(Not) Sleeping Through the Night

This post has been swirling around in my brain for the past month now. Starting at about the time that (everyone else thought) my baby "should" be sleeping through the night. I honestly struggle with talking to most people about this because I feel judged that my four-month-old, 17-pound baby isn't sleeping through the night yet.

It's such a big....deal...to everyone. It seems the topic of how well he sleeps becomes the sole determining factor of how "good" my baby is or how "good" of a parent I am. It doesn't matter that he is a happy, easy-going baby who goes down for naps every two hours pretty easily and quietly, who loves meeting new people and going on adventures, who touches your face with his chubby little hands as delicately as if he were blind and could only see through his fingers. Nah, if he's not sleeping through the night, well then, something's got to change.

I got told I was "doing it wrong" when I mentioned to someone that my baby still slept in our room.
I'm fully aware, though others like to remind me, that all the books say he is capable of sleeping 6-8 hours without being fed or without interruption, but he's simply not doing it. And I can't force him too! I'm also fully aware that the AAP says it's fine to let your baby cry, but I can't handle it. I don't know if I'm doing more harm than good (not teaching him independence, whatever, blah blah blah) but it feels like I'm going against every single cell in my body when I don't come to him when he's crying.

I've read certain chapters of No-Cry Sleep Solution several times now, hoping for something new to pop up for me to try. One of the things it talks about is evaluating why it's important to you that your baby start to sleep through the night. Are you doing it for the right reasons? It also asks, "Are you really ready to give up nights with your baby? Are you really ready to do what it takes for change to happen?"

I've skimmed over that section so many times, waving it off with a giant, "Psh....Yes! Please! Give me my nights back!" Recently, however, I probed a little deeper:

"Really, Meghan? You mean that? ....Because, you know, once Axton does start sleeping through the night, that means you will only have 12 hours a day with him. And 12 hours may sound like a lot still, but that means that your time with him will be cut. In. Half. No more middle of the night reassurances that he's still alive, that he still very much relies on you, that the heat of your body and the taste of your milk is the only thing that could lull him back to sleep. No more sleepy eyes blinking back at your own, no more excuses to just let him stay in bed next to you, his head resting on your arm and your bodies cuddled against each other. You sure you want to give that up?"

And I realized that maybe.....just maybe, a small part of me wasn't ready for Axton to sleep through the night. And maybe, just maybe, that was contributing to him not doing it.

So, the next day I moved his crib to our walk-in closet (anything to make our son more like Harry Potter, yes?). Seriously, though, I felt it was a happy medium. I wasn't ready to move him to the other side of our apartment where I would need a monitor to hear him cry and a light-switch to see where I was going. But with him in the closet, we can shut the door while we are still awake, it's much darker in there, and it's a small step towards independence - for the both of us - while still keeping him close for the nighttime wakings.

I was reading a friend's blogpost today about potty-training her little girl. She said that they had tried previously to potty-train her, but that it didn't go over well. Her mother saw that she simply wasn't ready, and dropped the issue. She gave her daughter the time and patience she needed. She waited until her daughter was emotionally, physically  and mentally mature and, most importantly, until she was ready to do it. Now, a few months later, her daughter practically potty-trained herself with no fuss or trouble. There was minimal bribing, fighting, or crying. She just did it. I thought to myself, That makes sense. And if that works for potty-training, then why wouldn't it be similar to sleeping? My little guy is just simply not there yet, and I just have to be patient until he is.  (In my opinion, 4 months is still pretty young anyway, but what do I know?) For now, I can do things to encourage healthy sleep habits and provide an atmosphere at night that would be most inviting for sleep. Oh, and I can pray. Lots of praying.


If you have advice, feel free to offer it. I may or may not follow it, but I will certainly read it and appreciate your kind efforts. Also, I feel the need to say that since becoming a parent I've learned a lot about judging others - or rather, NOT judging others (particularly other parents). The love that I feel for my son? It's a big, big thing. It's an all-encompassing, tremendous, delightful thing. It's the kind of bond that could change the world. And to think that the way I love my son is the exact way someone else loves their son? Well, that's very powerful to me. So, regardless of how I parent, I don't judge you for the way you parent. Because I know that I do the things I do out of love, and I know that other parents do the things they do out of love, too. And that's all I need to know or say. Us parents, we love our kids and we're all just doing the best we can to raise them as such.