The Battle Continues

It's been a while since I have posted regularly. I have no excuse for my slacking. I have been busy but not so busy that I couldn't have written a post here and there. I must also confess that I have had plenty of time to scroll through and read other people's postings while never posting one of my own. Very one-sided of me, I know.

Maybe one reason I haven't written anything as of late is that nothing feels very newsworthy. The Tot continues to fight his naps and is now developing more advanced techniques for winning these battles. For example, when he is about to fall asleep in the rocker, he forces himself into a sitting position (eyes half closed) and proceeds to fidget and fumble about in my lap rather than relax and succumb to the sleep. He has also begun to employ various methods of avoiding relaxation in general including chatting to me, biting my shirt, playing with my face, and the simple, but very effective, shaking of the head back and forth whenever he starts to feel sleepy. Because of his general opposition to sleeping both at nap times and at bed times, he has also returned to his previously extinct behavior of crying when we leave him in the crib. I have to confess, the first time he did this last week, I panicked. It had been so long since he had cried when we put him down. Not to mention that he wasn't just fussing, he was all out screaming and sobbing. I was sure there was something wrong with him (on fire, perhaps?!). I went right in to check on him (yeah, I know - SUCKER) and began mentally scrolling through my checklist. Not hot, not feverish, not teething, not dirty, not stuffy, not cold, not hurt, etc. I could find nothing wrong with him, but I figured I would just sit in the rocker and rock him until he fell asleep. Your laughing at me now, aren't you? 

Well, I rocked for a good 20 or more minutes but he never fell asleep. He became very relaxed on me and didn't fidget but refused to let those peepers close. Finally, I had to put him back down to see if he would just soothe himself. Notsomuch. The Husband then decided to give it a go. So he went up and rocked the Tot to sleep which involved a complicated pattern of rocking in the chair, standing and bouncing and then, finally, patting in the crib. It was probably a good 30-40 minutes of work. But, it did work and the Tot slept through the night. Unfortunately, it was the start of what would be several nights of fussing at bedtime. For no known reason. Thankfully, both the Husband and I had wised up by night two and employed the much despised "cry it out" method. I am pleased to say that it was incredibly effective and the night time drama only lasted a few painful years minutes.

I am always surprised when these sleep issues crop back up. For some reason, I had imagined that once the baby slept through the night, he would always sleep through the night. Okay, now I know you are laughing.
Much the same as when I pictured rocking my tiny infant to sleep, it didn't take very long and the baby always slept soundly. Oh yeah, and in my imagination, I was rocking them to sleep every night (none of this self soothing stuff!) and they were sleeping in a crib with a mobile (too stimulating, I already know), a crib bumper (gasp!) and some sort of lovey object (which the Tot refuses to form any connection with - apparently he is too self sufficient for that). Okay, so life is rarely how we picture it. The reality is always much different. In this reality, I will just be happy when the Tot goes to bed without a fuss and sleeps soundly for, say, 11-12 hours. Now really, STOP laughing!