Milesones and other things worth being happy about

...actually every day is worth being happy and thankful for, but there's no harm in me listing some great new things going on!

1) We had our first camping trip with Maddy and it went great! Getting her to fall asleep was a challenge the first night, but that was understandable as she's never slept outside in a tent before! Also, there is nothing for peaceful than swaying your baby to sleep while looking out at the lake and listening to the birds chirping with PERFECT weather! Its moments like that when being a mother just couldn't feel any better. Once she fell asleep she slept all night (well, at least until 6am....ugh). The only bummer is that I ended up with heat rash on my face and neck, despite using sun screen all day and spending the majority of my time in the shade. I got the same thing when I was pregnant in Hawaii, and the common thread here is the SPF 70 Aveeno facial sunscreen (actually, its Target Up and Up brand pretending to be Aveeno.) Either way, I think it needs to go in the trash! And I hate my skin!!!

2) Madelyn started doing this!!! I can't believe how fast my active little girl is growing up!
http://www.youtube.com/user/LumsdenFam#p/a/u/1/piDAbL5JLF0
By the way, I looove these little sweatpants she is wearing. They are from her Aunt Kathy. They are 6-9 month size, which I am so amazed she has grown out of, EVEN without her cloth diaper butt! I can't believe my daughter is wearing 12 month size clothing!

3) Ross and I are soo soooo sooooooo happy with his new work schedule. It is working out better than we had ever hoped. The only babysitter needed is for 6 hours Wednesday afternoon; otherwise Ross or I are with her. Ross and I even get to have a "weekend" off together (Sunday anbd Monday). This means we get to enjoy Sunday and go to church as a family again. God is good! Its amazing how if we stay faithful even if we think He is ignoring our prayers; he blesses us with more than we could have asked for. We got what we didn't even realize we wanted. He knows what we need better than even we do! I had surrendered and was willing to work more hours while Ross stayed home which is the last thing both of us wanted. Now he works 30 hours a week and I work 24. It is the PERFECT set-up for our family. I always thought I wanted to be a 100% stay at home mom and envied those who got to do that. Ross thought he wanted to be a work-a-holic and spend all day at the office. We both learned that is NOT what each of us were meant to do, and this balance is just so amazing for us.

4) As of my last weight check on the Wii Fit- and *ahem* I weighed myself the morning BEFORE the family camping trip where I indulged in chips, SMores, and a margarita made in a Gatorade bottle (compliments of my brother-in -law..) Anyways...I am down 11 lbs since I started working on losing the extra baby weight! And that would make me, um 42 lbs less than the day I walked into my OB's office 38 weeks pregnant and started crying when the medical assistant weighed me. Even a patient's wife (who I hadn't seen in a few months) saw me today and said, "wow! You lost weight!". I feeeeeel gooooood.

5) aaaaand...Tonight for the first time since she was BORN, Madelyn went to bed without a single tear or protest (or without having to be rocked for 45 minutes and set down like a delicate explosive). Tonight, after our play time and bedtime routine, I rocked her for 15 minutes or so because I wanted to, and so we could spend some more quality time together. Not because it was a necessary task to get her to sleep, without even a guarantee of that. We do the same thing every night, and she's starting to get it. Hopefully she has learned there is nothing to fear, and we will be there when she wakes up (whenever that may be!). The nights are already a lot less tense in our home.

Why Did I Wait?

...because I had to wait until I was ready. And until SHE was ready.

"Can you just let her cry?"
"Oh....nnnooooo. I can't do that."

People said this over and over, and I said this over and over. I read BabyWise before she was born, threw the idea out the window after she was born, read No Cry Sleep Solution and almost threw that in the shredder after it failed miserably. (Seriously- if any of my local friends want to come over for a little fire in the firepit in our backyard, I will gladly burn the book, and laugh devilishly while the flames reflect in my eyes).

Then it came down to that night as I rocked smart little Maddy who had been throwing a tantrum after I left her in her crib. She poked my face, smiled, and giggled. I know my daughter well, and I know she was saying: " Haha, NOW I get to stay up and play longer, even though I'm exHAUsted. You're fun. Fun to look at, fun to poke, and fun to mess with".

