Likes: Nursing, mommy, being awake CONSTANTLY, being held, tasty hands/blankets/anything that can go into her mouth, squealing/shrieking, popping her eyes open as soon as her body touches the crib, nursing, being outside, nursing, and watching her big brother
Dislikes: sleeping at night, napping during the day, being put down once asleep, the hour before bedtime.
(comparison time...)
Biggest Achievement of the Month: Two things---> taking the pacifier like a champ, and surviving the first TWO nights away from mom and dad. Nate and I went to Colorado for a college friend's wedding and we were gone for 2.5 days, getting home really late on the third night.
(four iPhone pics for you...)
(we are officially in love with Breckenridge!)
Cecelia did fantastic for my mother-in-law and father-in-law even though I was a nervous wreck before we left. They stayed at our place to keep the kids in a consistent environment and I know they loved their time with CC and Tru but I could also tell they were exhausted when we got home:) CC took the bottles, including ones in the middle of the night and before bedtime, and was generally happy without The Boob. Whew. I'm sure you could hear my sigh of relief around the world even though this blog has been ridiculously silent in the past month. (no exciting excuse for that one, just crazy-busy life with little time at the computer). I overcame my fear of pumping and dumping ABSURD amounts of milk on this trip, and only brought back 16 oz with me. And I didn't even freak out too much thinking about how much of my freezer stash Cecelia went through while I was gone. Well, that's not true---I still get a little sweaty just thinking about it, weeks later:) But I did enjoy myself despite the milk dumpage and I'm really glad we went on the trip together, just to have 'adult' time away from the kids for once. We felt so free and young! :)
Biggest Challenge of the Month: Sleep, or lack-thereof. I shall go into detail in a few more topics but let's just say it hasn't been too pretty up in this household for the past couple of weeks. I've come dangerously close to multiple mental breakdowns and it's seriously starting to feel like we are 'just' surviving each day and not really living/enjoying it. Sad, but true. For as young and free as I felt in Colorado, I'm pretty sure I've aged an additional 5 years because of sleep drama.
(don't let the smiles fool you.)
Secret Tricks of Parenting: I discovered that when she is super fussy at night, even while attempting to nurse and rock in her dark room, she will usually pipe down if I walk around while nursing. Apparently sitting to nurse is not always acceptable to miss thang? The pacifier has been an awesome 'trick' this month, too, although she isn't the best at actually keeping the darn thing in her mouth. At least it's something to soothe her when she just wants to suck....took her long enough to listen to me on that one, huh?
The Mecca (aka Sleep): Okay, here we go. This should have been a separate 'complaining about life/It's really hard being a parent sometimes' post but you are lucky enough to get my emotional unloading all wrapped up into one post today. Cause that's just how I roll as a dwindling blogger:)
One month ago Cecelia was kicking butt and taking names in the sleep game. Remember how I was all, 'Oh she can sleep 7, 8, 9, even 12 hours at night now!' but I was nervous it wouldn't last? It didn't. Apparently the initial transition to daycare, or maybe just being 3 to 3.5 months in general was amazing for her sleep. But about 3 weeks ago everything fell apart. Four month wakeful period, indeed.
She gradually started waking up earlier for her first wake up, moving from 3 am to 1 am, then midnight, then 11:00. That is when I sort of freaked out, wondering what in the heck happened to my great sleeper who could sometimes last until morning time without waking but almost ALWAYS lasted until at least 1:30. Then we left for Colorado and when we came back, Cecelia's sleep went into the crapper.
(who, me?)
I've been keeping track of her sleep for the past few nights and holy man, it's bad. She used to go down peacefully after nursing to sleep at 7, and I wouldn't hear from her again until about 2ish. And now?
6:45 - asleep in the Ergo, into crib
7:10 - awake, screaming, pissed. Nursed and rocked until 8:00. Tip-toed out of room.
8:35 - awake, talking. Then crying by 8:50. Tried paci, failed. Nursed other side, rocked. Tip-toed out at 9:40.
10:25 - Awake, sighing, but somehow fell back to sleep without help. There is a God.
11:05 - Awake, fussing. I'm exhausted, so I took her to bed and nursed to sleep.
3:45 - Awake, fussing. Nursed other side. Couldn't fall back to sleep until 4:45 after pacifier and rocking and a lot of praying on my part.
6:30 - Awake for the day since big brother is calling for me. Sigh.
See what that tells us? She sleeps a lot better IN our bed and only woke once in the night when I finally gave in to co-sleeping. But on the nights I'm a hard-ass and keep her in the crib longer that 11pm she will continue to wake up every hour or so. Horrid, right? Also horrid? Any wake-up that lasts longer than about 10 minutes---can't handle being awake for an hour at a time on top of being up numerous times!
