gearhead mama

What a different child Sophie is. M is nearly three years old and we are still battling over sleep. My heart spasms with fear when M wakes during the night, wondering if she will settle in ten minutes or two hours. She hates sleeping. Hates it. For naps she sometimes falls asleep in my arms screaming that she doesn’t want to sleep. When she wakes up two hours later she picks up right where she left off, as if she had never slept at all. Sleeping is admitting defeat.

But Sophie. My dear, sweet Sophie. Sleep comes to her like a calm, quiet fog rolling off the water. She welcomes it, embraces it. In the early days she would sleep anytime, anywhere. Then things got tricky for a while, especially in the evening. She wouldn’t sleep between the hours of 6 PM and midnight unless she was in someone’s arms. That finally started to ease up a little, and then naps went out the window. She didn’t stay asleep if I set her down. Okay, no biggie, I just wore her for naps, trusting that it would get easier. And even then it was easy, comparatively speaking. Getting M down for a nap at this age was an ordeal. I would put her in the Moby and walk and walk and walk and walk and walk. She refused to lay her head on my chest, looking all around and eventually dropping her head backwards and staring straight up, struggling to keep her eyes open. She would finally succumb, her head flopped away from me, and still I had to walk, waiting and biding my time before I dared to gently, so gently, lift her head up and onto me. And heaven forbid if I didn’t leap to my feet and bounce if she stirred, or else I risked the wrath of her roaring to wakefulness, tired and cranky and pissed off that she had been tricked into sleeping. And set her down? HA. HA. HA.

With Sophie I just put her in my new wrap and went about my business, doing dishes, tidying the house, taking M for a walk. Sleep came effortlessly and noiselessly; she cuddled against me and let it take her.

Almost two weeks ago she started sleeping through the night. Going down between 9 and 10 PM and waking between 6 and 7 AM. Nurse and then back to bed for another 3 hours. Astonishing, simply astonishing. I still get slack-jawed when I really think about it (although you wouldn’t believe how cranky I got on the one night she deviated … how quickly we become spoiled).

Over the weekend I emerged from my twice-weekly bath to find Mr. Gearhead sans Sophie. “Where is she?” I asked. “Well, she seemed really calm and quiet, so I put her in the Kanoe and left.” “You did what?” I sputtered, my mouth agape at his audacity. “I dunno,” he shrugged, “I haven’t heard anything out of her.” I stood there stunned while he walked down the hall and poked his head through the door of her room. He returned to me. “She’s out like a light.”

And so he has given me courage. I see her yawn (usually about an hour and a half after getting up), scoop her up, change her diaper, stick the binky in, drop her in the Kanoe, bounce it for a minute and walk out. As in, I leave the room. And then … she goes to sleep. She usually wakes 30-40 minutes later. I go back in the room, re-bink her, bounce the Kanoe and leave again. And she goes back to sleep, usually for an hour or more. Sometimes I can repeat this and get another hour.

Astonishing. Simply astonishing.

At first I would tense whenever she stirred or if I did something to wake her. I would feel that anxiety in my heart, my chest tight and unyielding. But now I am learning I don’t need to have that fear. She doesn’t hate or fear sleep … she welcomes it, wants it, and is grateful when I provide the opportunity to do it. It is such a simple thing, really, and I still don’t understand why it’s so damn hard with M. My baby sleeps when she is tired and is awake when she isn’t. In fact, in the course of writing this post I have tended to her three times. The last time she wouldn’t settle, so I picked her up and changed her diaper. She fussed a bit and farted a few times. I picked her up off the changing table and she rested her head on my chest and fell back to sleep. After a few minutes I set her back in the Kanoe, and here I am, typing again - with two hands! But I know oh so well that it isn’t always like this. That it often isn’t like this.

It is such a relief to let that fear and anxiety slide away, for my life not to be ruled by the constant need to get my baby asleep and keep her that way. Especially since I have a toddler to care for as well. I cannot imagine the stress of parenting a baby like M and a toddler like M, all at the same time.

I don’t know who or what made Sophie this way. I just wanted to thank the Universe for it. I am eternally grateful.

As in, I’m getting it! Overall things have been going well with Sophie, but she’s gassy just like her sister. It’s not like she spends hours screaming in pain, but it’s just bad enough to disturb her sleep and therefore mine. Add in my own long-standing insomnia issues, and some nights I was only getting 2 or 3 hours of sleep. If I got 5 I felt lucky.

This was mind-numbingly painful for me, and my days were pretty fucking miserable. I was also an awful parent, constantly butting heads with M and resorting to tactics I really don’t agree with (punishment, bribes, coercion).

