Posts made in December, 2009
High Five!
I am not here. No really, I’m not. I’m up to my eyeballs in finishing my BIG ASSIGNMENT (which has taken on capital letters in my mind and thus shall appear so) and in trying very hard not to puke. But you know, all work and gagging and no play makes Josie a something something so I’m stealing half an hour to respond to the first of two lovely memes I’ve been given this week.
Blogging buddy Mum’s The Boss tagged me in a High 5 thingy where I am required to tell you about my 5 best bits of 2009.
Ok. Here we go. You ready? In no particular order…
1. The arrival of beautiful Isabell
In January this year, my bestest friend gave birth to her beautiful girl Izzy, a sister to Lucy, and the smiliest most lovely little girl you could ever hope to meet, or (if you’re Kai) gaze longily at while trying to force feed grapes. She is gorgeous and I love her.
2. Starting this blog!
Oh yes! Back in May this year I began Sleep is For the Weak with this hesitant post, little knowing that seven months later said blog would have become one of the highlights of my year, encourage me to start writing (and then not stop), introduced me to a whole host of fascinating and wonderfully unique people who I genuinely couldn’t imagine life without, and led to some fantastic new opportunities.
3. Kai learning to crawl, then stand, then cruise and then OH MY GOODNESS he’s walking!!!
So basically everything he’s done this year. He is ace. The whole ‘this time last year I had a little baby and now I have this great big toddler’ still amazes me. Nature is miraculous and so is he. I could fill a top five just with things he’d done: his face on holiday at the farm we visited, or riding the diggers at Trentham Gardens, or his first birthday, or this Christmas even. And let’s not forget the finally learning how to sleep bit, which, let’s face it, pretty much tops everything else that happened, with knobs on…
4. The whole LOST ARG spectacle.
A viral online Artificial Reality Game based on the TV show Lost which I somehow ended up reporting on with all the twists and turns of the game as it unfolded, authoring the blog, that in the few short weeks it ran, attracted over 30,000 hits. It turned out not to be an ‘official’ ARG and met a sadly premature end, but was still unbelievable fun. Proper geek stuff I’m sure you’ll think. But it was fab. Really really fab.
5. The times when life stopped. Just for a moment.
And there were lots of them. The times, perhaps, when I was curled up with my head on Ant’s lap. Or when Kai was still for a moment with his hands tight around my neck. Or a walk home through through the autumn sunshine when the low sun set the world on fire. Or watching the frost sparkle in the air at Christmas like fairy dust. Or this moment, or this one. They aren’t fancy, they aren’t dramatic, but these times are the highlights of my year over and over, and the things that sustain me through the inevitable rough patches that the year has brought.
In fact, next year I’d be quite happy with just more of number 5. However, I have a feeling the New Year has some surprises in store for us. It always does, after all, and life never stops still for long.
So what were your five best bits?
I’m tagging:
xx
Read MoreThe In-between Bit
So here we are. In this post-Christmas, pre-New Year inbetween bit which I think should have a special name but I can’t think of one. Possibly Leftovers Week, or Tripping-Over-Piles-of-Presents Week, or Kai-Will-Not-Stop-Screaming-Unless-Thomas-Is-On Week. Yes, one of them. Only wittier.
How was yours then? Cause mine pretty much rocked. I’m serious – this has been the best Christmas ever. You know ever so often the planets just seem to align for a moment in a mystical combination that means no one gets ill and nothing gets broken and Kai sleeps through the night for five nights out of seven (oh YES!) and everything, just for a moment, is perfect? It’s been one of THOSE Christmases.
I have lived off delicious food served by lovely people that I didn’t have to make. I have had frequent, long naps. I have received new books and things to make me beautiful and TWO pairs of slippers. I have eaten more Christmas meats than should probably be legal.