Now some people would say, "That is wrong. Your baby is not manipulating you with her cry. She NEEDS you." And then I would tell them they had no idea how wrong they are. A mother knows what her baby needs. Its just in our souls. We know it. It has always been my intention to do everything just right for my daughter. Ever since she was conceived, I have not stopped worrying/caring about her for a single second. Every moment I do my best to give her what she needs.

What she needed, was to fall asleep without me in the room. Period.

What IIIIIIIIIIIII (and Ross) needed, was for her to not monopolize the evening with the bedtime charade that had been going on for too long.

You want to know the funny thing? Even though this was a difficult and life changing decision for us to make, it went SO smoothly. I'm going to spell it all out for anyone who is curious. I know a lot of anti- sleep training mamas, and a lot of pro-sleep training mamas (about 50/50). But no one has ever actually spelled it out for me. So here is our experience; 4 days in.

Night 1:

7:00- down. Fell asleep in my arms (she was SOOOO tired)
7:45- woke up because I snuck into her room and she was in a very light sleep (oops). Rocked her.
7:55- She poked and laughed, and I decided with a whole heart to go ahead with sleep training. I kissed her head and laid her down...she cried hysterically. BIIG time drama. I watched her on the video monitor as she stood up in her crib and yelled at me for leaving her in there.
8:00- went in patted her cheek, she smiled. I told her I loved her and good night. Crying starts again.
8:04- mom is practically guzzling wine to take the razor sharp edge off, and family is there to comfort us. Also had to turn down the monitor, but still watched checked the video every minute on the minute. Who knew a few minutes of crying could turn my world upside down?
8:08- Crying stops, She finally settles kinda tosses and turns in crib (per video monitor)
8:15- OUT. Snoozing. All is right in the world- except for my massive guilt. Slept til 7am

Night 2
*note- we saw her pediatrician this day. Thank the Lord she didn't need any shots. We were going to forego them anyway, so as not to mess up the training process with a vaccine reaction/injection site pain. Our pediatrician who is very in line with our parenting beleifs confirmed that Maddy is old enough and smart enough to manipulate us with crying. He told me I did the right thing, and offered some helpful hints. Hallelujah!!!!!!!!

Began the night with our routine:
Bath
Lotion/fresh diaper/PJ's/bedtime song
Runaway Bunny/Rocking Chair
Bottle/Nurse
Brush litte teeth
Seahorse while rocking
Set Seahorse in crib and say, "See, Seahorse goes to sleep- now Maddy Goes to sleep. I looooove you. Goodnight Sweetpea" (Okay in all honesty, I DID get the idea of using soothing key words at bedtime from the No Cry... Book. Meh.)

7:17- set down. Cried.
7:21- came in, patted her, touched her cheek and told her, "I love you, good night", Caved in and picked her up and cuddled her a minute (oops! hehehe).
7:24-set down. cried. stood up in her crib.
7:30- settled down, sleep soon followed. Slept until 7am

Night 3
Routine
7:52- down. Cried.
7:54- stopped crying settled into sleep. Slept until 7am

Night 4 (pending)
Routine
8:15 down (today was off schedule since her dad and grandma cared for her today)
Cried for 30 seconds; nothing serious. Then got herself comfy and fell asleep.

I always make sure I see some drowsy eyes and a yawn before I set her down. Also, when she wakes up, she is well rested and as happy as can be. I realize this will all change once we get another tooth or she gets sick, and I am prepared for that. I will be able to handle it 100X better, now that we have bedtime under control most nights.

My advice on sleep training to anyone
1) First of all, don't do this with a young baby. Our ped. told us that 9 months is a good time to start; 6-9 months is a case-by-case basis, and anything under 6 months is a big no-no.
2) Don't let anyone tell you you have to do this if you feel uncomfortable. Baby is cabable of screaming loud and making awful noises. It is not for the faint of heart.
3) Moms, always trust your instincts. If its not right, go in there and pick up your baby. Your heart needs to be in it. If you are convinced its right but then can't stand to hear them cry, try again in a week or so.
4) Above all- do what is best for your family. Your WHOLE family. For the past 18 months, she has been my#1 priority. Heck, she probably still is, but my marriage also needs to be in the #1 spot. Her night time behavior started to put too much stress on Ross and I, and I caught us snapping at each other under the stress of it all. We could NOT be the best parents we could be to her if we kept it up. Not to mention she needs her sleep.

