Rough but rewarding

I haven't been blogging much recently and the blogging I've done has been more "surface" because my mind and heart have been very pre-occupied with this whole "parenting" thing. It's been a very rough week or two with Elyse. This was something we actually sort of brought on ourselves, but Matt and I both believe it's what needed to be done and I just had to endure it this week. I think it was our first test of many where we needed to make a decision and firmly stick with it regardless of how hard it was. We were having pretty significant sleep issues with Elyse. It was taking forever to get her to go to sleep at bedtime or for naps because she would fight it and would wake up if her paci fell out. Then it started affecting us in the middle of the night as well. I was getting up 5 or 6 times, sometimes more, just to give her the paci back so she would go back to sleep. We both felt like we were the "paci police" getting up over and over to retrieve it to get her to go to and stay asleep. We were all enslaved to the paci and Elyse's inability to sleep without it. I was becoming over-tired and she wasn't getting the sleep she needed either, no one was. She didn't need to eat, didn't need me, she was just hung up on the paci. It had become a joke in our house that we needed 3 hours to watch a 2 hour movie because we knew we would be interrupted so many times over this issue.

I brought this up at her 4 month visit and after a clean bill of health ruling out any other issues she could be waking for, her pediatrician highly recommended we begin sleep training Elyse because she felt she was entirely to pacifier dependent. I've been told over and over that the longer we wait the worse it will be, so sleep training we began. That basically means we do our nap/bedtime routine of rocking, cuddling, reading a book, etc, and then she gets put to bed, fed, safe, and secure, and that's it, we don't go back in. As you can imagine it's absolutely heartbreaking because at first she would cry for what would seem like hours (but was actually only 20 minutes, which is still an eternity for my maternal heart). I would lay on the floor of her room where she couldn't see me and just cry. I would whisper to her in my mind promising her I was right there, that mommy didn't leave her, but that she just needed to learn to fall asleep. It went on and on like this for days, for every single nap, for every bedtime. She was crying, I was crying, and I felt horrible. I doubted myself over and over if it was the right thing to do. How can a good mother ignore her child's cries? But that was just it, she didn't need her mommy, she didn't need her daddy, she needed to sleep. Matt had to remind me over and over that she isn't missing us, she was just in a panic over why that soothing piece of plastic wasn't magically finding it's way back to her mouth. His constant reassurance was so crucial for me and he was a tremendous help through this.

I prayed and prayed for God's confirmation in our decision and for confidence to carry it out because I knew consistency was key. I knew she HAD to learn this or it would be a much harder battle down the road. I felt confident that we were helping her learn the skill of self-soothing and just because it wasn't easy didn't mean it wasn't right. It won't be easy the first time we spank her, but she will get spanked. It isn't easy when she fights being strapped down in her car seat, but she must stay buckled. Like I said, I'm sure it was the first of many battle's we will have with Elyse, but we are her parents and things like bedtime and car seats are non-negotiable. I just had no idea we'd be battling so soon, but it's amazing how fast this sweet baby started expressing her will and testing limits. Responding to this is what we needed to do and knowing that we did it adds so much more confidence to me as a mother. Matt was such wonderful support and was 100% with me on it which helped so much, but he was at work for almost all of it, so it was hard doing it alone. A week or so later, I truly believe it's working. She is finally just "talking" herself to sleep and guess what....no more getting up in the middle of the night!!! She can put herself back to sleep on her own. It's by no means perfect (the time change and her wanting to drop her 4th nap didn't make it any easier) and there are still times she fusses, but nothing like what it was before.

At first I felt like this was our dirty, dark secret that we let our baby cry. I was ashamed and doubtful and the harder she cried, the worse I felt and I didn't want anyone to know. Now that I truly believe we did the right thing I feel comfortable sharing. I'm so proud of my precious little girl, but more importantly, I'm proud of myself and Matt. I know we handled it in the best way for our family. We handled it quickly, firmly, consistently, and together.....I feel like those are the makings of some pretty good parenting skills for later on. I just hope we have a little reprieve before we are faced with the next obstacle.