The Parent Whisperer

One thing I have learned is that in the world of new parents, Baby Sleep is a competitive sport. We met a couple at the coffee shop yesterday morning with a baby born the day after Talia and in answer to the question, "how's it going", they answered with how long young Matthew sleeps (9 and a half hours - we think they use opiates in the bottle).

Young Talia's first sleep in her new crib. Talia's parents enjoy a mix of 2 minute timed cries and
shushing and patting comfort in between while they wait for her to fall asleep.

This is why people write books on how to get babies to sleep. Because there are millions of parents out there desperate to find the answer and willing to spend any amount of money to find it. The sad, unfortunate truth though, is that there is not a book's worth of content for the answer. The answer is actually just one word: wait. These books are actually just a long list of things to do while you wait. You can spend your waiting sleeping with your child, ignoring your wailing child, shushing and patting your child. You can bounce and rock, you sling and swing. You can feed 'em or change 'em. You can attach, ferberize or whisper. But know this - all you are doing is waiting. Waiting for them to figure it out, or move out. Whatever comes first.

You may recall an earlier post where I admitted that I only read baby books until I found one that agreed with me. One that described how I most wanted to wait. I truly believe that all parents that do the same although some are better than others at convincing others that they are in fact choosing a methodology for their child. Ha!

They are not. For example, I could go on and on about the importance of children sleeping in their own beds: it fosters independence, it decreases the risk that they will be crushed by a parent dead asleep and it uses the very cute crib that you've chosen. However, it might be more true to admit that Talia sleeps in her own bed in her own room because I value my own sleep very highly and she makes too many noises too often for me to sleep deeply if she was in my room, never mind my bed. Or, to use my book theory, I don't want to wait with her so nearby. I need some distance in my waiting.

So this afternoon, I'm shushing and patting my daughter into her nap (see The Baby Whisperer to explain this particular way to wait) and I realized truly and deeply that like all parenting books, in addition to not actually doing any thing other than giving me something to do while I wait, it is also meant to make parents like me feel better about what we're doing while we wait.

This particular book is for those of us who need to feel like we're doing something, like we're not completely abandoning our children, but who aren't willing to actually sleep with them either. The shushing may or may not soothe a crying baby, but I realized at minute 7 that it was really soothing me. The patting may or may not ease young Talia into sleep, but it absolutely keeps my hands from covering her mouth to quiet her down. That Tracey Hogg woman made a fortune giving parents like me something to do until our children are old enough to do things like fall asleep on their own, and more importantly helps us feel righteous about doing it. Amazing.

So this will be my book - The Parent Whisperer. It will help parents identify what their parenting priorities are (mine are MY sleep, MY eating and her making me look good in public) and then match them with the waiting activity that most closely matches their hopes. Of course, this will involve me finding out what those other options are - you'll remember that I've only read about the one that matches ME. But you watch, it's going to be a best seller.

Off to start my research. Right after I wake my daughter from the nap I spent an hour getting her to take. But holey moley, did I feel good about how I spent that hour.

Sai-ai-ai-ling, Takes me Aw-ay-ay

So this week we took our first family sailing trip up to the Elliott Bay outstation on Gambier Island. We left on Tuesday and all three of us returned Thursday afternoon - victory indeed. We had gorgeous weather: the three sunny days of July I think, with no motor issues or sails ripping apart. Again, victory everywhere.

First photo is of Scott taking us out, Talia slung in at the helm. Hopefully this time next year, she'll be able to run the tiller for us. Or at least reach it. The sling is awesome and we used it all the time as the photos will reveal. Unfortunately, she probably got a bit addicted to it and was a bit sad without it once we got home! Oh well, as problems go, it's one we can live with. Anyway, you can see that the Captain of Cheap Therapy is pretty comfy with his new first mate (Oh Lord, if that isn't the cheesiest line ever - ahahhaha! I need to send that in to the Lats and Ats photo section).



Here we are cruising the decks at the outstation. Do note how gloriously clean the boat is - it was beautiful. Okay, it might be hard to tell from this photo, but trust me, it looked really good.


Sleeping in the boat is intimate at the best of times. Adding a third body to the mix is kind of funny. We brought the bassinet along and it worked awesome for nights. However early morning, she got to cuddle up with us, making for a really nice start to the day. Especially when it is dad keeping her happy and quiet!


And here is a photo of sweet T bundled up in her sling. Think it was a bit bright for her? Or maybe she's getting tired of all the photos, poor thing.


Nap time on the way down broke almost all the rules of baby sleep. At least she's on her back, but probably all the blankets might be considered a bit of a hazard. Oh well, she lived and she napped which counts as a win in our books. We were taking a bit of a beating on the way down, and she just lay there, bouncing around quite happily in her v-berth coccoon.



Hopefully there will be many more voyages in our future. It was a good first run and we had a really great time. As always, three days on the boat feels like a week of holidays and we came back very relaxed and happy, thankful for the boat and for each other. Really, a victory.

As I Mean To Go On

As a responsible parent-to-be, I read up on life with newborns prior to Talia's arrival. As a fundamentally opinionated and lazy person, I stopped reading when I found an author who agreed with everything I already thought about life with newborns. The Baby Whisperer by Tracey Hogg is a good read with a lovely tone of voice about it that makes it feel possible to do have a happy, contented baby who eats and sleeps well and grows up to bring peace to the Middle East. And of course, she agrees with me. Kids like routines, parents matter, sleep is good and a child can learn to do it my way. Well, that last one might not be verbatim, but I think it's what she meant.