By the way, writing all of this is not to convince myself or others that I did the right thing- its more to document what has been consuming my world the past few days. I also hope it might help anyone else out there who has struggled with guilt about sleep training. Sweet dreams? I know mine will be, now that I can relax in the evening once again...

*disclaimer- these methods didn't get her to sleep through the night. She just has naturally done this since she was 9 weeks old. The girl sleeps heavily like her mama. She just hates falling asleep when there's so much fun stuff to do (like her mama!).

"You Take the Good, You Take the Bad..."

*warning* Please don't read this if you are offended by fowl language. I usually don't swear, but when I am very upset or fired up, its just what comes out. Also, I did try substituing "booty" and "poo", but it just didn't work. I am an angry woman this morning, so swearing is what you get. Sorry in advance!

Madelyn Kristine is 9 months old today.

The Good (what people WANT to hear):
-Maddy says "doot" in the most adorable little voice. Its similar to baby brother Ike on South Park.
-She also says "nah nah", and appears to say this when she's hungry. Our first way to communicate verbally!
-She has started waving, which is the cutest thing ever.
She loves FOOD, and i love that its so much easier to feed her these days. I love how we can go to Sweet Tomatoes and feed her a baked potato with chicken, cheese, and veggie soup on top (instead of salsa). By the way, thats us having mercy on other couples who want to have a night out w/o hearing a loud baby in the next booth, so we now do our "fine dining" at a family friendly buffet.

The BAD. And the UGLY.
* this story will take long to tell, because I like to go on tangents

The 9 month mark has proven to be THE most difficult in bed time. That's right, more difficult than her Midnight Maddness routine she did from birth to 8 weeks (well...maybe not that bad, but at least then I was on maternity leave and my only responsibility was to care for new baby). Yesterday, work was VERY busy. One of thoes go-go-go days. Don't get me wrong, I actually love being busy, as it makes the time pass quicker. But by 6pm when I got home, I wanted to do nothing else but relax with my family. And to be honest, we did that.

[note]Maddy is in the process of *maybe* dropping down to one nap, because nap time has been a crap fest lately (more on that later). So we are still working out the kinks to find what works best for all of us.

At 7:30 or so, I started the "go down for bed routine". We usually start this at 7 or earler, but she had taken a long afternoon nap. She wasn't acting tired yet, but I knew the bath would wind her down. And it did. She was yawning and rubbing her eyes by the time I turned on her musical bear and settled down to nurse and bottle feed her (yep, we do both at night. Mama doesn't make enough milk for her big eater any more, but she's not ready to throw in the fancy printed nursing cover towel yet). As usual, "story time" consisted of me opening up "Runaway Bunny" to the picture pages only. She gets inpatient when I read her the story, because the pages with the words are black and white. So, since story time is NOT suppose to make baby cry, we just look at pictures now.

Anyhoo, she nursed, then drank 2 oz or so of formula before she yanked herself away and smacked her lips for a minute. She looked up and me, and then the eyes started to close. She drifted asleep in my arms. Sometimes I continue to rock her for a while, but I read "No Cry Sleep Solution" which tells you to set them in the crib when they are not quite all the way asleep, but almost there ("awake but drowsy" they say, except for Maddy was hardly awake"). Well, no matter how gently I do it, when my daughter's head hits the mattress, an sensor goes off in her head, telling her to wake up. So within seconds of setting her down (after the WHOLE bedtime routine) her eyes literally spring open, she smiles, and starts to kick. Not wanting to excite her, I slowly creep away in hopes that she will fall back asleep since she was TOTALLY ASLEEP. I didn't hear her cry, so I figured I had succeeded and was about to proceed with my evening of having a beer with the hubs and watch a movie. That quickly vanished as Ross came in to tell me she was crying. I walked back to her room, and oops. Yeah, appearantly the minute after I left she unleashed the biggest rampage ever. In a few short minutes, she had protested my setting her down by crying SO HARD that she vomited in her crib. NICE.

