno. For now, I feel obligated to acknowledge that yes, Charlotte girl, you have a cough. It woke you up and hurt your throat, didn’t it? And now you just need some mommy-love, and you’ll go right back to your cozy dreams. At least, that’s my rationale. Or, to be more accurate, my instinct. It’s frustrating to deal with such sleeping problems after having such a previously good sleeper. However, yesterday, naps went slightly better, so I’m optimistic that we’ll eventually get our good sleeper back. The word “consistency” keeps playing in my head, taunting me. Because what else is echoing after “Be consistent, be consistent, be consistent”? The phrase “Are you sure? Are you sure? Are you sure? Are you sure she doesn’t REALLY need you? Shouldn’t you go comfort her?” My heart goes out to those with non-sleeping babies. I took Charlotte’s sleep habits for granted, and now that we’re starting from square one (or, square negative one, I think), I’m willing to do just about anything to have a well-rested (read: not cranky), happy, baby who, I’ll admit it, gives Mommy a break when she naps and some much-needed sleep at night. Not too shocking, after great sleep deprivation, unending Charlotte care (I didn't even have time to eat and lost 4 pounds this week), and being Charlotte's favorite thing on which to wipe her snotty, germy nose, I came down with Charlotte Plague. Chris did too, so now Charlotte is in her post-sickness clingy stage, and Chris and I feel like we've been run over. Repeatedly. **I wrote this post yesterday morning while in a headache-y fog. I’m happy to report that my little darling went down for the night with NO CRYING last night, and then, bless her little sleepy heart, she slept for 13 hours. Straight. Dare I hope we got our good sleeper back?