I tried everything I could think of to help Sophie – craniosacral therapy, chiropractic, homeopathy, NAET and the dreaded elimination diet (which thankfully resolved the reflux, but not the gas). I finally just quit trying. My healer thinks the universe is trying to teach me that not everything is my responsibility, that it’s not my job to “fix” things, that I can stop trying to figure everything out, stop trying to be perfect, and just be. I have to say I agree with her, but when trying to manage an infant and almost 3-year-old on 2 hours of sleep, I really didn’t give a flying fuck about lessons from the universe. I just wanted less gas and more sleep!

But I did decide to quit doing everything. I stopped making appointments and ceaselessly searching for a way to “solve” this “problem”. And about 2 weeks ago I stopped using the homeopathics because they didn’t seem to be helping anyway. I even started venturing off the elimination diet. But then I was rewarded with about 5 really hard nights. Again I started wondering what I had done “wrong” and how I could “fix” things. I know this is not a healthy mindset, but it did occur to me that the bad nights started around the time I stopped the homeopathics. Hmmmm. I started them up again, and huh, maybe they were helping after all. And things started to get better. And then things got really good, and now it seems like the gas is essentially gone, and – get this – for the last three nights, Sophie, at almost 12 weeks old, has slept for 6-8 hours straight. No waking, no nursing, just fussing once or twice, which is quickly resolved by re-binking. (Yeah, I swore I wouldn’t go that route again, but you gotta do what you gotta do.)

No way have I even started to make up all the sleep I’ve lost in the last few months, but jesus does it feel good to get 7 straight hours of sleep. I don’t think M slept 4 straight hours until she was over a year old. This? This feels decadent. Luxurious. Practically criminal.

I don’t know if it will continue, although I have to admit I desperately hope it does. With sleep like that, I can do this. I can manage, function, not dissolve into the evil screaming mother with three heads (one of which spins 360 degrees while spewing fire). It still isn’t easy, but it’s at least doable.

(Although everything is on hold while I wait for the dust to settle after my huge dietary transgressions yesterday … I ate three basil, tomato, mozzarella sandwiches (first wheat and dairy in two months) and I also had a chocolate cupcake (first chocolate and eggs in two months). Sophie seemed unusually uncomfortable about 24 hours later, although it seemed to pass (ha ha) fairly quickly. So I am crossing my fingers and holding my breath that it was an isolated incident and not related to the food. I can’t tell you how badly I want to be able to eat again.)

And I have to thank mb as well, for her mention of the Kanoe hammock on her blog. I have been eyeing hammocks since I was pregnant, but couldn’t decide what to get. With her endorsement, I made the plunge and bought a Kanoe, and I think it is also part of the reason for these long stretches of sleep. I heartily recommend it.

Now. If I could just figure out how to get her to take her naps in it, I would be happy. Right? Isn’t that how life is? I just need “this” (fill in the blank) and then I’ll be happy. Heh heh. One of these days I’ll figure out how to just be. Maybe.

And while we wait (for hell to freeze over) here are some recent pictures.

She has the most awesome smile, and we have been seeing a lot of it these days. She’s a very happy baby.

Peace man.

In my opinion, the only thing more beautiful than a nursing baby …

Is one who is sleeping on the b o o b (sorry for the spacing, but I get tired of whackos finding my site whenever I use a word like that) …

We’ve been trying to have Mr. Gearhead take over more of the bedtime and nighttime parenting, in preparation for the arrival of the new baby. Overall, things are going okay, but the middle of the night wakings are still not nearly as smooth or short as when I handle them. When getting back to sleep is of the utmost importance to me, I will lug my tired butt out of bed and handle things myself, just to speed things along.

I know some of you regularly get up with your kids at 6 AM or so, which means 5 AM wouldn’t seem that out of the ordinary; but I had the pleasure of spawning a kid who often sleeps until 9 AM (or later), so 5 AM is obscene to me. Obscene. (And before you hunt me down and shoot me – or at least peg me with rotten tomatoes – please bear in mind that I pay my dues in lots of other ways.) So when M awoke at 5 AM yesterday morning, I quickly made my way to her room. Problem is, she wanted her papa. Or at least said she did. There’s a lot that goes into this – primarily that papa is not as comfortable in his skin as mama, and has a harder time being internally clear on who is responsible for what. This means he has a harder time being externally clear on who is responsible for what, and is more likely to be unduly influenced by pleading and negotiations. M has recently figured this out, and all of a sudden papa is her favorite person when it comes to anything pertaining to going to bed (she may sleep late in the morning, but the kid still hates going to bed).

So going to bed and going back to bed almost always go faster and easier when I’m in charge, but now M is asking for papa because … well … faster and easier is not at the top of her list. Rather the opposite.