Here is what I consider to be the biggest blow to my mental sanity: the hours from 7-10pm used to be my fave because I could unwind a bit, get caught up on housework, BLOG, comment on blogs, do paperwork for my job....you know, total and utter luxuries at this point. But now? I'm lucky if I get 20 minutes in a row to myself before I'm back up in her bedroom begging her to stay asleep. (And yes, Nate helps me out, too, but her highness doesn't tolerate the fact that daddy doesn't lactate. And so I usually end up rescuing Nate from her protests within 10 minutes). Then after such a crappy evening of failed sleep, she is still up throughout the night.
Numerous wake ups. Difficulty getting her to fall asleep at bedtime. And long stretches of awake time in the middle of the night, once she is awake? The trifecta of bad sleep, if you ask me.
Let's not discuss that Truman has been waking up around 5 to start the day, and he had a streak of three nights in a row when he woke up around 2 after wetting the bed. That has NEVER happened before and thankfully hasn't happened lately, but nothing like having to change a child's jammies and an entire bed on top of dealing with a crying baby at night. Those might have been the 'lowest of lows' at nighttime thus far with two children.
She is also not napping longer than 20 minute stretches throughout the day, unless I hold her or let her nurse the entire time of a nap. And even then, it's only cat naps that never amount to anything past a half of an hour. I believe she is averaging about 1.5 hours total of sleeping each day and it used to be about 4-5 last month. So that's great, too, since I'm pretty sure babies this young need about 14 hours of sleep in a 24 hour period. Cecelia gets about 8. Fantastic, right?
Basically she only wants to fall asleep while nursing and when I go to put her down, forget about it. Dunzo. I realize that she probably has a pretty wicked sleep association between my boob and her zzzz's but it's really difficult to change this. I'm not always just popping my tat in her mouth at the first whimper, either---I am totally down to try the pacifier, rocking, shhh'ing, standing near her crib without picking her up for a bit, etc. But seriously? Nothing works. And at 2 am, when she has already been up 5 times, I give up. And usually bring her into our bed and let her nurse until her heart is content, while I'm semi-awake and relaxed.
For the past week or so, I've been so sleep deprived that I feel like I'm treading water and my head keeps dropping below the surface. I'm so frustrated that I can't figure out what has changed, and then FIX it, that I'm just exhausted from over-analyzing all of the possibilities. I know it's just a phase and someday she will sleep. I know I should be grateful that she just wants to nurse and cuddle and be held for every second she is asleep. And sometimes I am at peace with just not caring that much and going with the flow. But sometimes I'm really over being so tired. It's one thing to be majorly sleep deprived with a newborn and a toddler on maternity leave. It's another to be sleep deprived with a 4 month old, a toddler, and a part time job.
I'm sure some of you will suggest crying-it-out but the bottom line is that I don't feel comfortable with it right now, especially when she is just now 4 months old (ie way too little, in my opinion, to be left alone to cry). One really ugly night I did try to let her fuss more than usual and put my foot down, refusing to nurse her back to sleep. I put the pacifier in her mouth 100 times, let her cry/fuss for 5-10 minutes at a time, rocked her, etc. And do you know what happened? She was awake from 9:30 until midnight when Nate finally called it quits in the name of maintaining my mental sanity. Seriously. I think my child is the strongest-willed baby girl I've ever met and she makes her laid-back brother look like the easiest child ever.
So whatever, that is my sob story about how tired I am at the moment. You definitely caught me in the midst of a rough patch and I can only hope that the next monthly update will not contain any mention of multiple RIDICulous wake ups each night, or struggles to fall asleep at all. Please, God, let this phase be short lived (so we can move onto the next challenge in baby-ville) :)
Temperament/Personality: You won't believe me when I say it, considering the assault you just took with the previous 9 paragraphs of complaints, but she is really a happy baby. Aside from not sleeping she is such a doll and is incredibly happy 80% of her (loooong) waking hours. Cecelia is quite content to lay on a blanket and observe her crazy family, or chew on a toy, or just be. She gives us the most amazing, gigantic smiles each morning and then throughout the day, unless she is overtired (ahem, most evenings). And a big first? She laughed for the first time the day after Nate and I returned from Colorado!! I tried to catch the tail end of this gift on video and only sorta succeeded.
The child definitely has opinions about things, though, and will let us know about it if we get out of line:) I hate to admit it, yet I sort of love it, but she is definitely showing preference to mommy holding her above most others. It is embarrassing when daddy or grandpa or anyone else tries to hold her and she immediately starts to cry and stare me down, but I'm hoping it's just a phase. {side note: should the title of this blog be 'Hope it's just a phase' or maybe 'So freaking tired?' I might need to rename it soon}.
