Sleep training

So I've made an attempt at letting baby girl "cry it out" lately, because I don't know why she keeps waking up, and I can only assume it's because she is so used to being held and loved by us. I really wish I knew what was the problem, because that would be easier to fix. Since I don't, though, I just decided to try my hand at sleep training.

Here at BYU, most of the professors are big on attachment theory. Thus, I'm rather fond of it myself. So I never imagined using a cry it out technique, because I wouldn't want my baby to feel like I wouldn't be there for her. Turns out I was just making assumptions about what Ferber's cry it out method was, because he very reasonably points out that it isn't beneficial for either the parent or the child to suddenly withdraw all comfort at bedtime/throughout the night.

So, here's a basic sum-up from what I've learned/read about Ferber's technique in the past few days:

- The idea is to help baby learn to fall asleep on her own. So I put her down awake.
- When I walk away, she usually cries. I have a plan, though, of how long I wait before going back to check on her.
- I check on her and comfort her briefly without picking her up. Mostly I reassure myself that she's okay.
- Each night I wait a little longer before checking on her, and also throughout the night, I'll check on her after longer time periods (at first I waited five minutes, then seven, then ten. Now I'll usually wait eight minutes, or even longer if she stops for a minute).

By now, we're doing pretty good. She isn't waking up every hour or two, which is SO nice. She was still super tired tonight, but we've also had some changing bedtimes lately which I'm sure doesn't help. I think I'm supposed to use the same method for nap times, I just haven't been very good about having a "set" nap time.

I think one of the hardest things for me (aside from, you know, letting her cry) is that I secretly really love holding my sleeping baby. Which might be why I have such a hard time with naps... I let her nurse herself to sleep and just snuggle her for a while. Yeah... I'm so good at consistency.

It's that time again...

Time for a procrastination blog post! Yes, I am working on an assignment. I just finished a good chunk of it, and I'm pretty excited by how it's turning out. So, the logical conclusion is to take that energy and write a blog post, right? I thought so, too.

Baby girl and I had a couple adventures yesterday - we weren't at home very much. I had to take her to campus for my class, but it all worked out. (She even made some new friends in my second class!) And then we headed up to Taylorsville for a wedding reception after class. We didn't get back until I think... 8:30? I was hoping to get her to bed between 8:30 and 9, but since she slept most/all of the way up to Taylorsville and at least half the way back, I wasn't sure I'd be doing either of us any favors by trying to get her back to sleep right away. So she went to bed at 10, and went down with hardly a peep. Only up once last night to eat. (My thoughts on Ferber's sleep-training method should be coming soon...) Got up about the same time she usually does, between 7:30 and 8.

Mostly I told that story because tonight she was sitting with her dad (so I could do my homework) and she started falling asleep at 8! Actually, I started her little solid food meal around 6:45, and between making little batches of oatmeal and feeding her somewhat distracted self, Gary wasn't finished until 7:30 or so, after which he bathed her. Because she was gross. I nursed her after, and I could tell she was about to doze off, so I stopped nursing and sat her up and bounced her a bit. It was cute, though, watching her nodding off in Hubby's arms.

She did wake up about an hour later, but we let her cry for a bit, and she's back to sleep now. Poor, tired little girl. She was a pretty busy girl today, too, and so didn't get prime napping time. Hopefully she'll still sleep until 7:30 or 8... that's my only concern, really.

Oh, and happy 6 months to my little angel baby.

Who by the way likes to sit up on her own these days. We took her to Texas Roadhouse tonight and at one point I had her sitting on the bench of the booth next to me. It was super precious, because she's so little, but I had this funny moment where I realized she would be sitting next to me (or dad) in a booth for a long time, and mostly not as small as she is now.

Oh boy, I love being a mom.

Carrot Face

I have a little baby who absolutely loves carrots. I've had her get pretty enthusiastic about her cereal, but never any of the fruits and veggies. She kept reaching for more! Now, a certain amount got on her bib, face, hands, and pants... but I think maybe even with all the smearing, she ate double of anything else she's tried (cereal excluded). Here I was wondering if she just wasn't really into solids yet, and I just wasn't giving her the right ones! Right when I opened it, even I thought they smelled delicious, almost like pumpkin. I kept checking the label to make sure they were really carrots, and only carrots. I want whatever carrots Gerber uses. Seriously.

Sadly, I forgot to take a picture of her carroty face. I especially wish I'd captured the moment that she got a little glob on her eyelashes. Cute.

In other news, even though we still haven't figured out sleep, she keeps me going with her smiles. I thought as I was wiping carrot off her face just now that taking care of Baby is definitely my favorite part of the day. Cleaning the house, going through school, and everything else probably has more noticeable reward, but this little girl is my favorite.

Who needs sleep?

This post is mostly to make myself feel better.