When I informed her that I would rock her and not papa, she let out a shriek that pierced my eardrums and made my brain recoil in pain. Then she kept shrieking. I sat with her in the chair and started rocking. I know from experience that when things don’t go her way she will get upset, and all I have to do is stick with her, hold her, let her be mad, let her get it out, and most of the time we’ll be okay in short order (this is another thing that Mr. GH has not yet mastered, and the end result is a lot more tears). But this shrieking took things to a new level, and I quickly began to question my decision. The whole point of my choice was to make things easier. Was it possible I had miscalculated? Had we finally reached a point where Mr. GH could do this faster and easier than me? I replayed recent nights of listening to her beg for this and that, and the inevitable finale of enraged crying, and I didn’t think so. But as the shrieking continued I had my doubts. I crawled around inside my head trying to figure out what to do. Do I stick to my guns? Hand her off to Mr. GH? Neither seemed like a good choice. My anxiety mounted and still the shrieking continued, along with kicking and thrashing. My thoughts started turning to, “I wish she would just quiet down and go back to sleep,” which is always a sign that I have strayed from my center.

Knowing that this was not a good space to parent from, I tried to calm my mind and accept where she was at. In order for me to help her successfully move through this kind of anger I needed to be in a place without judgment, without attachment to outcome, of unconditional love. But I was struggling to get there. I was tired. And my ears hurt. It was harder than usual. Then I suddenly had the thought that I needed to move out of my head and into my heart. I pulled myself down into my chest, and the anxiety and whirling thoughts and what-ifs slid away into the dark night. I stopped trying to talk myself into loving her, and instead urged my heart to physically open to her, to beam its unconditional love across the small gap between us and engulf her. Within 5 seconds the screaming had stopped. She rested her head on my shoulder and let me rock her. I was back in bed within 10 minutes.

The heart is a powerful thing. I wish I was able to remember that more often.

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Confidential to Leigh: I am not ignoring your requests for more belly pictures. To the contrary, I am equally impatient with myself to get some done, and disappointed that the weeks are slipping by undocumented. But fatigue and laziness are powerful things. Mr. GH has some time off during the holidays, and with some extra time on my hands I expect to finally surmount these obstacles and have some new pictures. Stay tuned …

Lately M has been sleeping a good 12 hours at night. Not that things are perfect – I’m up with her during the night at least a few times a week – but I can usually count on a morning wake time that is 12 hours after the evening bedtime. We used to put her to bed at 8 PM, and she would get up at 8 AM. Then it started drifting towards 8:30 PM, and then 9 PM. Thankfully, the wake time followed in lock step, so she was sleeping from 9 PM to 9 AM most nights. Then I got pregnant, and between the exhaustion and nausea, I found that I could no longer have anything to do with preparing dinner. This meant things didn’t get started until Mr. Gearhead got home from work. And let’s just say that Mr. GH isn’t a morning person, so it’s not uncommon for him to drag himself into work at 9 AM (or later). With the ever pressing “emergencies” that abound when one is working as an engineer in a faltering automotive industry that is laying people off left and right while still trying to accomplish more with fewer people, combined with a somewhat co-dependent personality that makes it difficult to say “no!” … well, my husband usually puts in more than the 8 hours he gets paid for. With a start time of 9 AM or later, he’s not exactly getting home at a reasonable hour. Despite several conversations where I asked, wheedled, demanded, begged and cried that he come home earlier, there has been no substantive change. (He even went in early for a few days, and still came home just as late as usual!) M is now going to bed at 10 PM – sometimes later.

Amazingly, the wake time follows suit, and it’s not uncommon for her to sleep from 10 PM to 10 AM (helped, I’m sure, by the room darkening shades, that were one of the best investments we’ve ever made). I grouse a lot about our sleeping issues, but I gotta say, I’m pretty damn thankful for this arrangement. Most of my friends with kids this age are getting up between 6 and 7 AM (oh the horror!). 8 AM is considered sleeping in. Of course, since she doesn’t go to bed until 10 PM, I am always up well into the night, as I just can’t seem to function without those few hours of time to myself (made all the more precious by the drought in naps). But being a night owl myself, I don’t have too many complaints about this arrangement.

Last night we got her down around 9:30, and she slept through until about 8 AM this morning. She fussed briefly, then was quiet, fussed, then quiet … the pattern that typically means she’s having gas pains. I fretted that it was probably too late in the morning to get her back down, even though she had definitely not had enough sleep. But I figured it was worth a try. We went in, changed her diaper, administered Colic Ease (I really should buy stock in that company), I sat with her for a few minutes, and then laid her back down. Oooh, she was pissed. This was not a part of her plan at all, and I was pretty sure things weren’t going to go well. But I left the room while she wailed in anger … and less than a minute later she was asleep. She slept until 11:30 AM.

