Category: Kids/Parenting

I forgot to mention that my last post, “Where I belong,” is featured in the Carnival of Family Life #42.

It’s been a long week—and it’s only Wednesday. We’ve been “sleep training” (crying it out) for almost two weeks, and it’s just getting worse. Hayden hasn’t nursed at night for 13 nights, and he’s still spending hours on end crying, screaming and moaning. He absolutely refuses to console himself, even though he’s perfectly capable of doing so.

It’s gotten to the point where he’s completely inconsolable: neither Ryan nor I can get him to calm down, and if by some miracle we do get him calm, when we put him back down, he’s even more hysterical than he was in the first place.

Hayden’s getting just enough sleep to be just a little grumpy all day long—except for when he was in the gym’s daycare this morning. Of course.

We’re wracking our brains trying to figure out what could be wrong with him. I think he’s eating enough during the day—I feed him until he refuses to eat any more. He does have a nasty diaper rash, but that’s only developed in the last day or two. It’s been relatively warm and spring-like here lately, so I don’t think he’s too cold.

Sigh. I’m afraid that we’ll just have to endure more sleepless nights until he becomes so exhausted that he can’t NOT sleep.

Today’s special report on the Haydie News Hour focuses on walking.

Hayden took his first steps December 21. Everyone said that the first steps were like a watershed: he’d be running around in no time.

Less of a watershed and more of a puddle, as it turned out. For the first few weeks, he almost never made an attempt to walk unless “prompted” (stood up a few feet away from another family member). Even then, he couldn’t take more than three or four steps at a time before it looked like he was overwhelmed with enthusiasm and bowled himself over.

By mid January, I was worried that we’d somehow pressured him into those first steps and he wasn’t really interested in walking. One Sunday afternoon, I was mulling over those very thoughts when I looked up to find Hayden had ventured away from the couch. He was standing on his own—and he’d taken a few steps to get there. Not only all by himself, but completely of his own volition.

By his birthday, he still wasn’t walking much, but consistently. I was still a little concerned (I am a mom, after all), so I planned on talking to his doctor on this past Friday.

Last week he started walking quite a bit more—probably about a third of the time that he spent moving was walking. But he had never stood up without holding on to someone or something. I put it on my list of things to talk to the doctor about.

The doctor got to see him walk—a diaper-clad Hayden toddled perfectly across the examining room from Ryan to the doctor (yeah, still no stranger anxiety). The doctor said that if he hadn’t started standing on his own by 15 or 18 months, we would look into it.

Maybe I should have voiced my concerns earlier. That afternoon, Hayden was sitting in the middle of the living room and I was languishing on the couch (still very sick at this point). Next thing I knew, he was standing. I kind of caught it: enough to know that he’d just stood up entirely on his own.

Fastforward to this week. Now he’s walking just about half the time. Today we went in to Ryan’s work for a while. Hayden walked all around. Everyone had to say hi. One girl at work was so interesting that he waved, squealed, planted one foot on the ground and stood up like he did it all the time.

What do you know? They keep growing.

In other news, last night, Hayden slept from 7:30 PM straight to 6:25 AM (and even then, we didn’t get out of bed). But that’s probably another report on the Haydie News Hour.

Here are Hayden’s latest stats:

• Height: 29.75 inches (50th percentile)
• Weight: 19 lbs, 8 oz (7th percentile :/ )
• Head Circumference: 47 cm (68th percentile)

So in all the areas, he’s falling behind where he’s been his whole life. He’s average height and he’s got an adorably chubby tummy and thighs. I don’t get it. Do other babies look obese?

He also got two shots and a blood draw from his toe. His feet were so cold they had trouble getting enough blood for the hematocrit test, but he came out pretty high: 0.47 blood iron level. (Wikipedia says average adult levels are 0.42 to 0.52; the doctor said it was a little high, but it was okay.)

We’re trying to get him to sleep through the night again. Night one was rough. I went 17 hours without nursing on one side; now I’m horribly sick. I’m thinking the two are connected. Night two (last night) was rough, too, but mostly because I was feverish and nauseated all night. Hayden slept much better last night; he woke up less frequently and cried more quietly and shorter.

It’s a little sad, though, to think that all he wants is his mommy and I could easily go to him. Does he stop crying because he’s tired or because he despairs of ever seeing his loving parents again? He doesn’t seem overly clingy during the day, though, so I don’t think we’re causing psychological damage. I hope not.

I have to keep teling myself that it’s most important for all of us to get a good night’s sleep.