My daughter was a wonderful sleeper, up until shortly after she hit 4 months. We figure she had a bit of constipation, so she would wake up with the effort of trying to excrete. Then she had another UTI (actually, she might have had the UTI the whole time), and then she had surgery. Whew. It's been interesting.

Lately, though, she's been even worse than she was the past month and a half. I thought maybe all my bad sleep-training habits had finally caught up with me, but when I thought I'd start letting her cry a little, I noticed it got worse. Her cries, to me, sounded so much like pain. And I thought she was in pain.

Tonight, my husband finally noticed it too. I wasn't making it up! When he went to rub a little vaseline on where her ureter comes out (where she had her surgery), he noticed it looked a little red. We're going to call on Monday to see what we can or should do about it. Poor little girl. I thought I noticed her crying a few days ago when the ureter was draining (quick anatomy review - the ureter is the tube from which the kidney drains into the bladder. Baby's got two - one wasn't draining hardly at all, so they moved it out to the skin. Weird, I know), and I think she even seemed to flinch when I went to rub vaseline on it once. The only trouble is that she doesn't do it every time - I see the ureter drain and she's just doing her thing. But it did look a little red to me last night. Maybe it's swollen? I don't know.

Anyway. It makes me feel a little better as a mother that I haven't simply failed at helping my baby to sleep. I still have some work to do in the sleep training department, but I feel somewhat justified in my actions for now. Who's going to turn away a baby in pain? Not me, that's for sure. I love my little girl. Even if she does persistently scream every two hours or so.

(Confession: I've taken to brief periods of co-sleeping with the little girl because I'm too tired to stay up with her until she won't scream when I put her down. Not the best three-hour stretches of my life, but possibly better than the less-than-two I've been getting.)

But you know she makes it all better the next day. <3

Doing alright

We had a little procedure done on Friday morning. After a somewhat trying week, Baby was surprisingly chipper that morning. Not so much that afternoon. But look! We had to put her in baby scrubs, which were pretty awesome.

Primary Children's is an excellent facility, by the way; I was quite impressed by the accommodations for waiting  families and how they handled everything. We got in quite early, and though we were told they'd try and keep her over night (when we first discussed the surgery back in January), the doctor decided to just watch her a few hours and send her home after she'd had some fluids. We were home that afternoon.

Poor baby... she was very lethargic and whenever we had to move her, she'd cry as if in pain. Fortunately, today has been much better, and she even began smiling this evening, more like her normal self. Unfortunately, she developed a fever so the doctor had to stick a catheter in her. :-( I can only imagine how not-good that felt after her surgery.

The other good news is that she had normal weight gain this week. I don't know how much fluid is left in her from the IV yesterday, but even before surgery, her weight gain was right on track. What a relief! Even if I do have to deal with the occasional bottle and the pumping. Maybe if she's doing real well at her 6 month checkup, I can drop the formula-enhanced bottles. At least I know she can kind of take a bottle. Much easier to leave her with a sitter this way.

You know what else has been good news in all this? I've learned that A) people are really nice and B) I have friends. Excellent friends. Maybe it sounds silly, but I wasn't sure I had anyone nearby that I felt I could just hang out with. Turns out I do! I am surrounded by excellent people.

Plenty to worry about

I don't know how some women do it. Moms who go to school and/or go to work, yet still manage to be good moms (and get the dishes done, I bet!). I only feel capable of doing one or the other, though I more than likely have horrible time-management skills. Normally I'm not big into the comparison game, but in motherhood, I play the worst kind: I compare to the way I imagine all mothers must be.

On the other hand, I realize some of my struggles are a little out of the ordinary. She is having surgery this week  (the first of two). I had yet another doctor appointment today where I found out she still hasn't gained back the weight she lost from her most recent UTI, and in fact she probably should've gained 6-12 ounces in the past two weeks and she only gained 3. We've been to the pediatrician 4 times in the past month. So today, instead of dedicatedly tackling the 40+ pages of reading I have left and possibly starting on the 5 journal article reviews due in a week, I spent the past two hours looking into how I could help my baby gain weight, wondering if my milk supply was low, and considering making an appointment with a lactation consultant. Or maybe her surgery will help her feel better, so she'll be able to eat and grow normally.

I just want to take my baby out for a walk on a beautiful day, but I haven't even mentioned all the housework I've neglected. Guess I just need to work on my mad babywearing skillz.

Oh, well - with a face like this, what do I really have to complain about?

And now for something completely different!

I put my baby down in her crib for a nap (already asleep) and turned on the baby monitor, getting ready to do some of my neglected housework. It was silent, so imagine my surprise when I walked into the room and saw this:

Once again, though... with a face like that, who really cares?

Also, I got these cute little baby hair things in a set with a headband. The headband is too small, and she never really had enough hair for the hair things, but I decided to give it a go anyway.

Hee. Maybe one day she'll get some hair.