Let’s just say we won’t even bother to attempt a nap today.

Can you hear the anguished howl in my voice? At the ripe old age of 25 ½ months, it would appear that my lovely daughter is in the process of dropping her nap … and it is not a graceful transition. Nor a desired one. The last few weeks have been one terror after another on the sleep front (as if that’s different from our everyday life?). Naps on some days and not on others. Naps that occur after hours of attempts on my part, and lots of screaming and yelling on her part. Bedtimes pushed to 10 PM, 11 PM, midnight (not by my choice). Waking up early. Sleeping in late. Crashing after many sleepless days and napping for 3.5 hours. Horrendous evenings with a screechy, exhausted toddler who we just can’t get to bed fast enough. And yet she still howls with fury when the time comes, even though she can barely keep her eyes open.

Sleep has never come easy in this household, and any smooth periods we have (typically measured in weeks) are inevitably followed by utter chaos and confusion. My daughter is such a lovely child, but this sleep thing … it’s fucking killing me. Our days are starting to feel like relentless games of Russian roulette. I never know what to expect. Her behavior seems in no way linked to her physical needs. She can act utterly exhausted – rubbing her eyes, cranky and crying, short-tempered – and completely refuse her nap. Other days she seems fine, yet goes down with no trouble. And every combination in between. I feel completely clueless. … But what else is new?

My only hope is that we’ve been through something sort of like this before, and after a few difficult weeks, that perhaps stretched into a month or two, she settled down (a little) and at least started napping again (with a lot of help from me). But I honestly have no idea what is going on. I don’t know if this is just a phase, and she’ll return to napping (which truly seems like what she needs if you ask me – but what the hell do I know?), or if we’re done with the nap for good. Do I give up? Keep trying? Putting her down leaves me with the expectation that I will have some time to myself, to do as I please. When she doesn’t sleep, I’m left bitter and angry with disappointment. Not a good place from which to parent. Sometimes it seems easier to just not try at all, so I don’t have to deal with the frustration of not getting what I want.

This makes me sound like a horrid person, but I honestly do not relish the idea of spending every waking hour with my daughter. I need that nap. I need a little time to myself, without the constant, pressing, demanding needs of a toddler raining down on my head. I’ve always disdained the idea of “quiet time”, feeling that it disrespected the child who clearly didn’t want or need to nap any more. But I get it now, oh yes I do. I’d rather not go there. What I want is a child who will sleep when she’s tired. I have asked for this for two long years. Will it ever happen?

A snowmobile hauls a train of small carts up a steep, icy incline. I sit alone in the last cart, listening to the engine choke and sputter. It’s nighttime, but the moon must be out because the landscape is bathed in a ghostly, pale light. There is a cliff thrusting out of the earth on my right, and a sheer drop-off to my left. The snowmobile is struggling, and I am afraid. Suddenly my cart detaches from the one in front of me. I bump and slide backwards down the path, and come to rest a ways down the hill. The train of carts continues on, and I am gripped by panic as I realize that they’re leaving me.

After a moment of indecision, I resolve to continue on foot. I know I must go on. I struggle up the slippery path, my breath coming in clouds. As I near the top I glance up and see a menacing figure step onto the path. I turn to flee and am suddenly surfacing, warm and safe in my bed. No, no, no, I think dimly. That person is a part of you. You must find the courage to return and look them in the face. Do not be afraid. I slide back into the dream and continue to struggle up the path. I am almost to the top when I take a deep breath and force myself to look up, only to find myself staring into the eyes of my daughter. Relief washes over me, and she reaches out her hand to help me scramble up the last few steps to safety.

I am standing outside a warehouse. It is still dark, but not so cold. I sense that I have traveled by plane after reaching the top of that snowy hill, and now I am home. A little flatbed truck picks me up and winds through the maze of the warehouse. It drops me off in a dimly lit hallway, and I push through a heavy, metal door with my bags. I enter into one room; walls, floors, and ceiling are concrete, stained and dirty. There is not a single window. My possessions are scattered about, the bed is rumpled and unmade, the kitchen counter on the far wall is cluttered with dirty dishes. Tears well in my eyes as I realize, this is my home. But in the next moment I think, I don’t have to stay here. It is suddenly crystal clear that this is home simply because I have not chosen to make it elsewhere. The whole world is open to me; I can live wherever I want. My heart sings with joy, and I eagerly prepare to leave. I notice several file cabinets, and decide to lock each drawer. I don’t know if or when I’ll be back, but I don’t want anyone rifling through my papers. As I slide the key into a lock I am awake again, and again I think no! Those papers are a part of you too. It would be dangerous to keep them hidden and locked away. Again I slide back into the dream and squat in front of the cabinets, unlocking the drawers. I pull a folder out and start to leaf through it. It’s just a bunch of junk. Paperwork wrought meaningless by the passage of years. I stare at the drawers, full to the brim, and my heart sinks. Surely there are some important papers in here somewhere. I can’t just leave them behind, but it would take hours – days – to sort through and organize everything. I’m ready to leave now. I rock back on my heels, defeated. What do I do?

