Sleep and the crazies

The crazies

I wrote this whole nasty post about my mother 4-5 days ago but didn't publish it. I knew I'd regret it. I'll give you the bare bones.

1) she visited over labor day weekend
2) she is crazy
3) I did my best to meet her craziness with calm and respect.
4) I failed sometimes and succeeded sometimes

You want a little content with that outline of the process? Ok. I will oblige. She has this unconscious fantasy. The fantasy is about how she wants my baby to be hers. She wants to have the baby and push me out of the picture. She made several comments about how she could have the baby and I would not be there. To the point where it completely freaked out Mr. A and he ran after her when she took Gummy out for a walk in front of the house.

See.

She is crazy.

I'm hanging by my fingernails for my therapy session tomorrow morning. Between her and the tedious in-laws who have major issues with overstepping boundaries*, Mr. A and I are both doing MAJOR work on our issues on setting boundaries with scary, authoritarian parental figures. And doing that work with the actual scary, authoritarian parents themselves. So far, neither of us have gone up in flames, but we keep expecting to be psychically destroyed by each our narcissistic parent.** So far, everyone's psyche is somewhat intact, although personally, I'm rattled.*** And to be honest, Mr. A is looking worse for wear.

Sleep

Bedtime routine is going swimmingly. I do it on my own all the time and it feels like a well rehearsed dance, with room for improvisation, but with the steps mostly defined. And my dance partner is well rehearsed.

We started sleep training the weekend my mother was here. That was a poor choice. But it had to be done and Mr. A was home. And Gummy (and Augusta) were ready. It was awful for at least 2 nights. But it's much better now. We do have a few things to iron out, but at this point, she is waking up infrequently, and when she does, a simple replacement of the soother in her mouth does the trick. Still, I want to get to the point of putting her to bed and picking her back up 12 hours later. Not always, but most of the time. I'm pretty sure she is capable of it.

But right now we are sticking with the expectations of 10 hours in her crib without being picked up. And after those few rough nights, she has been fine with it. But the window is 7pm to 5am, and most mornings, she, like the birds, is up at 5am. Back down from 7am to 9am, but there is a two-somewhat-difficult-hour window when she is up and one of us needs to be up with her. And it's mostly me.

I am hoping that she will soon knit those 2 extra hours of sleep into her night sleep, so that she can sleep 7pm to 7am. But I am not holding my breath. And frankly, it's easier for me to be up early than to be up late at night.

There are lots of pros and cons to sleep training. I feel like I can see why people are against it. And I also see why people would love to do it but it's just not something that they can do. It's emotionally difficult to hear your child cry and not respond (or wait 15 minutes to respond). You have to have a clear idea of why you are doing this. You also need to believe that your child is fundamentally ok. It is the right thing for us and I'm glad we are doing it. But please know that this is not a comment on your parenting decisions.

Ok, Gummy Girl is up from her nap and I  want to post this now. More on eating and day care to come.


* Mr. A's father stating that they would be coming over for a visit EVERY WEEK.

** My kingdom for psychoanalytical training.

*** I broke some dishes a few days ago in a fit of desperation and rage. Gummy was asleep upstairs and Mr. A was gone and the cat was outside. No one was hurt. Except the dishes. And my sense of being a sane person.