The Evolution of a Parent: Our Sleep Journey

Before reading this post, please read The Evolution of a Blog.

While pregnant, I skimmed Dr. Sears' The Attachment Parenting Book.  A lot of the ideas made sense to me, but I wasn't going to take it as gospel.  I kind of had an idea of what kind of parent I wanted to be, but I also wanted to wait until H got here, and then kind of wing it.

And wing it, we did.  

There were many things I didn't know and wasn't prepared for.  When H was about 9 months old, I wrote a post on here called The Honest Truth.  This post was written as I was slowly coming out of a bad place, hence the overwhelming negativity in it. We had a pretty rough infancy with H, but it wasn't because she was a particularly hard baby.  I believe now that I had a hard time because of my perspective of the situation.

If I could rewrite The Honest Truth, I would probably keep the bulk of it the same.  I think it does a good job of describing to people the details of how having a baby is hard.  What I would change is the ending.  Yes, it is difficult, but what I realize now is the reason for it.  It wasn't hard for me because Hannah was a "bad" sleeper.  It wasn't hard because she refused to take a bottle or pacifier, or because she loved bouncing on the yoga ball.  It was hard because she was a baby, and babies have a lot of needs.  She wasn't a bad sleeper.  She just loved to be close to her mommy, (can you blame her?)  I would have melt down after melt down because she wouldn't nap anywhere except my arms.  Instead of reading books and researching the internet to try to figure out how to make her nap flat on her back all by herself, I think it would have been easier to handle if I just would have realized that she's a baby.  I should have realized that she just spent almost 10 months curled up in a nice warm, safe place, with the slightest bit of motion, listening to my heartbeat.  I was expecting too much of her, and had zero empathy for her in those moments.  This is my deepest regret as a parent so far.  

I had a love-hate relationship with co-sleeping.  I loved snuggling with her, and knowing she was safe right next me.  But I despised having to go to bed so early, barely seeing my husband, and sleeping in 30 minute increments.  Although nothing can really cure sleep deprivation, I think a better attitude about it would have made all the difference in the world.  I always said we coslept out of desperation.  "She has to sleep with me.  She refuses to sleep anywhere else,"  I would say.  As with my example about naps, I should have realized that it is only natural for her to want to cozy up with me.  I should not have made it sound like she was lacking some terrific skill that all other babies possess.  I should not have made it sound like she was totally and completely inconveniencing me.  The truth is, it was inconvenient.  But she is a human being that I am raising.  I'm not trying to make her fit into the life I had before.  This is a completely new life filled with new challenges.

We moved H to her crib at 6 months by making her cry, like everyone told us to, and it worked.  I don't regret this because I don't think it scarred her for life, and we all ended up sleeping better (including her.)  To this day (at 16 months old), she continues to wake at night.  We've been through so many different routines of sleep.   We go through about 2-3 weeks of consistency, then things change.  The times when I have been happiest are not when I am getting adequate sleep.  It is always when I accept the situation, look at life through her eyes, and have empathy.  It is when I stop reading things on the internet, or talking to other moms, making comparisons about how I "should" be doing things, what I should try, what is normal.  I'm happiest when I stay in my own world and realize I love the way things are, and we are absolutely fine.  I feel this way for a little while, then I get sucked back into the comparison game and try to change things again.  I tried to night wean, I tried CIO again.  We tried so many things I can't even remember everything we've tried.  I went back to having the "She's a terrible sleeper" attitude.  It was exhausting always trying to figure out how things should be and how to get there.

At this moment, I can say with confidence that I have come full circle.  We decided to go back to co-sleeping, at least part time.  We realized, as a family, that this is just what H needs.  By waking up so many times at night, she is trying to tell us something.  She is not ready to be by herself all night long.  Sure, sometimes she only wakes twice, which is less than some toddlers do, but it would always take me about 30 minutes to get her to go back down.  This meant about 2.5 hour sleep stretches per night for me.  We bought a mattress a few weeks ago and put it on the floor in H's room, and I have never been happier.  Sometimes when she wakes, I can rock her and get her back in her bed, and I sneak back to my bed.  Sometimes, I just lay down with her and sleep with her the rest of the night.  It is amazing.  I now have a love-love relationship with cosleeping.  There are times when she only wakes once, and I only have to nurse for a bit and she rolls over and goes back to sleep, all without me having to get up.  There are times when she wakes, and all I have to do is pat her back and remind her I'm there for her, and she goes back to sleep.  If she was alone in her crib, a simple little wake up like that always turned into a big prodcution: cry a little, stand up, cry a lot, wait for me, I come in, nurse, rock, nurse, rock, try to lay her down, cry again, nurse, rock, nurse, rock, etc.  All she was trying to tell me in those wake ups was, "Mommy, I'm alone in here!  Where are you?  I'd like to see you and have you hold me for a minute please."  Now with her next to me, when she wakes up, she is thinking, "Mommy? Are you there? Oh you are, I'll go back to sleep now."  Even though H may be waking just as frequently at times, I feel more rested than I have in a very long time.  There are times when I feel pretty tired, but I try to maintain a good attitude about it.  I love waking up in the morning to a big, wet, open-mouthed kiss from my little girl.  When she had a cold, I was able to nurse her a lot at night, so she didn't keep herself up all night coughing.  I love that I could do that for her.  I was tired, yes, but I felt good about the reason for being tired.  And I was much less tired than I would have been if I had to get up constantly all night to tend to a sick a baby.  

So there you have it.  My evolution as a parent so far, and our roller coaster of a sleep journey.  I'm sure parenting will continue to be a roller coaster in and of itself for the duration of my motherhood.  I'm not much for labeling the type of parent I am because I think it's better to pick and choose little things here and there that work for you.  But here I am, a co-sleeping, breastfeeding, amber teething necklace buying softy who most would probably consider an "Attachment Parent." I suppose if I'm labeling, that is the label I would prefer; however the woman at nurshable.com uses the word "gentle parenting," which I like better.  I didn't start off as a parent thinking, "I am going to be an attachment parent."  We just do what works for our family.  What I've come to realize is that I am happiest as a parent when I listen to my gut, and respond to my child's needs according to my instincts.  I regret not knowing all of this and for not having this point of view before Hannah was born, but I'm forever grateful to her for teaching all of this to me.