I awake with a feeling of sadness and indecision, the answer to my question no clearer.

We’ve had a rough go of things here lately. Our trip to Vegas was fabulous. The emergency appointment with the homeopath before we left (for help with the endless nighttime gas) seemed to have mostly done the trick. My fears about M sleeping in a strange room and a strange crib were for naught – she slept better than she did at home. The weather was gorgeous, the company was good, our days were full and tiring.

I was absolutely thrilled that M was sleeping so well at night. It seemed that her lifelong struggle with digestive issues was finally ending. The restless sleep, the crying out, the up and down – all of which I believed were due to gas pains – were gone. I thought we were finally seeing the light at the end of the tunnel.

And then we came home, and I found out it was a train. For the last year I have been able to put M in her crib, turn out the light, walk out, and she goes to sleep. She did not want to rock and cuddle. If I held her, she thought it was time to play. Sometimes this made me sad, but for the most part I have been very grateful that she didn’t need me to help her fall asleep. It was the staying asleep that was the problem. Well, now that she is sleeping well for most, or all, of the night, suddenly getting her to sleep has become the issue. Naps were refused until I figured out I had to cradle her in my arms like an infant (all 25+ lbs of her) and sway from side to side until the urge to sleep could no longer be resisted. Bedtime is a battle that sometimes stretches for hours. Papa is not wanted, not tolerated. It is mama, mama, mama, mama, never mind that mama’s arms feel like they’re about to fall out of their sockets. Oh yeah, and she also started waking up at 6:30 AM instead of 8:30 AM. To bed later, up earlier, naps dropped or drastically shortened. And tired – she was so, so tired. I was baffled. And also angry. Really angry. I was back to being a sleep-deprived, psycho-angry mom, raging at my daughter, terrified at who I had become. I screamed and threw things and had unspeakable visions.

And then I have this dream. This dream of a steep and dangerous journey. One that is made alone, with no help. Where an enemy turns into a friend … my daughter. How many lessons does she have for me? How many ways has she pushed me as I grow and change? Held out her hand to help me on my path? Encouraged me to continue? And what about the child I carry within me … the little girl I once was? She has lessons for me too, and has helped me on my way.

The first part of the dream is obvious. My journey as a parent – as a person – had clearly hit a rough spot. It was tough going, but when I had the courage to face myself – to go back into the dream and look into the eyes of that menacing figure – I found a source of love and healing. I had thought the way forward was filled with fear and danger, and I wanted to turn and run away. But when I opened myself to it, I discovered instead a hand up, a light step, a scramble to safety. This taught me to trust and keep going. That I would not be a psychotic, angry mom forever. That I would find a better way.

But the second half left me scratching my head. My home was a dark and dismal place. Easy enough … the home represents me, and it’s pretty clear I needed to make some changes. I had journeyed and learned, and it made no sense to return to where I was before. And then the flash of insight … change is easy, I’m only back in the same place because I haven’t chosen otherwise. I can be and do whatever I want, I just have to decide to do so. Okay, good. But the filing cabinets, the important papers, the fear of missing something important – what did that mean? It’s clear the papers represented parts of me. Most of them were junk, and that makes sense too. I’ve spent years growing and changing, and left behind much of what I used to be. Those parts of me are outdated and not needed anymore. But the fear of something important being left behind … what did that mean?

Then I talked with my homeopath/healer, and she helped me understand (dear god do I love her). She said that people who do a lot of work on themselves are often afraid they have left stones unturned, issues unaddressed, hurts unhealed. We become so expert at seeking, seeking, always seeking – to better understand ourselves, to change old habits, to grow – we feel like our work is never done. And in truth, it never is. But it is not necessary to go through my life with a fine-toothed comb, to not take a step until every rock, down to the tiniest pebble, has been hefted and inspected. I don’t have to fear leaving important work behind. I can move forward with my life, and if there is work to be done, it will find me. I will find it. Ah-ha, I thought, as I leaned back in the chair and slowly nodded my head. It made perfect sense.

