A while back, I wrote a Controversy Wednesday post on CRYING IT OUT which attracted some attention, not all of it positive. You may remember my follow-up post entitled “Apology Thursday: I WAS WRONG” in which I begged forgiveness for being a know-it-all about sleep and included a photo of myself at my most haggard as a peace offering. Incredibly, this is the most-read post of all time on Higher Highs, Lower Lows, according to my analytics. This tells me that you all are a bunch of sick puppies who like to watch others suffer.
Anyway, I’m here again to say that I was wrong. Wait, scratch that. I wasn’t wrong so much as I was an arrogant nincompoop. And here’s why: Seabass is having what we’ll euphamistically call “sleep issues.”
About a month ago, the little dude – who up until this point had been the portrait of restedness (is that a word?) – decided to stop taking his afternoon nap. He would happily take his morning nap from 9am until about 11:30am or later, but at 1pm, could not fall asleep for his scheduled afternoon siesta. At first, I thought it was a fluke. But after a few weeks of this, it had become a habit, and I was – AM – pulling my hair out.
I e-mailed my go-to girl for sleep, Deb Pedrick, with www.familysleep.com. “Try waking him from his morning nap at 11am and putting him back down at 1pm,” she said. “Let’s allow him to be a little tired so he really wants it later.” I did as I was told, and it worked! For two days. Then Seabass was back to crying/babbling/screaming for the hour I allotted him to be in his crib. I wrote Deb again.
“Okay, let’s try waking him up at 10am now,” she wrote, intrepidly. “If he’s only had one hour of morning sleep he should want it by the afternoon.” So, once again, I did as I was told, and it worked! For two days. By this time, I was getting pretty tired of waking a peacefully sleeping baby only to have him cranky for the remaining eight hours before bedtime.
“I can’t keep waking him,” I wrote Deb. “I’m not getting anything done because he’s hardly ever asleep. So I’m going to let him sleep as long as he wants in the morning, give him a shot at sleeping in the afternoon, but not push it.” Deb said that was fine, especially since Seabass’ night sleep was super consolidated and luscious at 12 glorious hours every night.
So, that was the plan this past weekend, and all was well. Until Seabass awoke at 11pm last night and didn’t stop crying until I went into him at 12:15am.
Little sleepy dumpling.
Now, look. Generally speaking, I am really confident in the “cry-it-out” method. Every night when I put Seabass to sleep, I look at him and wordlessly say, “I’ll see you at 6am, buddy,” as in “I won’t be seeing you any earlier.” And this has worked wonders for both his own sleep and ours. Nine nights out of ten, he’s silent as a mouse.
But every great once in a while, he wakes in the night and cries like it’s going out of style, and last night was one such occasion. When I realized he’d been awake for over an hour, I went in and scooped that little dumpling into my arms. I think he was a little surprised, like, “Whoa! You’ve never done this before!” but it didn’t stop him from crying intermittently for the next hour or so, even with me rocking him. He didn’t have a fever, and there was no other obvious reason for his discontent. The only thing I could imagine was that he had another tooth coming in.
I am very, very, very protective of my sleep because a well-rested mommy means a patient, happy, playful mommy. But in the wee hours last night, I held my precious little boy and enjoyed the act of soothing him just by being near. His crying eventually tapered off, his movements became more calm, and his eyelids drooped. He never fully fell asleep while I was there, but when I lay him back down in his crib, he cried for only a moment before finally falling silent. I, on the other hand, was awake much longer trying to fall back asleep.
Why is it that, despite having missed three total hours of sleep last night, Seabass was still up bright and early at 6:30am? It makes no sense, but since when was making sense a baby’s modus operandi? In any case, as I slithered out of bed to start the day this morning, I noticed no resentment that I’d lost valuable sleep last night. In fact, my thoughts were only of Seabass, hoping he was doing better since the last time I’d seen him and looking forward to his shining, rosy-cheeked face. It struck me that I was comfortable in my role as caregiver, that maybe I’m finally growing into this whole motherhood thing, 10 months later.
I am Jaime, wife to Jacob. We are the smitten, stupefied, sometimes scared silly parents of a precious boy nicknamed Seabass and a darling girl nicknamed Sweet Chuck.
Higher Highs, Lower Lows 
I have nothing to say except OH MY GOODNESS I CAN’T WAIT TO GET MY HANDS ON THAT CHILD!!!!
The End.
xoxo
Oma
The one thing that makes me the absolute craziest is trying to figure out why my little monkey does any of the things she does.
Bedtime at 8pm and up and ready to play at 11pm? Why??? Who knows!
Sorry about the sleep last night! You should send him off to the movies this afternoon with a little extra money for popcorn while you stay home and take a nap.
I went through something similar as a cry it out mom. When he was older and had slept well for several months, I found I enjoyed comforting him the odd times he had night issues. I was more comfortable, I think, distinguishing real needs for mommy vs. Im just going to cry so you spend all night with me.
Your little one is probably on a growth spurt or maybe ready to only have one nap. That was our roughest transition time….probably more so for me than him.
I am glad you are feeling more comfortable in your caregiving role. Those are the types of experiences that make it all worthwhile.
As a parent of older children, I miss those “cuddly” years. Enjoy your little Seabass!
When you say that he has sleep issues, what you really mean is that you have issues with his sleep habits. Awareness of this distinction is key. Then decide what you want to do about it, up to and including hiring a local pre-teen to get some early babysitting experience by occupying sId tyrant so you can catch a break. You can lead a horse to water but you can’t make it drink. Same for babies, beds and actually sleeping.
I realized early on there is often no rhyme or reason and “teething” cannot possibly be the reason for every little off moment in a baby’s life. Sometimes life is a little off for no good reason at all. Good luck – we’ve all be there!
Whenever you start getting use to one schedule, he WILL change. His Dad was never a napper unless I held him and he NEVER slept for 12 hours until he was a teenager. It’s very frustrating to figure out what is wrong when they can’t tell you. Sometimes, it’s just the boogieman and he needs you with him.
Benny is going through similar times. Morning nap has moved later but is still solid. Goes down easy for 1 1/2 to 2 hours. (You couldn’t pay me to wake him 😉 Afternoon nap is totally hit or miss, but much shorter, an hour if I’m lucky, usually more like 1/2 hour to 45 min. Sometimes goes down easy, sometimes cries for a short while and falls asleep, sometimes he’s not having it (like today.) I quit giving it an hour like I used to. Now I try for a good 15 minutes and then we’re done. Sometimes he ends up going down in the later afternoon for a short siesta. Whatever works. I think they’re definitely in transition to 1 nap but not quite ready to make the move. I’m trying to not stress about it and take it one day at a time. Hope tonight goes better… that’s the brutal one! I still succumb to middle of the night nursing once in a while. (Shhh, don’t tell.)
Don’t be so hard on yourself. I am four years and three kids into this motherhood thing and I don’t think that I am anywhere close to having a handle on it 🙂