Whew, that is a painful one to admit. Everyone you meet asks how your kid sleeps. I wish I could rewind to this time last year when he was 5 weeks old and DID sleep through the night.
My child was a champion sleeper from day 1 (well maybe day 3 or 4 to be honest...). We left the hospital and he would sleep 4 or 5 hour stretches. Everyone was telling me to wake him after 3 hours because he needed to eat. Not my child! Parker was sleeping 7 hours straight at night by 3 weeks old and 10 hours straight by 5 weeks. Everyone was jealous.
Jealous of what? My false sense of accomplishment? Not that I had ANYTHING to do with Parker sleeping...that was a fluke in my opinion. Jealous of the puddle of breast milk I awoke in every morning? Pumping didn't help me...my wonder child refused to take a bottle, so a relatively large amount of frozen milk went to waste. If I didn't mind pumping, I might have offered to donate some of my "liquid gold", but really, who likes pumping?
So what happened at 4 months that changed everything? Please...I have no idea, I really wish I could fix it!
Around 4 months, my little man began rolling, sitting, crawling, standing, walking babbling and the dreaded teething...not all at once though. I am sure I am forgetting some of his major milestones because I am so tired I can't even remember if I put on deoderant some days. I would have to say rolling was the beginning of the end. Once my little genius could get off of his back, our lives changed for good. Rolling onto tummy leads to crawling which leads to pulling up to standing which leads to chewing on the crib railing. And really, who wants to sleep when you can cruise around your crib and get up to no good? Gone were the days of putting Parker in his crib and having him doze off in a few minutes peacefully, and in were the days of squeeling with glee at his new found talents.
"It is a phase" I kept telling myself. Every time Parker met a new milestone, we got one good night of sleep, so I figured to myself, he is just growing and developing....these are GOOD things! I was and am so proud of my little (big) boy! I am amazed at what he can do every day, but I still wish he would sleep.
Sleep train him? Stop talking to me....seriously, I don't want to hear it. We tried it for 10 minutes one night, and after changing his jammies and sheets because he was so upset he threw up, forget it! I don't own enough jammies or sheets to get through a night at that rate. Comfort him, settle him down and leave the room? I can settle him, but sitting down or leaving the room leads to the vomitting, so not worth it in my opinion. If it worked for you, that's awesome!
With 6 teeth fully in, 1 just popped through the gums, another arriving any day now, and 6 or more bumps where canines and molars are soon to appear, we are lucky and thankful to get 3 or 4 hours of uniterupted sleep. It doesn't happen often. It pains me to wake the (finally) sleeping baby in the morning to get him ready for daycare. He is so peaceful and beautiful, but after his big stretch and rubbing of his eyes, his big, toothy smile shines and brightens my day. He giggles, crawls/runs/throws himself at me, gives me a hug and a sloppy open mouthed kiss and the past 10 hours have been forgiven....mostly. After a coffee or two, I can function and things start making sense to me.
So does my child sleep through the night? Hell no he doesn't! Does it make me a failure? I may feel it at times, but no, I'm not a failure. He will sleep again one day right? Right?!?!?!
It is hard not to compare children and, yes, even judge each other, but who cares if your kid sleeps and mine doesn't? Who cares if your kid talks and mine doesn't? What really matters is that my kid was walking by 10 months and 1 week...was yours? No? I WIN! ;)
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