I didn’t “move out of my house” overnight, but in the weeks that have passed since that conversation, I feel like I have slowly morphed into a new person. Gone is the self-righteous indignation when things don’t go “my way”. Gone is the feeling that my daughter is “defying” me and needs to be bent to my will (whoo boy, was that a big one left over from my mother). Gone is the simmering anger that explodes into uncontrollable rage; that sweeps over and consumes me and won’t return me to myself until I’ve yelled or thrown or purged it in some outrageous way. I am left instead with a sense of overwhelming joy at the presence of my daughter … almost disbelief that I get to share my life with her, am graced with her beauty and love. Yes, I still get irritated, annoyed and exasperated. Yes, I still really want her to be able to fall asleep without my help. But I no longer feel wronged by her, or my life. She is who she is, and I am who I am. Life is what it is, and I’m okay with it, know that I’ll make it, know that her sleep will get better, only for other challenges to rise up and meet us. I am “in the flow” as my homeopath would say, instead of kicking, screaming and biting as it drags me along by the heels.

I have had other help on this journey, including some beautiful inspiration from Scott Noelle’s Daily Groove. His daily emails, which always seem to be exactly what I need to hear, when I need to hear it, helped me better understand my anger. Yes, it is a signpost that I’m being wronged, but it’s a wrong I am perpetrating on myself (at least in this case). He helped me stop blaming my daughter and start taking responsibility for myself. Sure, I would be a lot less tired if she didn’t get up at 6:30 AM (a trend that seems to be diminishing, thankfully). But I would also be a lot less tired if I went to sleep at 9 PM. Maybe I don’t go to sleep at 9 PM because I have my own sleep problems – but that isn’t my daughter’s fault. It isn’t my fault either. No one is to blame. It just is. By accepting instead of resisting, flowing instead of fighting, there is a sudden ease to my life that brings a deep sense of calm and joy.

I know this won’t last forever. My homeopath loves to remind me of the cycles of life, as she dips her hand in a circle in the air. We go up and come down, it’s just the way things are. But as we grow and move forward, the downs become shallower and shorter, the journey back up less tortuous. For now, I’m glad to be up; and when I go back down, I hope to hold fast to the knowledge that I will be here again.

We are still living in no-sleep-hell. M has made it abundantly clear that if she’s experiencing any type of discomfort – be it gas, teething, sore throat or stuffy nose – she simply won’t sleep. We have pulled out all the stops to try to get through this cold … humidifier, vapor rub, Tylenol with decongestant (that shit is worthless), elevated one end of the crib, homeopathics, essential oils, and finally … the sucker. M has a long history with suctioning, and I’m sure that’s not helping matters much. She is also incredibly strong-willed, and – as I already mentioned – not one to stoically suffer through any kind of discomfort. And getting your nose suctioned isn’t exactly fun.

Around here, any benefit gained by using the sucker is typically more than offset by the cost; and that’s why it has become the method of last resort. To do it correctly would really require three adults … one to hold her arms/body, one to hold her head, and one to do the sucking. It’s nice for the person doing the sucking to have both hands free, so they can close the opposite nostril (although M seems to have found a way to defeat this move; somehow making it so no air will move through her nose). Sadly, there are only the two of us, so we improvise. Our latest approach has been to lay her on her back on the floor, so Mr. Gearhead can kneel behind her and clamp his knees around her head. He uses his hands to restrain her arms, and I use my belly flab to absorb the kicks while going at her nose with the sucker. Yeah. It’s not a pretty picture.

In an effort to make the sucking as fruitful as possible, it is preceded by squirts of saline nose drops, and time spent in a steamy bathroom. If we’re going to hell and back, we might as well try to make it worthwhile.

Since none of our other methods seem to be working, we have resorted to using the sucker before bed. And while M is now falling asleep at night fairly easily, she wakes some hours later, and doesn’t go back to sleep for four or more hours. And sometimes not at all. What with the discomfort I’m experiencing from my own cold, and the fact that every night feels like staring down a gun barrel, just waiting for it to go off, I am having trouble falling asleep. M uses her amazing 6th sense powers to start the night’s festivities just as I’m finally starting to drift off (usually around 1 AM, but sometimes as early as 11 PM). She does this every night. She is amazing.

Last night I decided we would take a different approach. When she woke in the middle of the night, we would use the sucker. Again. Yes, it would suck (ha, ha). Yes, it would wake her completely. Yes, there would be screaming and yelling and crying and more screaming. But maybe, with a clear nose, she would actually fall back asleep, instead of keeping us up the whole fucking night.

The gun went off at 12:45 AM (just as I was falling asleep!), so Mr. GH and I wearily rolled out of bed and started the routine. We sprayed and sucked, sprayed and steamed and sucked. We wrestled and tortured and comforted and wiped tears. After an hour of work (interspersed with many breaks), we managed to extract a fairly sizeable amount of snot, and I was feeling confident that we would all finally get some more rest.

Ha. Ha.

