Well, it finally happened last night. The one decision, the one shining moment in which all my parenting principles were thrown to the wind in a giddy whooosh of crankiness. Let's be honest here: things have been getting better. Blake has been taking two naps per day at roughly the same times each day. While scanty at first, those naps now total at least three hours every day. He has a bedtime which is encouraged by an early afternoon nap, a sweet predictable routine, and as much consistency as two slackers can manage. He wears a big thick cloth diaper to bed with extra padding and a nice slick coating of butt paste so he'll be reasonably dry and rash-free all night long. We don't talk in the bedroom, and we work hard to keep him in his crib. (Although it must be said that I have been known to make some weird decisions when I'm not fully awake. I've often woken up in the morning to find him latched onto my breast, with only the haziest notion of how he came into the big bed.). There have been things from The No Cry Sleep Solution that I have yet to try (like loveys); so maybe I'm not as fully dedicated as I need to be.

With all of those caveats, the facts are these: Blake does not sleep longer than 3 hours at a time. He wakes up at 3 a.m. and will not be moved off the nipple, despite all of our tricksy parenting-fu. He screams for long periods of time in the middle of the night, even when he is being rocked and held, simply because he is not sleeping with my nipple in his mouth. He wakes up for the day at 6:15, full of happy chuckles and mute indications that it's time to read him the story about the doggy.

Something had to give. I'm not proud of myself, but there it is.

Last night at 3 a.m., after I had nursed Blake and the Boy had walked him around for a half-hour hour while he screamed and screamed and screamed some more, I snapped. "Put him in the crib," I muttered, "and bring your pillows into the living room." We have a handy futon in the living room that has often served as a temporary bed for one or both of us during these last noisy months. Last night we put Blake in his crib, closed the door to the bedroom, opened the futon flat, and lay down to sleep. Blake screamed for a good 10 minutes (a bad 10 minutes, truth be told), and suddenly fell silent as if poleaxed. I snuck in a few minutes later and found him sound asleep on top of his bedding. Leaving him undisturbed, I tucked a thick receiving blanket around his body and went to sleep myself.

Will I do this tonight? I don't know. All I know is that I'm going back to work in January and I won't be able to function on 2-hour sleep gulps. I kind of feel like I'm letting him down because I'm not the infinitely patient mother he deserves. I suppose I'll have to deal with it; it's just one compromise I have to make in my long career as a parent. Hoo.

On a considerably lighter note, the Boy asked me to share this picture with you:

the force is strong in this one

- 0 comments/hedgehogs -

- Rocketbride's adventure of 10/20/2004 09:24:00 p.m.