(shrieker)
Eating: Sister loves to nurse and for that I am seriously thankful. (There's always a bright side, right Pollyanna??) I just wish she wouldn't NEED to nurse in order to sleep but I will gladly accept her love for my milk. She still goes about 3 hours or so between feedings but sometimes can go 4 if we are busy. She's been doing great with her bottles at daycare for the most part and only takes two 4 oz bottles while there. Which obviously makes me pretty happy since I'm pumping three times each day and getting about 15 oz. Love the number games...when I come out on top:)
The Superficial: The Hair is still there...in patches.
She's wearing all 6 month clothes now and 9 month ones fit, too. Since I've gone on a bit of a shopping spree for missy in the name of a fall/winter wardrobe, I had to buy all 9 mo stuff because 6-ers fit just perfectly now and I know in a few more weeks her legs will be entirely too long for them. Let's pause for a second and soak that in: my 4 month old baby is wearing 9 month clothes. She's so freaking tall. Weight guess: 15 pounds by my trusty method of weighing myself alone and then holding Cecelia. No clue about her height but we'll find out official stats next week at her four month appointment!
Oh, and I guess this fits in here: she has a new favorite pose. I call it 'The Mega Pout' and it's freaking amazing. She did it non-stop for a few days and now not so much, which makes me sad, because I loved seeing her bust it out when she was happy and playful, like, 'Oh, this is kind of fun, this lower lip thing I can do. I think I'll practice for 10 minutes straight.' Observe.
Strangers are still stopping me to drool over her, asking how old she is. When I tell them 'four months' I'm still getting the response that she seems a lot older than that, and a lot more alert/attentive. I think it's funny that people think my baby looks 'old'. :)
Motor Milestones: Shortly after my 3 month update Cecelia started holding her head up during tummy time like a boss. For real, and not just occasionally, like I had said last month. Her head control is fabulous enough to avoid the classic newborn head bob when we hold her upright. Then there's her stellar hand-to-mouth coordination. She's like, 'Oh, come here, shirt--let me eat you,' and 'Ooooh, my favorite tasty blanket again!'. Everything.in.her.mouth. She's still the queen of a half roll and hasn't *quite* gotten the hang of moving her arm out of the way to make it all the way onto her belly from her back.
Out and About: The only really notable excursion from the month would be CC's first time to church. AND! It was our first time as a family of four in the pews, but we weren't 'that' family with crazy-loud kids distracting the entire congregation. I hesitate to use the church nursery just because I really do enjoy having our family do church together, and I'd just rather have them with me so I'm not stressed about them crying the whole time in the nursery. But anyway, we all made it to church and it was a good trial run for this upcoming weekend when Cecelia is getting baptized!
(all dressed up for God!)
Favorite Baby Gear:
-Nuk brand pacifiers (apparently we should have bought stock in all things 'Nuk' brand, since these are the only bottles she will take, too. Love you, Nuk!!)
-The Ergo (again. I wasn't going to repeat baby gear throughout each month but this bad boy has provided for at least a FEW decent naps. And therefore it makes the list again)
Little Sister and Big Brother: Reading back over Truman's four month post made me chuckle for a lot of reasons, but mostly because OMG-he was so fat and bald! But also, we had already pulled out the jumparoo for him. I just remembered we even had one for Cecelia a few days ago, haven't pulled out the monstrosity yet as I'm avoiding the inevitable 'baby gear takes over the house' period of time. He'd already rolled over twice but he wasn't consistent with it yet, which really surprised me to read because I remember Truman rolling over really 'late' compared to most babies. Apparently he gets the tally mark for the first child to roll over as CC hasn't done it yet. And then, it struck me to read that he was laughing a LOT by now. Cecelia had her one shining moment of laughing for me one weekend but nothing like that since. Hmmm. Hope I don't start getting a complex about her being less happy than her big brother. Plus, I didn't even mention Truman's sleeping habits in my 4 month post so they must have been more acceptable than Cecelia's at this point. Which is frightening because Truman has never been the best sleeper and even HE was sleeping okay at 4 months. Sheesh.
But it's funny that at 4 months we were getting ready for a visit from the Missouri grandparents---because they are coming for CC's baptism this weekend, too! And both of my children found their voices by 4 months with their shrieks, they are generally happy children, and really freaking cute (biased opinion noted, but it's true. You have to admit). So they are still a lot alike.
Cecelia is obviously super young still, but I can already tell that she is in love with big bro. She pipes down when he is around and will just stare at him as he runs from train to train. And Truman? He's still very protective of baby sis, telling strangers as they oogle the baby, 'That is my sister. She grows up and plays trains with me.' ::swoon::
I love you, Cecelia Lorene. Even when you are giving me hell and wrecking my confidence as a mom because you WILL.NOT.SLEEP. I still love you. And I'm totally going to make you pay for this when you are a teenager by waking you up suuuuuuper early each day when all you want to do is sleep. Hee, hee, hee. No, really. We shall be best of friends during your teenage years, okay? Seriously. Because girl teenagers scare me a little right now.
