Napping

I couldn't tell you what was normal in the first few weeks/months of Jonah's life as far as naps go. I'm not sure there is such a thing as "normal" at that point. He slept a lot, he was awake sometimes. But eventually he started sleeping more at night and having distinct naps during the day, instead of simply falling in and out of sleep all day. For a long time, Jonah's typical nap was 45 minutes long. This wasn't very long, but it was enough time to be slightly productive, or take a quick nap of my own. The problem was getting him to sleep. He would fight it and we would often spend half an hour trying to get him to sleep. For a 45 minute nap. (We also had to fight him before "big sleep.") We would read and sing and rock until he finally fell asleep and then we'd put him in the crib asleep (and sometimes feed him to sleep). It was frustrating to work for 30 minutes only to have him sleep for 45 minutes. At some point his naps changed. To 30 minutes. We were then typically spending 30 minutes to put him down for a 30 minute nap. Not fun. For a long time he would take four 30 minute naps throughout the day. A lot can happen on a sitcom during 30 minutes, but not so much in the life of a new mom. I would finally get him to sleep and then have time to go to the bathroom, eat something, check my email, and start/switch a load of laundry. If I really needed it, I would lay down for a few minutes.

I remember thinking that something needed to change, and that maybe he was old enough to take two naps a day, and they could be longer. Jonah was nice enough to change it up and just take two naps, however he stuck to his 30 minutes (he would occasionally go 45 minutes). Very rarely (like once or twice a month) he would surprise me and take a longer nap (1-2 hours). These were nice, however they would have been more helpful if I had known ahead of time how long he would be sleeping. So on a normal day, he would wake up between 7:00 and 8:00 AM, be awake for around 3 hours, take a 30 minute nap, be awake 3 more hours, take another 30 minute nap, and then be awake 4-5 hours before going to bed around 8:00 PM. I started figuring out how to get more stuff down while he was awake, instead of trying to do it all in those short naps.

A couple of months ago, during his two 30 minute nap phase, we changed how we put him to sleep. We would read and sing to him and then put him down in the bed sleepy, but still awake, to let him fall asleep on his own. This is how the books say to do it, and indeed, it is much better! We spend a little bit of time reading and singing, and then Jonah does the rest of the work. He sleeps with his Taggies book, and sometimes he'll lay there awake for 5-10 minutes fondling it quietly (which is really cute, by the way). After this change, the 30 minute naps weren't quite as frustrating, because I didn't always have to fight with him to go to sleep. But 30 minutes is still not that much time.

All of that brings us to now. Jonah still takes two naps a day (although he has occasionally skipped his morning nap). He is, however, finally taking some longer naps. His morning nap is sometimes still 30 minutes, but more often it is 45 minutes to an hour. His afternoon naps are usually at least an hour and sometimes longer. I hesitate to say that his longer afternoon nap is "normal," because I don't want to jinx it, but in the past week or two, he has taken more long afternoon naps than short ones. The longest he typically naps is 1 hour and 40 minutes. It must have to do with his sleep cycle, because when he does sleep longer than 1 hour, it is almost always 1 hour and 40 minutes.

I know that eventually (and maybe sooner than later) he will drop his morning nap altogether and just take an afternoon nap. I'm kind of looking forward to this, because it will be easier to go out in the mornings and run errands if I don't have to work around his morning nap. My hope is that with the elimination of that nap, his afternoon nap gets longer (a mom can dream, right?). Before Jonah was born, there were days when I didn't have to go to work and I would be home by myself all day. I definitely took those free hours for granted. I can probably be more productive during one of Jonah's long naps than I was on those entire days by myself.

