bloggy knitty breaky

Warning: Bad, bad lanugage ahead.

I need a few days to get this going fucking insane baby sleeping thing figured out.  He's waking not just at 3 am (like he used to). Oh, no.  Now I pine for those good old days.  Now he wakes up at 3 am, and at 5, 6, 7, and then I let him get up for the day somewhere between 7 and 8 am.  Um yeah, my life is a twisted experiment.  This morning I actually called my sweet, hard-working, baby-handling, cute as hell husband a "fucker."  That's right, what's so cool about me is how mature I remain while under stress.

Seems like Wood and Dutch have also arrived at some sort of going fucking insane baby sleeping crossroads.  I was SO glad to open up their blog today and find I was not alone.  That I would not be the only mama wandering the early morning streets to get away from my crying-it-out baby and my darling "fucker" husband, stumbling into potholes wondering how exactly this is supposed to make me Less. Tired.

So, not much knitting here today. But here's something to enjoy on the topic of the short blog break. Just for a few days. I'll be back with more knitting tales at least by Sunday, if not sooner.  Thanks for the link, morphing into mama.

Comments

[Shetha]

There are many a time when my "fucker" is convinced that I need to enroll in an anger management course. Of course he always chooses the inopportune time to lecture me on that. How sad. In any event... I feel your pain and I want you to know you're an awesome mama and we love you, and so does baby Baz. Take the deep breaths... count to 10. It sounds cliche but it really really works for me sometimes. *hugs*

[peggy]

Hugs. Just when things are starting to go relatively smoothly, they throw it off track. It'll happen again and again. How old is he now? Don't completely slam this (I found it to be true for Brogan) but is he around the age of a growth spurt? A lot of babies tend to be unpredictable for a few days or a week or so around that time.

Hugs, hugs, hugs. Hopefully you can get some you time in there somewhere. I know that doesn't help at 3 anf 4 and 5 in the morning though.

[lori]

You are very effective birth control for me right now! Hang in there!

[MIM]

We've all been there. When I was sleep deprived I wanted to kill everyone in the house. That's why I finally had to sleep train the kid(s). If I hadn't, we'd all be dead.

Good luck! I'm sending you positive thoughts!

(BTW, thanks for the links! Oh, and I'm a knitter, too! But I'm not anywhere near as good as you.)

[Anna]

You've not thrown anything at his head yet, told him that you hate him or tried to punch him yet??? If not then you're doing well!

Hugs

[Cara]

Remember this - all (well most of the ones I've seen) mother's that say their kids sleep great are lying. Or drugging their kids. ;-)

Growth spurt? Teething? Hope things settle down soon!

[Siri]

Yup. All sounds pretty normal to me. It's hard, but you are definitely not alone.
When our first one was about 6 months and I was delirious, I finally asked a mother of four children when he was going to start sleeping. Her response: "Sleep? I have four children. I haven't slept throught the night in 16 years."
That changed my perspective entirely. Once I stopped having expectations, things went a bit smoother.
BUT...I do know people who claim to have their babies on a sleep schedule. It's worth a try. That just wasn't our thing.
Hang in there.

[Ariane]

Poor "fucker"...lol! We all act very "mature" sometimes:-)

My experience...babies wake more when they are breast fed. My nine month old was sleeping like an angel as of two weeks ago, now, she's on this "boobie juice" rampage! Seems like shes up ever hour on the hour!Hang in their, it'll past.

[Kara]

Must be the change of the seasons or something, because my former sleep champ has been waking up every two hours! And her cousins haven't been sleeping well either. But I think it's the ragweed, they're all allergic. It really does get better, though, as hard as it can be to see sometimes.

[Julia]

So. Fat!

It's actually a relief to know that you do not have the perfect child. I was worried about you for a while, but now we know he's a normal little fucker!

[stephanie]

Very funny re: "drugging their kids." If anything I'm the one medicated!

Been there done that. I hope it gets easier for you soon. Both of mine went through stages like that - both in and out of our bed. While I didn't use the method, I found that the Ferber book on sleep was helpful.

[Kay]

We had this problem, for a length of time I do not think it would be wise to tell you. I still think of it, bitchily, when I have to WAKE HER UP in the morning, or when she gets in her bed and JUST GOES TO SLEEP. (Mind you, she's almost 9. But I think, Oh, right, NOW you decide to let me sleep, because YOU need to sleep because you're a KID and you go to SCHOOL. Oh, you're a big sleeper, NOW.)

Ferber and other crying-it-out methods totally didn't work for her. She had STAMINA. She was STRONG FOR IT. And we didn't like the feeling of letting her cry too long (a little is okay--remember, crying to a baby is often just like 'talking' is to those who can speak, and even now, at 8, she likes to complain about something for a minute before dropping off to dreamland. So we patched together a mixed-message kind of thing, sometimes picking up and soothing, sometimes laying in the other room listening to her caterwaul, but it ultimately worked. My conclusion is that she got over it when SHE was ready to get over it, and not a minute before and not in response to anything we did or didn't do, and our job was to do whatever we had to, to survive it and be nice to her as possible and to each other of course. (The each other niceness was just not always possible.) Best of luck to you and the darling fucker, this too shall pass. xox Kay

[KT]

Hang tough. When my oldest was about 6 weeks old I thought I was going to stick a fork in my eye. We taught him how to put himself to sleep- pick your method- there are many. Ours involved a big ass glass of wine and turning off the monitor. Yes, I know I am evil, but it worked and even though he had staying power, we had more. Harsh? A little bit but Happy Mommy equals Happy everybody. Period. I should mention that I was vehemently opposed to pacifiers and did not give #1 a pacifier. When my second was born, he had to be in the special needs nursery (at Overlake) for 5 days. (He is fine, it was idiopathic) The nurses gave him a pacifier-much to my horror- and I have NEVER had a sleep problem with him and he is two and a half.

Was the pacifier the magic answer? Who knows? I just know that I had horrid sleep issues with #1 and no pacifier and ZERO sleep issues with #2 who had/has one.

You will get through this and it will work out, and then when he is a toddler it will all change again, I promise.

We are with you. Really.

[KT]

Sorry for posting again- I just remembered this. I found with #1 son that if I got him up at first peep it was almost always ugly. I have found this with #2 also- I wait for them to be good and awake and then I get them up. I have found that if I ignore the first peep they usually get back to sleep, especially if it is at an off time for them. In other words, if they do not usually wake up at 4am but I hear them peeping at that time, I ignore them and they give up (usually very soon) and go back to sleep.

Last thing (sorry, we have had many many sleep issues over the past 5 years so I have a lot to say)- if all else fails and you are climbing the walls, talk to your pediatrician. Ours was INVALUABLE in solving #1's issues when he became a toddler. If I recall you are in Seattle- and our guy is on Mercer Island and WONDERFUL. (Broke my heart to leave him when we moved cross country- he is AWESOME- lemme know if you want his info.)

Again, hang tough. I am SO with you.

[Kim]

I hear ya. My fabulous baby boy is 11 1/2 months (he's not 1, he's not 1, no my baby is not 1 already) and he went through that same thing. For us it would last about 7-10 days and repeat about every 5 weeks. It does get better. Our worst spell was at 18 weeks, coincidentally when I went back to work. It's only temporary, I promise. It's impressive how well mommies can function punch drunk from sleep deprivation.

Hey, where's this yarn yard sale? I'll check my Oregonian....

[Alison]

Hi. I remember your pain. For what it's worth, you can't really make them sleep in the night, but you can wake them up a lot during the day to make sure they are tired at night. This was my nurse's recommendation.