And most importantly, I got to see my boy’s face look like this:
and this…
and this…
and THIS…
Needless to say he’s had a brilliant time. He found the present opening bit slightly overwhelming though it has to be said. Because in the toddler mind it of course goes:
“Oooh look a present! I shall unwrap it – I am good at that. HOLY FRICK IT’S A TRAIN!!!! *uncontrollable excitement* I must play with it IMMEDIATELY! Get it out the box dad get it out the box dad get it out the box dad… oh this is amazing. What? Another present? But I’m playing with this one! Give me half an hour or so to gaze at it adoringly and I’ll be right with you…”
After three or four of these he was almost catatonic with the sheer wonder of it all and had to go and have a little lie down for a bit. (In his nap castle… did I tell you he had a NAP CASTLE?! That I can fit in?!!!)
And of course there was the digger. The real life oh-my-god-I-think-I-just-pooed-my-nappy-I’m-so-excited digger.
We’re still going. There are presents to unwrap today, and probably tomorrow too. I have never known such a lucky little boy – thank you so much to all of you that made it so special for him (and by association, so special for me).
We have another busy couple of days ahead of family, food, fun and other things beginning with F. Festivity? Frankincense? Who knows…
I hope you’ve all had a wonderful Christmas and are now nicely fat and jolly from mince pie eating and general festive cheer.
See you in a few days xx
Read MoreNew Dawn
This morning, I put on half my wardrobe and went out while it was still dark to watch the Solstice sun rise. I left the boys safe and warm and wandered, alone but with a head full of thoughts for company, to my quiet nature sanctuary.
There was a spring in my step as I walked on pavements, glittering with quartz, avoiding frozen puddles and leaving deep footprints in the hard frost. Because last night, on the longest night, I got MY longest night for 18 months.
Kai slept. At last. He slept. And so did I.
Waking up briefly at 10pm, he settled holding my hand and then I didn’t hear from him again until 6am. When I went in to him, all tousled and wrinkled from his long sleep, he smiled me a smile that told me he knew he’d done an important thing. And with a excited hug and a frantic tug towards our bedroom he was eager to snuggle up with me and his dad and have his first, long and happy feed since before he’d gone to bed. By Jove, I think he’s got it.
It may not be repeated tonight, in fact I expect not, but that’s ok. We’ve turned a corner here, I can feel it. And the hope for better nights, and finally some refreshing sleep, has never been stronger.
And so, with the energy that comes only from a decent stretch of sleep, I walked this morning. For over an hour I sought out the sun from its hiding place and watched as it rose, glowing and golden from the horizon. I watched the light change, touching the icy marshes, and the world transform.
I thought a lot. About the last 18 months, about the next year ahead. About my hopes and my anxieties and my confusion sometimes about why on earth I am here and what the hell I’m supposed to be doing. I didn’t find answers, but as the geese flew across the grapefruit sky in a perfect V, I too found some peace.
A new day has dawned.
Happy Yule everyone x
Read MoreSleep Update: The final hurdle
Amendment: My word this is a miserable post. It’s few hours later and I’m reading back. My apologies for filling you with so much Christmas Joy – NOT! In my defence I was exhausted and emotional but after a day of rest, mince pies and collective dancing to Postman Pat I’m already feeling better and more positive about tonight. Bear with me lovely readers – I promise the fun, not endlessly moany Josie will be back with you soon. Just a tough time but we’re on the way though xx
Upset today.
Trying very, very hard to convince myself that I am not the world’s most useless, horrible mother but after last night it is hard.
An update though first I guess. And totally devoid of humour I’m afraid. This is just one of those days where I have to tell it how it is and leave it at that. No trying to be clever from me. And another long post too – I don’t seem to able to tell this story quickly.
We have come a long way with Kai’s sleep, a very very long way. This time last year he was still waking at least hourly, refusing to sleep in a cot, refusing to sleep AT ALL at times unless held and rocked and nursed. We did what we needed to survive nights of endless crying, with a baby that seemed unable to tell the difference between night and day, despite strict bedtime routines and all the rest, and who seemed to have a natural wakefulness and immense difficultly to falling back to sleep once awake. Over the last twelve months we have spent every night working on helping Kai to sleep better, usually at the cost of my own sleep, and sanity at times. I read up on every sleep improving technique and strategy under the sun, shying away from the extreme approaches but still remaining persistent in weaning Kai off the things he seemed so dependent on for sleep. Move too fast and we’d end up with no sleep for days and an intensely distressed baby that was impossible to shut the door on and ignore. So we took baby steps, a ‘gradual retreat’ technique I guess, which although has been painfully slow at times and easily disrupted by endless bouts of teething, HAS worked.
