I knew lack of sleep would be one of the most difficult challenges to overcome as a new parent. But knowing what is coming is not enough to prepare you for its reality. The UN has recognized sleep deprivation as a form of torture. My involuntary, highly scientific investigation over the last fourteen months came to the same conclusion.
Before I go on any rants about how difficult it is to function on little sleep at work, how trying not to snap while Steve is telling you he requires a unique description on his invoice which should have been issued four months ago but he waited until now and it’s an emergency if it doesn’t get sent today… I must acknowledge my incredible wife.
She has carried the team through these long nights, sometimes having to get up as many as seven times in the night to feed our little girl, only completely accidentally kicking me awake every other time. It’s been hard not being able to help her more, I wrote about our struggles with sleep last year:
While I understand why parents get to the point where they resort to cry it out sleep training, we didn’t have the heart to do it. This method involves putting your baby in their bed and only returning in the morning, letting them figure out the sleep thing on their own. But hearing your little one cry for you and ignoring it is excruciating. So we continued to sacrifice our sleep in the hopes that eventually she would stop taking after her father and our sleep prayers would be answered.
Yes, I am apparently the culprit. I am told I was a terrible sleeper as a baby. Things got so bad at one point that my wife began telling single women to check with any men they date if they slept well as a baby before spending any more time with them. It had been a particularly rough night.
Many people advised us that we would have to revert to the cry it out method. That it was the quickest way. At one point we did try a more hands on version where I would go over when she cried, reassure her and set her back in a sleeping position in her crib. I would go back, over and over, with increasingly long breaks in between.
It was brutal. Babies are strong negotiators. Even if you tell them it’s sleep time they tend not to agree. It’s hard to reason with very loud and impressively consistent screaming. We quickly gave up. The limited attempt was not in vain though, her wake ups reduced to once or twice a night.
After a bad round of teething, our little one’s sleep got worse and stayed worse. This time we came up with our own method of sharing the load while trying to help her learn to sleep. I would get up if it was before 3AM, reassure her without giving her food, and cuddle her back to sleep. After 3, she still got Mama.
At first when she realized I was trying to get her to go back to sleep instead of taking her to her mother, she was having none of it. She exhibited high potential for a career as a ninja by squirming, kicking and wriggling in an attempt to escape my clutches.
I tried singing, dancing, clapping, praying, anything to calm her down. After an hour, my arms maxed out from the craziest workout, she exhausted herself. Finally accepting my cuddles until she fell back asleep.
We kept going. After a few rough nights it started to work. My methodology got better. I would start by putting on my noise cancelling headphones allowing me to stay calm. After letting her complain for a bit I would sing her remixes of songs she liked, especially the ones Mama made up for her. The sessions got shorter, the wakeups reduced, and we didn’t feel guilty because I was there for her whether she liked it or not.
Then one night it finally happened. I got up to answer her cries, and as soon as she saw it was me and not her mother she let out a huff and put herself back to sleep. I was too thrilled to be insulted.