M was still awake at 3 AM, at which point I handed off the reins to Mr. GH, closed my door and put in ear plugs. There is only so much I can humanly do, and after a week of being up all night every night (preceded by many weeks of nights interrupted by teething and gas pain), I am at past my limit. We were up again at 7 AM, once again fulfilling my nightly quota of four hours of sleep. Dear god, please make it end soon.

(Apologies in advance, for the whining and bitching.)

There is no way around it. I am in an ugly, ugly mood. M is sick again, and even though it is the mildest of colds, she’s the biggest fucking sissy in the world when it comes to being sick. This means she slept for 6 hours last night – one 4 hour block, and one 2 hour block. It was fun.

There are days when I really don’t want to be a mother. Today is one of them.

The rage, frustration and resentment I feel scares me. I understand that it is directly correlated to lack of sleep, but I find it deeply troubling, nonetheless. I am ashamed to admit that I had fantasies last night of wrapping my hands around M’s neck and shaking her, shaking, shaking and screaming SHUT THE FUCK UP WHY WON’T YOU SLEEP WHY WHY WHY WHY!?!?!? Just reading that makes me want to cry, but it is the truth.

I am feeling very despondent about life today. I am one of those people who needs eight hours of sleep to feel like a normal human being. In my pre-child life, I was greatly upset if I only managed to garner seven hours before rising to go to work. I stumbled through my day in a haze, longing only for it to end so I could return home to sleep. I would struggle through meetings, pinching myself to stay awake, often in vain. When it was really bad, I would scooch my laptop over so my back was to the door of my cubicle, lean my head on my hand and doze.

Needless to say, it has been a long ass time since I’ve gotten anywhere close to eight hours of sleep. I can count on one hand the number of times I’ve slept six straight hours in the last 15 months.

In the beginning, we had the nursing woes, and it was common to be up until 1, 2 even 4 AM, night after night after night. For months. When we cleared that, the gassiness began, and M kicked me, night in and night out. I think I averaged maybe four hours of sleep a night during this period … often in fifteen minute chunks. This lasted for months on end. And let’s not even talk about naps … naps that would occur only in the car, with the engine on and wheels moving. Naps that resulted in an insane number of near misses as I constantly struggled to maintain consciousness while piloting my precious, sleeping cargo. Out of sheer desperation, I finally moved her to her crib around nine months, and she stopped kicking me, only to start fussing instead. Without me at her side, the gas pains would wake her briefly … she would moan and cry out, then go back to sleep for a few minutes, repeat, repeat, repeat. After seeking help from a chiropractor and craniosacral therapist, I finally bit the bullet and took her to a holistic pediatrician. We paid for this out of pocket, and after piling it on top of all the chiro and CST visits, I figure I’ve easily spent several thousand dollars on health care practitioners since M was born. As a friend so succinctly put it the other day, “How much is your sleep worth?” A lot, apparently.

Amazingly, the holistic pediatrician helped (and it should have, for how much it cost). I never had much faith in homeopathy, but I do now. The gas (and frequent night waking) disappeared overnight, and after a while, M even started pooping several times a day. We had a few good weeks, maybe even a month or two. She was still up at least once a night to nurse, but other than that, her sleep was good. Mine, however, was not. I’ve battled insomnia off and on my entire adult life, and it chose that opportune moment to rear its head again. I …

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Um, excuse me while I go yell at my child, throw and break a few things, terrorize the cat, curl into a fetal position on my husband’s lap and cry uncontrollably for a while.

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Okay. I feel a little better now.

The long and short of it is, I’m tired. And not “I’ve had a few bad nights” tired. This is deep and pervasive, bone-aching tired. Night after night, week after week, month after month of not getting enough sleep. My life is fuzzy and gray around the edges, and if I didn’t know better, I would think I was depressed. But I’ve been there before and this is different. I’m just plain tired, and after 15 months in survival mode, where the house is always dirty, and it’s a struggle just to keep food in the fridge and clean clothes on our backs, I’m tired of it. I stagger through life, barely on my feet, overwhelmed by the simplest things, and like a giant stone wheel, the days keep coming, nipping at my heels; one false step and I’ll be crushed. There is no cushion, no factor of safety. I’m scraped to the bone, and it only takes one moderately bad night for me to lose it.

Even if I were to start getting eight hours of sleep a night (and I’m not, oh no, I’m not), it wouldn’t be enough. I’m not foolish enough to think I can recapture every minute I’ve lost in the last 15 months, but some of it has to be made up. At least a little.

