Sleep-capades

Many of you know that it took Breyten until he was roughly 3 1/2 years old until his regularly slept through the night. So when Ada started sleeping for 5 and 6 hour stretches at 2 months, you can imagine how satisfied and relieved I was. Then her 3 month birthday hit and with it came hourly wake-ups followed by wake-ups with long periods of wakefulness. Initially we attributed the hourly wake-ups to a growth spurt. She seemed hungry and eagerly nursed. That gave way to waking every three hours and often wanting to baby talk to us, a behavior we then attributed to a cognitive growth spurt. But when the waking continued for two weeks, we figured that the growth spurts should have passed and that the issue must be continuing for some other reason.

I realized that Ada almost always falls asleep while nursing, being walked, or being rocked. We were teaching her that she needed these comforts in order to fall asleep. I decided that we should teach her how to fall asleep on her own and how to comfort herself when she wakes in the middle of the night. With Breyten, I was so desperate for him to sleep and so exhausted from him not sleeping that I don't think I had the confidence to embark upon the trial and error learning that I've been doing with Ada. Consequently, he didn't sleep through the night for 3 1/2 years. I figured that it was worth a try to see if Ada could be helped to learn a new behavior.

So far she's been doing great, though the results have not be consistent. The first night that I tried my new approach, she woke at 2:30 and after nursing was interested in having a long conversation with me. After attempting to nurse her several more times and trying to rock her with no success, I realized that I had nothing to lose in trying to put her down in her basinette without her being asleep yet. I'm not a believer in letting kids "cry it out," so I was totally prepared to pick up Ada and continue soothing her into sleep. But as it turned out, she fussed a bit but never worked herself into a full cry. Since her basinette is immediately next to my side of the bed, I could lay down and watch what she was doing. She scrabbled around a bit, moving her arms and legs and rubbing her face into the mattress (she sleeps on her tummy). She whined and whimpered. She stared off into space for a while, but eventually, she fell asleep. It was 4:00 and it had taken me an hour and a half to go through this process with her, but I was so happy that she did it by herself.

The next several nights I put her down in her basinette before she was asleep and she continued with the same behavior: fussing and then falling asleep. While it did not lead to her sleeping through the whole night (she still woke around 2 to nurse), she was definitely having an easier time staying down through periods of REM sleep. Occasionally she'd whimper and moan when she moved into REM sleep, but she quickly got herself settled for a few more hours of sleep.

But one thing about babies, you can never count on them going for too long without a change. Tonight Ada figured out that if she cries, I will come and pick her up. Every time I put her down she'd turn on the tears and I would comfort her. She would nurse and get to the point of almost being asleep...I would creep her over to her basinette...and wahhhh!

What could it be? I wondered if perhaps she would prefer to be on her back, so I tried changing her position. That worked for a while to calm her (she was looking around, strumming the side of her wicker basinette with her hand), she eventually melted back into tears, exhausted.

I tried putting her thumb into her mouth, but she was instead interested in sucking on my index finger. She really could suck it in and I was actually concerned that she was going to gag herself on it. What else could she suck on that wouldn't be as long as a finger? A binky aka paci aka suckee aka bobo? Nah. Not my girl. Despite my and Breyten's childhood devout adoration of pacifiers, Ada has always held them with disdain. She appears quite insulted when we suggest that perhaps she could soothe herself with one by putting one into her mouth. But she was sucking so vigorously on my finger! It just seemed perfect. I tried the pacifier again.

And voila! She took the pacifier and immediately fell asleep!

And then it fell out of her mouth.

Wahhhhh!

I put it back in. She fell back asleep. She curled her fingers around the ring attached to the front of the pacifier. It was quite a moment of dexterity for her. But then she flailed, pulling the pacifier out of her mouth.

Wahhhh!

I put it back in. She fell back asleep. And it slipped gently out of her mouth. There she slept. Peacefully. Beautifully. Finally.

I went downstairs. An hour and a half at getting this one down tonight. I dished out some dinner for myself.

Wahhh!

REALLY?! I ran back up, gave her the pacifier, put her back on her tummy with her head turned to the side so the pacifier had a better chance of staying in or at least within hand's reach. So far it's been an hour and a half and we haven't heard a peep.

I fear a bit that she will become dependent on the pacifier which does not seem to have a good track record of staying in her mouth. I guess we'll see. I must admit, the problem solving is interesting to me. I love figuring out how she is going to respond and what I might need to do in order to modify or reinforce that response. It really makes me realize how intimately I know her and will continue to know her.

I remember being a tween and a teenager and telling white lies to my mother. She often would not believe me despite the lie being quite plausible. In my mind I figured that there was no way she could know or come to verify the truth, and her refusal to take my word (albeit my word was false), was testament to her audaciously and unjustly mistrusting me. But I now see that she knew me so well from years of observing and problem solving and trial and error behavioral studies that there is little chance I could have gotten much past her. She knew me better than I knew myself.

Motherhood demands patience and energy and tenacity. But it is by far the most rewarding endeavor that I have ever embarked on. As a child I remember loving my parents very much, but my experience was very centered on myself, as it should be. As a parent, I am aware of the intimate and profound relationship that I am building with my kids. It makes my love for them multidimensional. As the large nutbrown hare said, "I love you right up to the moon and back."