Sleep Training 3-20-11

Sleep Training

It is amazing what you learn the more you parent. With Landon, we were taught to get him on a schedule from day one, so being the perfectionist that I am...that is what we sought to do. We never rocked the poor kid and we tried every trick in the book to get him to sleep through the night and put himself to sleep, really from the beginning. Looking back, I regret it all. I was very young and had NO idea what I was doing, and no friends with babies that lived nearby. We were on our own, and in our youth and inexperience...we did the best we could. We missed out on a lot of cuddling and bonding and cherishing that first time around. So the second time we did it differently. With Noah we rocked him half the time and laid him down to put himself to sleep half the time. We rarely put him in bed with us, but we even committed that cardinal crime a few times. But I had time to cherish him, and I TOOK time to cherish him.

Third time around, well...I have been pretty exhausted keeping up with life and many small children and sickness, so Everett has often been found sleeping next to me in bed. He loves it there. It is his favorite place. He will fall asleep immediately and stay that way if tucked into the curve of my body. And I like hearing him breathe  But alas, its not practical for forever and its not the safest option either. But we can't put him in a crib until Jon is done building the ladder for the bunk beds for the older boys, and Everett isn't a huge fan of the pack n play in our room. But it was time, and I knew that because he was getting very picky about how and where he would sleep. So, about 3 weeks ago, I started laying him down in the pack n play and letting him self soothe a little. Landon told me to stop torturing such a little baby, and while I was reading Noah a story one day, Landon got Everett out of the pack n play, climbed into the rocking chair, and rocked the baby to sleep. I found them in the rocker, Everett sound asleep in Landon's arms. Somewhere between here and there, it clicked for Everett and now about 85% of the time, if I lay him down, he will put himself to sleep.

I was just about to post this on facebook, because I was proud of him. I had the status update all planned out in my head (yes, I occasionally think in terms of status updates). But right before I posted it, I read the blog of a friend of a friend. A friend whose 4 year old daughter was killed while they ate pancakes on a Sunday morning after church when a car ran into the restaurant where they were eating. That was almost ten years ago. Today is that little girls birthday and mama was blogging about the things she would have done differently if only she had known her daughter would always be 4. She would have laid with her in bed longer.. She would have hugged her more. She would have held her hand tighter. She would have drank in her smell. And then, suddenly, my status didn't hold the weight that it had, just two minutes before. In fact, I was quite sobered. I want to drink in my kids and savor the moments, because we truly DON'T know when the last one will be. Earlier this week, I heard about a mom just a few years older than me with three children of her own, that was told she has 6 months to live. Her husband will soon be a single dad. A hospice bed is being set up in their living room. I struggle with these things. I struggle because I don't know what separates me from them. I struggle because I want to live in the moment...every moment. I want to savor and cherish and cuddle and breathe and memorize and hold time still. But in the day to day...in the moments that make up our lives...I get lost in the busy. In the school work and schedules and the responsibilities and requirements. I struggle to walk the line of cherishing the moments with shaping the hearts of my children. I get lost in the exhaustion and my strength fades. I get angry and my patience get shot. And instead of living in the moment, I find myself wishing the moments to go by even faster...so I can make it till bedtime. Or so that my three year old who is struggling adjusting to his new baby brother, will just be 4 already so that he can handle this change a little better. And I blink, and the moments have turned into days and weeks and years. I have already experienced that with Landon. Sometimes I could almost weep for how I miss my 4 year old Landon.

I have literally struggled with anxiety since having Everett because the time goes so fast. I don't know if this is our last baby or not,  so because it may be, I want to capture and memorize EVERY single detail. I want to take a picture of him in every outfit. I want to remember his baths and his sounds and the way his eyes light up when I clap his hands together. I hate that he is already outgrowing his newborn cloths. I am still trying to stuff him into them because I want to will him to be tiny longer. I only stayed one night in the hospital and I regret that...because I wish I could have enjoyed and savored that time instead of trying to figure out where to go and when. The boys didn't even get to come to the hospital because Landon was sick. See...anxiety. Its as though I want everything to be perfect. And thats just not reality. I get short with the older boys because they constantly seem to need me, so as much as I want to sit and cuddle and coo with Everett, I find myself meeting his physical needs (changing, feeding, etc) and then putting him down to make lunch or get someone dressed, or pick up someone from school. I think this is just the way that having three children is. You do the best you can to be purposeful and to cherish the moments, but it is busy and that is just the way that it is. But parents who have been touched by tragedy seem to live differently. They seem to be able to bypass the unnecessary and to freely feed their children cupcakes before dinner and laugh at the unexpected. I want to live that way and cherish life as it is, but I feel so far from that.

When we are first time parents, we are often told to cherish the moments. To nap when our babies nap, and to let the housework go, and to just enjoy our children. But the first time around, so many of us are focused on doing it all right...teaching the baby to sleep through the night and to adjust to our schedules and to prove to the critics (real or imagined) that we can do it all and do it well, that we miss the magic. I wish I could go back and shake myself sometimes. Amazingly enough, ten years from now, I will probably say the same thing about the stage I am in right now.

As I type this, my almost 7 and a half year old is reading a Junie B Jones chapter book to me. It seems like yesterday that we were making play doh monsters together and reading about Elmo and Pooh Bear and Bob the Builder. I am honored that I have been given the opportunity to raise three beautiful boys. And I do want to do it right. But I DON'T want to get so focused on the the right and the perfect that I miss the magic and the joy and the wonder that is today. I want to remember the feel of Noah's hand in mine. The look on his face when he is laughing really hard and the way that he throws his red curly head backwards. I want to memorize the sound of Landon making bomb noises in his room, busily blowing up whatever make believe toy he is playing with. I want to savor the moments I spend reading with him in bed at night. And Everett. I want to plaster the image of his gummy little smile forever in my mind. After I nursed him this afternoon, I spent a few moments of quiet just looking at him. He was looking at me right in the eye...almost as if he was seeing through my heart. The kid loves me, I know it. And his eyes told me that I am doing ok by him. That the hustle and bustle is part of his life, and that the moments I do steal away with him are enough. That he feels loved.

So he can put himself to sleep, but you better believe that I will still rock him, and even occasionally, let him sleep in the curve of my body. Because he won't fit there for much longer. And one day...I bet you anything...that I would give my right arm to feel his little body and smell his baby smell and feel the peach fuzz on his head, because in the blink of an eye he will be sitting on my couch reading me chapter books. That and we never know what the future holds. So I will keep trying...to delicately balance the necessary with the carefree. And I will keep trying to be purposeful about stealing moments to cherish amidst the busyness and chaos that often reign. I suppose there is beauty even in the chaos, if only I can train myself to see it.