Someone who lives in this house with me has pointed out a number of times that my early posts about Henry had an, um, negative tone to them. It's time I rectify that, whether you buy the assessment or not.
Henry was a very typical newborn. He slept fitfully but not badly. He needed to be rocked to sleep. He loved to breastfeed. He was 100% normal. The only hard part of that was that I had two other kids... and we were about to move. So I did indeed find the whole newborn stuff a bit more stressful this time around.
When we moved back to Ottawa, Henry's sleep improved - he typically slept from about 8:00 until 1:00 and then up around 4:00 again and then around 7:00 or 8:00. Not bad at all.
His naps though.... oh, don't get me started. His morning nap was and still is somewhere between 20 minutes to 45 minutes (if I'm lucky).
And then he had a week where he was up at night every 1 to 2 hours. Ouch.
Again, 100% normal.
But a few days ago I reached my limit on his crappy naps. I deduced that when he had good naps (like on travel days when he naps for long stints in the car) he sleeps better at night. It was time to take action.
If you follow me on Facebook you'll know that I expressed a bit of angst at letting a 4 month old cry-it-out. I've never been much of a cry-it-outer. Emily threw up when we tried it with her. End of experiment. Hope was so stubborn that she was hoarse after a week of crying. Awful. And not willing to do that again.
I threw caution to the wind three days ago when I was on the phone with my friend Meredith and Henry woke after a 20 minute nap. I just had a feeling that he could do it. So, I kept talking, he kept crying, badda-boom badda-bing he was back asleep thirty minutes later. Yes, he was pretty mad in those 30 minutes but it so paid off! The next day, I put him in his crib awake, 3 minutes later he was asleep. Since then, if he goes to bed awake he fusses for a few minutes and then goes to sleep.
Last night, he slept from 8:15 to 5:40 this morning. Hello success! I've got this parenting thing licked!
Ahem... I must divulge that I'm typing this while listening to him cry through the monitor after a 25 minute nap.
So maybe his naps still aren't perfect but he's doing great, being so cooperative when I need him to be and sleeping great at night.... for now. I'm under no illusions. I know how these babies operate. Next week could be a different kettle of fish.
But even on the bad nights this dude gives me laughs and smiles and cuddles and cute stuff that would melt anyone's heart. Perhaps there is a bit of bias... but I'm willing to say that this is one great and easy baby right now. Way to go, Henry!
His latest favourite move is to grab his feet - the happy baby pose - and laugh and giggle while I change him. And his laugh! Oh his laugh! I have to record his squeaky gaspy snort. It is so funny.
On Friday he had his 4-month check-up. The guy is humongous. He is 20 lbs exactly, 70 cm long. We now have to upgrade to a new car seat which means our Snap N Go stroller will now be useless to us as well. The price you pay for having a bruiser I guess.
Hm.... still crying. Perhaps morning naps just aren't his thing.
No comments:
Post a Comment