The frustrating thing is that I think M has finally become a “good sleeper”. It’s just things keep getting in the way. She’s sick, or teething, or the gas is bothering her again. When she’s comfortable, she falls asleep easily, and sleeps well … I think she’s even getting close to sleeping through the night. But fucking-a if stuff doesn’t keep coming up, and we’ll lick one thing only to have another take its place. I’ve even got my insomnia in hand – thanks to the wonders of homeopathy, herbal remedies, and aromatherapy (lavender, where have you been all my life?). It feels like we’re so close, so fucking close, and yet, so far away.

I want to live my life again, not just survive. I want to enjoy the time I spend with my daughter, not count the minutes until I can put her down for a nap, struggling to contain the monster that’s unleashed inside of me by the lack of sleep. Sometimes I don’t even know who I am, this hateful, vengeful person who can’t see past her desire to inflict hurt and pain. I am truly a stranger to myself, and find small comfort only by remembering that sleep deprivation is used as a form of torture for a reason.

I know it will get better. I know it won’t be like this for the rest of my life. But frankly, that is of no comfort to me now. I am spent, I have nothing left to give, I need more sleep. Now.

M is finally asleep. I’m going to bed.

Dear M,

You turned thirteen months old the other day, and I am too damn tired to write something heartfelt and poetic about it. When the hell are you going to start sleeping better? You seem to be growing more dependent on my boobs for getting back to sleep, not less. This is a development I am less than pleased with, by the way. Although I don’t particularly relish prying my ass out of bed once a night to nurse you, I’m willing to do it. But more than that? You can forget it. So papa is sent in instead, and you are definitely not on board with that plan. And all of us end up being awake for however long you decide – thirty, sixty, ninety minutes. And then you’re back up at the crack of dawn; not ready for the day by a long shot, but once again wanting boobage. I refuse to submit. If I submit, then you’ll be wanting me every 3 hours, then every 2, and it just ain’t gonna happen.

And believe me when I say you aren’t hungry. I know when you’re hungry. You suck so hard you almost peel my skin off. This … this is just playing. This is, “Hey mama, come on over for a visit.” Let me tell you, in most parts of the world, it’s considered uncouth to visit at 3 AM.

I sometimes think about having another baby, but I am so utterly exhausted I honestly don’t know how I would physically cope with being pregnant or dealing with a newborn again. I need to recover at least a little from what we’ve been through. Except we’re still going through it … the recovery stage nowhere in sight. And then I think about going through this all over again with a NEW baby, and I pick up the phone to make R’s vasectomy appointment.

Aside from all that, things are going fan-tas-tic. Honestly, they are. You’re so damn cute, you break my heart. And that about sums everything up.

Now I’m going to try to get some sleep.

Love,
Mama

The cat stands on my pillow and meows. I blearily open my eyes and put my face an inch from the clock. 6:37 AM. I lift the covers and the cat crawls in, turns around and snuggles up to me, rubbing his nose on mine, tickling me with his whiskers. I grunt with irritation, but tolerate it. He is getting old, and his kidneys aren’t doing so well. I am acutely aware that our time together is in its twilight.

All the while, a thought circles lazily in the back of my mind. As the haze of sleep fades, I suddenly pounce on it and sit bolt upright in bed (okay, not really, but in my mind I do): M slept through the night. And not that pansy-ass No-Cry-Sleep-Solution 5-hours-is-sleeping-through-the-night bullshit. I mentally do the math and scour my memory … am I forgetting anything? No. She last nursed at 4 PM – my astonishingly enormous breasts, tugging at the confines of my skin, are proof of this. She went to sleep at 7:30 PM. It is now 6:30 AM. She. Slept. Through. The. Night. And miracle of miracles, she is still sleeping.

It dawns on me that if it weren’t for the damn cat, I would still be sleeping too. I drop-kick toss gently push him out of bed, and settle in, determined to take advantage of whatever time is left, and get some more sleep myself. Then a small voice in my head pipes up.

Maybe she’s dead.

Don’t be ridiculous. She’s not dead.

How do you know?

Look. At some point, she has to sleep through the night, and tonight is as good a night as any. In fact, as far as I’m concerned, this night is loooooong overdue.

But maybe she’s not sleeping through the night. Maybe she’s dead.

STOP SAYING THAT. SHE’S NOT DEAD.

But what if she is? And you sit here all excited because she slept through the night, and don’t go in to check on her until 8:30 AM, and discover that no, she didn’t sleep through the night. SHE’S DEAD. And you are a horrible mother because you let your dead child lie decomposing in her crib for two hours because you didn’t want to risk waking her up.

SHUTUPSHUTUPSHUTUPSHUTUP!

Your baby is dead and you’re a horrible mother.

And this is how I entertained myself until 7:30 AM, when M woke up.

P.S. She made up for the sleeping through the night part by being up from midnight to 3 AM the next night, and waking twice to nurse the following night.