We made a breakthrough when we stopped fighting for a while and gave into the things that Kai seemed to need. We stopped turning night times into a battle ground and instead concentrated in teaching Kai that night time was safe, pleasant, but boring too. We settled into a bearable pattern of Kai waking 3-4 times a night on a good night. And from there we worked, or at least I did, with endless support from Ant. First gently weaning Kai away from needing so much body contact at night, teaching him to fall asleep in his cot by gradually putting him down more and more awake. When I felt he was ready I began to get a bit tougher, and after A LOT of work he began to be happy to fall asleep with just the odd pat or hand hold. He began to sleep longer and longer stretches, waking just twice, or even the odd once in the night. When awake though, he was often AWAKE awake for a good couple of hours during which I would try my best to get him back to sleep with shushing, and patting, and bless him, he would try, lying down and tossing and turning for an age but seemingly unable to fall back asleep. Often cuddles were the only answer once his distress got too much, and inevitably, once exhaustion got too much for me, a feed or two for comfort and calming him enough to put him back in his cot to go to sleep.
I know most people think we have been too soft, or must not have done the right things, and that the problems are of our own creating, but Ant and I know that this isn’t true. The boy just isn’t physically wired to sleep well, I wasn’t as a child either, and it’s meant the usual strategies that usually seem to work so quickly and easily on most children have been harder to get right with Kai. I believe the progress we have made as been because we moved at a pace that Kai was ready for.
And now he’s ready for the final step. Knocking the final night feed on the head and teaching him to settle himself without any intervention from me. This is the hardest bit I think and the one I’ve been finding most tough to do.
Enter lovely Lucy from Sleepytot who kindly offered to help me through making these changes and finding a strategy that suited Kai and was bearable for me. Lucy runs a company that make baby comforters and offers free, supportive sleep advice via her website. And no, this is not a sponsored post but a genuine, much appreciated connection made online after Lucy read my blog. We’ve decided to work together over the next couple of weeks or how ever long it takes to try and crack this final hurdle. You can read about it on her blog here, follow our progress in the community section of her website, and no doubt I’ll be posting my progress here too. Ant’s off for two weeks now giving me extra time to nap during the day if it gets tough so we figured now was as good a time as any.
I’m making two big changes to start with. Firstly, the easy bit – I’m teaching Kai to fall asleep at the beginning of the night with no help from me and just his dummy to help him, which he seems to genuinely need to suck to help him settle. Kai’s going in the cot, I’m sitting by the door and he’s going to bloody well go to sleep. This has not proved to be much of a problem and the last two nights he’s been happy to do so with very little complaining albeit after a lot of patience.
Then the tough part. No more milk at night. Last night that meant literally hours of angry screaming from Kai, hence the feeling like shit today. He woke at 2.30 and I tried to settle him with as little intervention from me as I could manage but after a while his distress got so bad and so relentless I had to hold him and soothe him till he calmed, and then put him back in the cot. I did this the whole rest of the night. He would settle, curl up and try and go to sleep, but not be able to do so or only sleep very lightly. Eventually he’d work himself up again, more cuddles, during which he would heartbreakingly keep signing for milk and clawing at my top, but I persisted, calming him down and putting him back the cot. I think teething pain wasn’t helping last night but I’d dosed him up with Calpol, given him teething gel – I’d done all I can. It was up to him now.
I gave up at 6.30. Getting him up and turning the light on to feed him. I want him to learn that milk is fine, but only once it’s day time. The minute the light was on and he had some milk he was happy as larry, bouncing around, smiley and laughing and ready for his day despite being awake most of the night. I don’t know how he does it. His stamina is unbelievable.
I’m determined to persist though. Lucy believes, and I do too, that it will get easier if I am consistent and persevere.
It’s just impossibly hard in the meantime.
Watch this space.
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