I’m convinced that Co-dizzle is putting all of her 11 month old energy into “guarn-dam-teeing” that she is the last Mohican on this here reservation. Ugh, that child, a veritable Sleeps She Will Not! I love her to smithereens, but if she doesn’t start sleeping past 4:30am, there’s going to be a come to Jesus meeting of epic proprotions.
Now, I will say, in her defense, it is in part my fault. When we moved to the new digs, she went from being in a pack and play to a crib. Big transition for a small person. Add to that, a week later, yet another stint in the pack and play at Grandma and Pa’s house, while DH and I had some alone time with the house and all of our earthly possessions as we unpacked. Mo-dizzle came home totally toilet trained, even over night, but Co dug her heels into the sleeping through the night with such force, we’ve got some size 3 ruts in the floor leading up to her crib.
The pediatricians I have had for the girls have both said, “Three nights makes it a habit,” when I ask what I should do or not do with respect on how to handle it. My mistake in thinking that if I just popped a warm bottle in her maw, she’d get a milk coma and fall back to sleep, like her job description requires. Three nights of that, and it was like she was waking up to a hot fudge sundae. Well hell! Who doesn’t like that?
Back to the drawing board. As the wake-ups continued, I just prayed that she wouldn’t be so loud as to wake Mo in the next room. The house has all hardwood floors which means a fly farting sounds like an elephant stampede. A baby crying is like a banshee wail that can make your ears bleed. Several times over the weeks, I’ve stepped on a particularly unforgiving floorboard, which emits a Dumb and Dumber most annoying sound in the world type of sound.
Mo calls to me like she’s been awake for hours, which she probably has, so in addition to piping down pip-squeak, I’ve got to do a potty break for Mo. She wants to be up, no matter what the reason or the season. Oh, is there a bird out my window? Let me get up! Did the air conditioner kick on? Time to get up? Sister’s crying? Let me get up! And she knows I’ll let her get up and go, too, because we want her to be potty trained, right? Right. Ugh! I am so delirious from sleep deprivation, I’ve got toothpicks propping up my eyelids.
As for Co, instead of picking her up, I gave her the tough love. I let her cry, while I dangled my upper body into the crib to rub her tummy, rub her back, rub her face (oops, sorry) and keep putting back down when she would grab the bars and hoist herself back up. Fast forward a few more days. We have progressed into a wake-up at 4:30 in the morning, which, while still sucks, I can manage better than a 2:30 or 3:00 one.
I’ve decided to forgo the bottle, keep an appetizer plate stocked with pacifiers on her dresser and simply slide into her room to pop one in her mouth if she starts up a holler. Sometimes, it isn’t even because she lost her plug or has a wet diaper. She just wants to talk. They say what goes around comes around, right? Yeah, ask my mom about how at 18 months, I was still getting up to “talk”.
If she’s particularly persnickety and it’s closer to 5am or 5:15, I may pick her up and rock her in the chair. Sucker that I am, I realized that with Co, I haven’t had a chance to cuddle and just generally love on her the way I was able to with Mo, seeing as Mo was an only child at that age. It’s not that I look forward to these early morning wake-ups, but I’m do remind myself, it won’t be forever. I mean, if she starts Harvard Business school still waking up at 4:30am to chat, I think I’m the one that needs to be committed (a grown ass woman still living at home? I don’t think so, but that’s another blog for another day).
So, as dawn broke over our still sleeping neighborhood this morning, I’m thinking about how this would be good fodder for you folks. And then I stopped. I tucked Co a little closer to my chest and breathed in the scent of her curly ‘do. She sighed, eyes wide open, and manipulated her plug to just the right position in her mouth. She patted my shoulder with one of her little hands, as if to say, “Thanks, Mom.” I’m crushed with fatigue, with love, with the overwhelming desire to stop time and be thankful for this little sleep fighting warrior, my little Sleeps She Will Not.