One of her standard lines is "Start as you mean to go on". I think she means that you do at the beginning the things you hope to be doing later, be consistent. There is some wisdom in that certainly, and it is probably good advice.

However, I somehow took that to mean "Start by doing it right from the beginning so that you never do it wrong and your child is always fine because you're always doing it right." This would be a less healthy interpretation. Unfortunately, I didn't realize that until yesterday. The first 6 weeks of sweet Talia's life have been an exercise in failure for me against that standard of doing it right from the beginning, every time.

And then yesterday it occurred to me that I might want to give some thought to "how I want to go on" and then evaluate our parenting from that point of view. What good news that was! Because were I well-rested and well-fed and sipping cold white wine with a friend outside in the yard, and she asked me how I meant to go on in parenting, I would say something like this:

"I want to be open-handed with my child and myself and my husband, not holding too tightly to any thing, person or idea. I want to be a learner and be adaptable. I want to be gracious with my children and my husband when they make mistakes so that they can be wholly themselves with me. I want to be wholly me with them and I hope they will have grace for my mistakes. I want to be faith-full and Jesus-y-ish and see God better through my family. I want to get better at it, and I want to enjoy it, enjoy them. I want to be thankful."

And that would be true. There are however, dark parts of my heart that would rather be perfect at parenting and I was living in those dark parts for a bit there. I will probably visit them every once and again. But my whole heart isn't that way. Thank goodness.

So right now, I am less committed to a perfect going-to-sleep situation. In the practical sense, how I mean to go on with sleeping is to figure out a way to help her sleep in whatever situation she's in. She won't always get to sleep in her own bed, and I won't always sing the same song, or any song for that matter. Sometimes it will be Scott putting her to sleep and sometimes it will be Grandma and sometimes God love her, she'll be on her own. And that may mean that sometimes, I have a daughter who doesn't sleep well but that's how I mean to go on. Imperfectly, making it up as I go and wishing that it was the way that worked best.

Oh well. I feel better at least.

Counting a Few Blessings

After the last post I find myself wanting a record of at least a few sweet things:

1. Waking Up Faces. I wish I had footage of this to post because a still photo won't capture the hilarity of my daughter waking up. Big stretches and arms all over the place. Arms akimbo in fact. I believe the word akimbo was invented for this exact motion. Eyes squeak open only enough to decide if the scenery is worth a full waking and the wrinkles in the forehead... oh my goodness. Laugh out loud funny she is.

2. Cuddling into the Neck. Little baby breaths against my neck even when it's a million and twelve degrees outside. Feeling the little hand resting on my shoulder. Looking at those blond eyelashes. Smelling that baby smell that I never really smelled until her. Mmm.

3. Baths with Daddy. My daughter loves water and loves her dad and bathtimes are about her favouritist thing being a wicked awesome combination of the two. A poop disaster yesterday landed her in the shower with Dad and she was beside herself with enjoyment. Loves spray on her belly and on her head and in the bath, loves swimming her little arms around and pushing herself around with her wee legs. Little tadpole gazing up in total love with her dad who gazes back.

Those are my top three for tonight. Off to see some of those waking faces.

A.

My Daughter is Cute. My Heart is Not.

One month, 6 days in. She's easy on the eyes, that's for sure. At least to me, Scott and my mother. And my dad, Brian and Anna. That's a nice thing.

One thing that is not so nice is a day (or several) where a person wants to just quit. When a person realizes that this was all a terrible misunderstanding, and that when I was begging the Lord to get pregnant what I meant was, "Let me have the feeling of getting my own way, but please don't change anything about my life." Of course, I didn't know that at the time. In fact, I guess I was really asking for my life to change. I just didn't know that I didn't really want that after all.

Silly me.

The system is set up so that there are no returns, no take-backs, no do-overs. I suppose this is wisdom, but I couldn't tell you why. At least not this week.

Now this might sound like whining. You might be thinking, "goodness, Talia must be a really difficult baby." Nope. She's not. She is healthy, she is alert and happy often. She cries often too, but has yet to be inconsolable. She eats well, and she is cute. Probably a dream child.

However, she is permanent. She is always here. She doesn't take 12 hours off. In fact, so far she has yet to take more than 4 hours off. And of those 4 hours, I spend 30 minutes wondering if she is going to fall asleep, and another 30 minutes wondering if she's going to wake up. Who thought up this system??

And me. I am always here too. Me and my head wondering what the magic code is to falling asleep for 2 hour naps. Me wanting to get an hour's worth of work done in the 10 minutes she plays happily on her own. Me realizing that I am a bit addicted to accomplishments and items crossed off the to do list. Me unwilling to believe that my life really has to be about someone else. Someone who is frikkin' useless. Albeit tremendously darling and cute.

Ugh. And someone who needs attention again. Hmm. If only she could put the sausages on the barbecue while I turn down the potatoes and change the laundry.

Huh. I thought this would be funnier. Maybe in a few years...??

A.

One Month Old

The Johnson Family on July 3, 2007. Young Talia is a month old and both mom and dad can smile. Talia is eating her hands, a favourite pastime of late. The hot weather is perhaps making her a bit cranky, but her cute moments make up for most of the crying parts. As I type, she is with her Dad instead of in her bed because she is prone to inconsolable crying when she discovers herself in bed. Well, completely consolable as long as she is removed from said bed, and we are totally falling for it. Today, we are falling for it. Some days, not so much. We're what's known in the parenting business as "inconsistent". I like to think of it as keeping her on her toes.

Soon, I'll post my rant about the massive gap in Baby Lit about the first 6 weeks and the truth about baby raising advice. Maybe sometime after the first 6 weeks are over and I'm a complete pro.