Plan B to a relaxing evening: Ross soothes the daughter while I change her bedding in the dark, so as not to excite her anymore. I then took over (my choice) and rocked her gently, rocked her slowly. Within 15 minutes or so, she was back asleep. For good this time, or so I thought. I waited until she was a limp baby in my arms and then set her back in her crib. The instant her head touched the matress, there went those springy eyes again, only this time she was pissed. She immediately rolled onto her stomach and crawled to the head of the crib, crying all the way. At this point, out of sheer frustration, I called for back-up. Then I went downstairs and cried.

Long story short, Ross attempted to soothe her. When I say "soothe" I mean lull to sleep. Once we are in there she's not crying. She just wants to be awake and play. He came down after about 15 minutes and said, "She's not acting tired". I looked at the video monitor, and there was my baby- holding onto the crb rails and happily jumping up and down. We made the decision together that there was nothing more to do than leave her in there for a while. We were not helping her by being in her room. I knew I couldn't fully let her "Cry-it Out" (for my own emotional reasons, and also because she pukes when she cries too hard). So she did end up crying for maybe 10 minutes before she passed out. It was agony. Attachment parents, cover your ears. For a few minutes, it was was really heavy duty lung hearty screaming. Yes, for a second, every fiber in my body screamed, "go pick up your baby", but the logic won over that. The logic being that my baby was FINE. She did not need her mommy or daddy. She was just pissed that it was time to sleep, and at this point she was overstimulated by our attempts. This was a situation that a visit from mommy and daddy would not have helped, but only make it worse. I am not ready to use Cry-it-out as a full on method for sleep training, but last night it was a necessity.

No Cry Sleep Solution? I tried your methods, and you can suck it. Elizabeth Pantley, I would happily use the pages of your book to wipe Madelyn's poopy butt after she ate a baked potato at Sweet Tomatos, which was topped with sour cream that was most likely not up to regulation food standards. Yes, that shit was nasty.

Cry it Out Method? Why don't YOU come over here and clean my baby's emesis covered sheets- and give her her second bath for the evening since she now has vomit in her hair.

We are at the point where the books I have read are not helping. (everything from BabyWise- which some believe is written by the devil himself to the aforementioned No Sleep Cry Solution- wait, is that how the title goes? In this house it does!). as well as advice from people near and far. I'm hoping this is just a phase, but we need serious bedtime (and nap time) help. Don't get ,me wrong, Madelyn is a very happy and sweet baby (until bedtime). I am blessed to be her happy mommy, only I am not happy when it takes 2 hours out of the day just to get her to sleep, a necessity to her functioning. Lately I have felt like I'm not the great mom I thought I was. I feel like I was a pretty awesome mom of a baby 3-8 months old. Those were my glory days. I don't know how to be a mom of a 9+ month old. She is a smart girl, and is starting to test the waters (and test me, frankly). Now I actually have to be a mom. This is not fun. Lord help me!

This morning, I enjoy Madelyn and multiple cups of coffee. She is still my best baby girl friend, and she still lights up my world. I am working really hard to relax and keep my anxious nature at bay while we go through this time. I know if I am wound up, she will become wound up as well. On Monday, we see her pediatrician for her 9 month checkup, and I am praying that he has set aside a good 30 minute or so for us. I will literally stand in front of the door if he tries to dash in and out without giving me a good plan of action. I also intend to call on the mammas (my mom and Ross's mom) for some advice. The plan for today? Not get anxious about this situation. Also, let the house (and my personal appearance) stay messy until she does take her afternoon nap. Also, breathe in, breathe out, and above all: be thankful.

Why I do it

A lot of people have this reaction when they find out what I do for a living:

"Wow, isn't that depressing?". Even if they don't say that, the look on their face usually speaks for itself. Its similar to when someone bites into a lime, or has just witnessed a guy getting kicked in the groin.