Old Normal

People often ask me how things are going with Jonah and what he is up to. My answer typically involves telling them about his latest tricks, cute things he's doing, or whatever is normal for him at the moment. I recently realized how much that answer has changed over the past eleven months. A baby's "normal" changes so quickly and, as a stay-at-home-mom, I barely notice, because it is also my normal. Sure, I keep track of the big changes: new teeth, new foods, crawling, etc. But it would be so difficult to keep track of the big picture on a calendar, so I haven't. I can't look back and tell you what a typical day or week was like when he was three or seven months old. I wish I could. Those non-momentous occasions are just as important as the first time he tried mangos or started rolling over. So I will start now. (I will try not to regret starting this when Jonah is eleven months old, instead of when he was a newborn.) This will not be a daily record, or things would be too much the same every time. At most it will be weekly, and more likely monthly.

This first post will be an effort to capture some of his previous "normals," to catch up to where we are now, at eleven months old. There are a lot of details that I don't remember from those early weeks and months (Thank you, lack of sleep). I remember commenting during the first couple of months, that I was surprised at how well I could function (or think I was functioning) on 3-4 hours of sleep. Jonah had trouble breastfeeding in the beginning, so just feeding him literally took about 8 hours a day. He was a reasonably good sleeper in the beginning though, and slept through the night fairly early on. Then he started screaming in the middle of the night and we'd put the pacifier back in his mouth. He'd sleep a little more and then scream again. This would continue until the morning. So we thought, "maybe he's hungry. But not hungry enough to wake all the way up." So I tried feeding him. Sure enough, he slept the rest of the night without screaming and even slept later than usual. Since July, he has been waking up around 4:00 or 5:00 most mornings, wanting to eat. The pediatrician says this is normal for a breastfed infant. So I feed him. Jonah had a cold in October and was waking up in the middle of the night with that. Nothing would console him, except eating. So I fed him. Since then, he also wakes up around midnight most nights, wanting to eat. The pediatrician says that he shouldn't need to eat then, and that we should get him to stop. We tried. We failed. So I feed him.

While I do miss getting more than a few hours of uninterrupted sleep, I don't mind that much. The times we have tried not to feed him around midnight, he either screams until we give in, or Peter goes in to comfort him, which makes Jonah scream even louder. I know that eventually he will sleep through the night again. So for now, I try not to be too bothered by it, and cherish that time with him. After he eats, I hold him for a few minutes and let him digest. He usually falls asleep eating, and it's a really sweet time with him. My hope is that once we start weaning him from breastfeeding, he will sleep through the night. Hopefully.

Another thing that used to be normal was cooing. When Jonah was five weeks old, he started cooing. He would look at us and say "oooo" and "ah-goo." Sometimes his eyes would get watery and I would tell myself that it was because he was filled with love for us. I absolutely loved the cooing. It was definitely one of my favorite parts of being a mom. Then it stopped. I don't know exactly when it stopped. I just realized one day that he didn't coo any more. And I missed it. He had moved on to other exciting tricks, like laughing. But he didn't coo. I am sad that I didn't realize how quickly it would stop.

Other changes: Jonah used to love ceiling fans. We noticed this at about seven weeks. He certainly stills likes them, but they don't mesmerize him in quite the same way. He started laughing around ten weeks old. I have been surprised by how much his laugh has changed over these months. He sounds so much more grown up now. Jonah started babbling between six and seven months. He has gotten more and more vocal and has expanded his "vocabulary."

It used to be normal for him to just breastfeed. Now he eats solid food too. While it's exciting for him to eat all of these new foods, it was certainly easier when he was just breastfeeding. Feeding him solids has been the area of parenting in which I feel least competent. I try to follow the guidelines that are out there about spacing out new foods so that you can see if he has an allergic reaction. We have slowly introduced finger foods. He's doing a great job and likes a wide variety of foods. I think if he were the only baby around, I would feel more confident. But I hear about other babies eating things he hasn't or starting finger foods younger, and it makes me feel like I'm doing it wrong, even if I'm following what the "experts" say. I don't know why this one aspect stresses me out, but I know that Jonah is eating plenty and I don't think it will affect his development if he eats table food later than other babies.

That's probably enough of Jonah's "old normal" for now. I'm sure I will remember more about how things used to be as I start to write about how he is now.