NOT Been a Good Three Weeks

Missy, I am so sorry that you are dealing with this. I completely understand. My husband works fairly long hours and an occasional weekend and I am a stay at home Mom. Jackson is becoming clingier to me when he does not feel well and my husband really does not know how to deal with the fussiness because he is never around. For me, one of the hardest things is seeing my family and friends with their easy babies. It is so hard to hear about other people’s babies who are soooo calm and laid back.

I have found that the baby bjorn carrier works well for us. When Jackson was young, he’d face me. Now he faces outward. As to the stranger anxiety, we dealt with that last month in a milder form. Have you had him around other people? We kept Jackson so isolated during those first, very hard months. I think that it contributed to his anxiety. I have started to expose him to people everyday for at least an hour or so. I used to do my grocery shopping at night after my husband got home, but now I take Jackson in his carrier and he looks at all of the people. Some he refuses to smile at and he enjoys other people. It is so random. One suggestion… test out babysitters. This may sound scary, but I posted for a babysitter on craigslist and found a wonderful, preschool teacher who recently graduated from college and has a ton of experience with babies and is infant CPR certified! What a catch! In my ad, I said that I only wanted teachers or nurses to respond- talk about over protective! Then, I called employers and other references. The school where she teaches already performed the background check, so it was perfect! I had a few people that responded to the ad come over and interact with Jackson to see if he liked them. He loved her immediately. My point is that it may work to test people out. He may be afraid of your father in law (my son was afraid of my father and mother-in-law), but love someone else. Who knows what goes on in their heads! You need some time with your husband to decompress and stay connected. Finding the right sitter might take work, but it is worth it to have some alone time!

As to the 3 AM waking, Jackson used to wake up religiously at 3 AM. I am not suggesting that you do the same thing that we did, but our doc told us that we needed to let Jackson cry because he was a “trained night crier.” We had to let Jackson cry for 3 nights straight before he started sleeping through the night. He sleeps for 12 hours a night and has done so for about 2 months. If he is waking at the same time every night, and only one time per night, maybe it is not reflux. I feel like it is so hard to be a Mom of a reflux baby because it is difficult to distinguish reflux from regular baby stuff. I would never recommend letting a reflux baby cry it out if they are in pain. But, reflux babies are still babies and they can get into bad habits just like non-reflux babies. Jackson cried for about 45 minutes the first night, 30 minutes the second and 15 minutes the third before he dropped that 3 AM waking. I am not saying that it works for everyone, but it worked for us- praise the Lord. I had been running to Jackson every morning at 3 AM just in case it was reflux. As a result, I was just reinforcing his bad habit. Once we tried the letting him cry thing, we realized that it was not reflux that was waking him up at the same time every night.

Sorry for all of the unsolicited advice! I hope that you find some encouragement and support very soon! And, if your husband cannot help with the baby, have him clean the house!

klmccart2008-03-30 09:39:39