Give Peas a Chance

After almost a week of successful rice cereal feedings, I finally got off my duff and cooked up some peas for baby to try. I now understand the appeal of jarred baby food. Also, turns out my immersion blender is not the finest at pureeing. The good news is that baby ate peas!

However, I'm thinking she hasn't decided if she actually likes them or not.

We'll try again today, though. I had to make more than enough so my immersion blender could actually blend the peas. (Which I may have learned through frustrating experience a few days ago.)

All we are saying is give peas a chance....

Graves

Yesterday, I was out on a walk with Baby, when my hubby called and said he was probably going to pick up a grave shift that night, since they couldn't find anyone to cover it and he'd had to take some emergency time off earlier this week. Now, my hubby works from 2-10 PM, and graves go from 10 PM - 6 AM. Ouchie. So, last night I brought him some food... and his desktop computer. Not the first time he's had that guy at work (so he can play games on reeeeeally slow days, like Thanksgiving), but it was my first time taking apart his computer. I felt reasonably accomplished after that. The whole thing felt like an adventure (for me... he was probably miserable since he told me he was already pretty tired at 10), but we'll see how today goes.

Right now, I still feel like it's 8 in the morning, because he's still in bed. (Also, baby had a bit of a horrible evening last night. The benefit was that I was awake when hubby came home at 6:30, so I actually got to "go to sleep" with him after all. The disadvantage was, well, I got up an hour later with the kid and have been up since. I guess this "aside" is a bit long for parentheses.) Maybe by the time I've actually showered and finished the laundry, he'll be up and it will feel like a normal day again.

My guy really knows how to bring home the bacon. I only hope his sleep schedule isn't too messed up for doing it.

Hungry baby

My little dear has seemed, to me, to want to eat solid food for a while. I read something a while back, though, that suggested that staying on breastmilk for the full six months might help with allergies or antibodies or something useful sounding, so I was determined to wait it out. Until she started grabbing at my food, staring longingly at our food, and not seeming satisfied after feedings yet not taking more milk (when I was pretty sure I still had some). The only reason I waited until today was because I had a doctor appointment, and I wanted to clear it with him, what with her surgery coming up pretty soon. He actually strongly agreed, hoping it would help her regain some of the weight she's lost in the past three weeks or so.

Well, I'd say it was a success! The very first spoonful she looked at me like she didn't really know what was going on, and then I thought maybe she was just playing with the spoon, but she wasn't spitting it out, and she seemed to like it. The first bit I mixed with quite a bit of milk so it would taste, umm, like what she used to eat, but lessened the amount a little in my next few batches. That's right. She kept eating. It took at least into the second tablespoon for her to finally tell me she was full. I could tell she was getting there because she wasn't as excited about eating near the end.

Here, pictures are the best anyway:

Food? I'm just going to eat my bib. Thanks.

What is this?

All finished! (With the first batch.)

I probably didn't mention that I nursed her a little bit before and after that first batch. Yeah. I always knew this kid was an eater. I just didn't realize how much she wanted to move on from eating just milk. I wish I'd gotten a picture of later feeding, because she took to grabbing the handle of the spoon and shoving it into her mouth (yes, I was holding it/guiding it too). SUPER cute. That's another reason I knew she was slowing down; she hesitated before grabbing the spoon.

Lesson learned: make more food from the get-go. Baby likes to eat. She was pretty happy about it.

At least she's really cute

Sometimes my baby falls asleep while nursing. Sometimes I just let her hang out there, cause I know she'll sleep longer if she's being held. Sometimes this means I get pretty bored. (Yes, I do have homework. No, I don't want to do it right now.) Enter the blog. Unfortunately, not much has been going on around here. Hubby and I have been sick and lazy, and baby is returning to her normal self after her most recent bout with infection. (Occasionally I realize she could have had her surgery by now and I kick myself.)

We did go to Tucano's to celebrate my birthday on Saturday (and because they sent me a free meal voucher... I love birthday clubs). Baby slept through most of it, which was amazing, but when she woke up and hubby took her out of the car seat, she started screeeeaaaaaming. Apparently she didn't like the excitement, noise, and/or people. I left without being stuffed, getting my little birthday icecream, or any extra cheese bread things. I think that was the saddest part. (My life is so hard, right?) She calmed down right after leaving though, poor dear. And it's possible she's been extra cute lately to make up for it. Here, I'll give some proof.

Mmm, toes.

This is something she's taken to lately - she can grab the pacifier while it's in her mouth, and she pulls it out. But I figure she can't put it back in yet, so what does she do? Chew on the side. I missed a beautiful photo opp just before this where she'd gotten... umm... the sticky-outy part on the back into her mouth in such a way that she was sucking on the pacifier without holding it. It's hard to describe, but I laughed and laughed and took a picture just as she spat it out. Oh, well.

That's about all for now. Our neighbors made something delicious and (American-)Italian smelling, and it's making me hungry! Time to see if the baby girl will be okay separated from me for a few moments.