Sleep, Glorious Sleep...

So you are in your mid thirties, battling against the mid-career plateau ennui.

Or (like me) you are in you mid-thirties and have no idea what you want to do with the rest of your life.

You have responsibilities, like (for instance) a small child to clothe and feed, so you have to buck up and make something of yourself, if not for you then for the next generation.

Here's my advice - and I'm serious:

Device a non-narcotic, non-hallucinogenic legal instrument that gets little children to go to sleep at or around 7pm, and keeps them asleep all through the night.

Then sit back and watch as truckloads of parents exchange cash (name your price - believe me, they'll pay it) for peace of mind, sanity and a good night's sleep.

You'll be a millionaire by the end of the year, trust me.

Of course, my sleep is disturbed infinitely less that Dr M's - we have breast feeding to thank for that - but even so, I miss those good ol' days when I suffered from spurious complaints like insomnia (blog passim) and other hpochodriacal ailments related to a lack of sleep.

When The First Born arrived, we were told quite sternly that we were not to put him to sleep on his stomach. Sound advice, one would think. Whilst the precise causes of SIDS (Sudden Infant Death Syndrome) remain unknown, there seems to be a statistical correlation between children put to sleep face down and unexplained cot deaths.

Unfortunately, no one thought to tell TFB about this.

It didn't take very long for M and I to figure out that he who must be obeyed slept best, and longest, whilst on his stomach. And then we had an earnest, passionate debate. For all of four seconds.

This sounds a bit flippant, i know, but it isn't. The truth is that a tired and irritable small child is a pretty distressing spectacle. And not just from the perspective of a tired and exhausted parent.

That said, the decision to put TFB to sleep on his stomach led to some...interesting moments. I fell into the habit of stopping by his crib each time I walked past to listen to his breathing. Which is all very well and good, but apparently I once jumped out of bed in the middle of the night, leaned over the crib for a moment (clambering over poor M, soundly asleep for perhaps the first time in a week, and waking her up in the process), and then returned to sleep, satisfied.

M, who had no idea what I was doing, thought that I had lost my mind. It didn't help when she shook me awake to ask me why I did what I did and I answered, mystified, that I didn't know.

According to this, new parents lose up to two months sleep in the first year of their babies life. Probably true. What it doesn't say is how this time is distributed between mother and father...

Because I am snide, evil and actually do not enjoy being woken up in the middle of the night, I encouraged M to breastfeed TFB, as recommended by midwives and doctors and instruction manuals the world over (although, it seems, not by all multi-national conglomerates - see this). Consequently, my sleep is interrupted somewhat less than hers.

Now, this is of course unfair. Even I realise that. So I tried (emphasis on the past tense) to wake up in solidarity with her, playing the solicitous (if flagrantly insincere) partner. Unfortunately, even this proved to be too much of a strain on my nervous system. So I reassure here that I am with her in spirit, if not in person when she awakes. No doubt this will form an important part of the divorce petition...

(Note: I am not quite the callous s*** that I sound like. Admittedly, I struggle to wake up at night. But I do tend to do the early morning shift, when the young monster decides that he has had enough sleep at five in the morning and wakes us both up.)

Which he does - wake us up, that is. Most nights, he winds up in bed with us. When he wakes up, he claws at the nearest face until said face is aroused, then smiles the most innocent, beatific smile imaginable. It is impossible to be upset, even if it is possible to remain tired.

Random sleep deprived fact No.2: We discovered that, if we catch him early enough, it is actually possible to put TFB back to sleep before he fully awakens (and hollers the house down) by either patting his bottom or rubbing his back. One night, M was woken up by his cries. She started to pat and rub for about sixty seconds, before realising that it was not having the desired effect. Then it took her another thirty seconds to realise that the cries were coming from the crib behind her, where our child was pleading for attention, and she was actually patting and soothing me back to sleep (not that I had woken up, mind...)

Enough about me.

The First Born can now roll over, pick up toys and put them in his mouth, pick up toys with his mouth, do a curious little shuffle on forearms and knees and tummy towards an object that he feels like putting his mouth...now, if he could sit and shake on command, i would suggest that...no, even I won't say that about my child (not in print, anyway).

The sleep issue aside, he is a darling. And actually, his sleep has only gone wonky in the last week or so, and I suspect that it's because he is teething. When he sucks on my cheek (don't ask why), I can feel the point of one of his lower incisors. Not doubt, he'll soon be taking chunks out of said cheek.

His aunts and uncle are here on a visit at the moment, and he so loves the attention. And we so love the three extra pairs of hands. I'll be sorry when they leave.

El Gordo, the First Born is five and a half months old, give or take the odd couple of days

Comments

[alicia r]

Gad to have ya back here telling us your tales of fatherhood! They are getting so old arn't they! He sounds like quite the handful... my daughter is going to be a lot of work... she's loves jumping in her jumping seat. She has begun that comando crawl yet, but I'm sure that she's going to have the walking part down quickly!
Good luck!
PS
We had to take her to the DR's today... she has a hand, foot, and throat virus... yeah, wierd I know... so good luck and keep your baby away from sick mother-in-laws!

[alicia r]

Okay... i can' type...
GLAD to have you back and she has NOT gotten that comando crawl down yet. WEIRD not wierd...

[Firsttimefather]

Commando crawl :-) perfect description. The thing is, the child ignores his toys (except to chew them to bits), and starts obsessing about the cracks in the floor. Then he tries to stick his tongue into them :-)
Hope she gets better soon. I think it will be just a little difficult to keep ours away from my mother in law, sick or not :-)

[alicia r]

Yeah, I guess that you're right. I'm from another state and his family is all that we have here also. But we are ALL stubborn, so when they are stubborn about holding her, I am the mom and therefore my stubborness is really the only one that counts:P But then again, I'm the momma! hahaha :)