I often talk about this fact with other nurses (like last night) about how many people don't understand how actually blessed I am to do what I do. I finally have come up with some better answers for why that is:

Yes, the job can be hard. When a young woman with small children and a loving husband finds out she has incurable disease; that's the hard stuff. When you see an agressive form of lung cancer rapidly take a sweet older gentleman and the stress tears apart the relationship he has with his daughter; THAT is hard. Then there's the woman I once treated who was pregnant when going through her breast cancer treatment and went on to deliver a healthy baby. When I find out her cancer came back and took her life when her baby was only 7 months old...that forced me to sit back, grieve for her family, and take a moment to ask myself, "Wow, how DO I handle working in this field?".

The answer is always the same. The most obvious answer to me, is that these events would happen whether or not I worked with these people. Even if I wasn't their nurse, I would still read about it in the paper or from a friend who's family is going through a loss. But I actually get to be in these people's lives. The woman with small children and a loving husband? I got to hold her hand through her first treatment, and have her thank me and tell me that I "made this easier" for her. The old man who's daughter was so upset that she walked out and left him there by himself? I got to sit with him while he waited for his ride so that he wouldn't be alone.

In this field you have to think: We have the facts. What is the goal? What do we want the outcome to be? Is the goal a cure? If that is the attainable goal, then I get to help cure a person's life threatening disease! The other day I called a 28 year old man who I had helped treat for Hodgkin's lymphoma 2 years ago. I was calling him to tell him his scan was clear and he was still disease free. Without treatment, his disease would have taken his life.

Let's say the cancer is advanced, and the person has 1-2 years at best, as long as they are on chemotherapy. Well, I get to help this person have 1-2 more years, and I also get to help make sure that those are 1-2 GOOD years, or at last mostly good. Even if the person is only expected to live 6 months, we can help give them more time, and even make them more comfortable. For some families, a few more months could be a blessing. I'm not going to lie, it doesn't always turn out this way. Those last months can be difficult. I witnessed this in my own family, and know that many close friends have witnessed it as well. So I don't want to sugar-coat cancer by any means. But I am required to hang on to the success stories, and see the good that comes out of these sitations.

We also treat patients on clinical trials at our clinic. I believe that every day, we are working on getting closer to finding the cure. 50 years ago, we couldn't cure people like we do now. So just imagine where we will be in another 50 years?

Okay, I have digressed and rambled, and rambled some more. But hopefully I have shed some light on why I do what I do, and why I think my job is more rewarding and joyous than people realize.

Bad Good Dream

Last night or in the wee hours of this morning, I dreamt that Madelyn was about 2 years old. She was my little girl, only bigger, stronger, and with longer hair and more teeth. It was very interesting to see what my perception of what she may look like as an older baby. Anyway, I was just staring at this beautiful little girl, and I started sobbing. I held up the picture I have of her on my desk at work when she was 3 months old:

...and asked, "what happened to this baby girl???"

I even cried when I told Ross about it this morning. By the way, I'm also PMSing. This is the first time in my life since I was 16 years old that I haven't been on birth control pills (or pregnant, or not having periods cause of post partum/breastfeeding/etc). I am reminded exactly why Dr. McAndrew and my mom had me start the pill at the tender age of 16. I become a NUT CASE when that time of month rolls around. I think I have a hormone issue. Last night I was convinced my husband was an as* hole for turning on South Park so loud that I couldn't hear an old episode of The Hills playing on my lap top. Then I cried because I felt like a bad wife. Its craziness, I tell ya, craziness.

In all fairness, I had just worked a very busy half day, came home and cleaned, cooked dinner, put Maddy to bed, and was ready for MY "me time". Its hard to fit in "me time" when both parents work and care for the baby. We're working on it.

So I realize I digressed quite a little bit, so I will summarize and wrap up this post:

1) I should REALLY go back on the pill

2) Babies grow up too fast. Seriously. Cherish every single moment you have with them. Don't wish for them to grow up and stop relying on you so much, even though its tempting. I would give anything to go back in time to when Maddy was a screeching 2 week old refusing to sleep anywhere but on my chest. *sigh*...