Kid is giving me a run for my money.
I honestly feel like I just starred in an episode of "Super Nanny." Remember the one where there is a SCREAMING child and the parent is sitting outside the room cowering and hoping that they will just give in and fall asleep? That was me. 10 minutes ago. And you know what, he gave in.
*Can you see me doing my little happy dance now?*
Travis is obviously going through a big change in his little world now - he is crawling and is SO freaking strong... he planks, not just crawls, but he plank crawls. This means he has man-arms of steel. Which means he can pull himself up at a freakishly far distance.
Exhibit A.
What I'm trying to say is that now, he wants to stand and look around at night, and last night he fell backwards nearly giving me a heart attack with worry that he would break his skull. Luckily, after much reading, prompted by my amazing husband, I have come to learn that there really shouldn't be enough inertia to have him do too much damage if he's only falling down (versus falling off, say, a table).
So tonight, I toughed it out. I did not give in. I did not take him out of his crib to rock him. I sat in a chair next to him and I didn't say a word except "it's time to go nite-nite." After 5 minutes of monitored whaling (and by the way, it felt like an hour), I would take his little hands and work them down the side of the crib rails and then help him bend his knees so he could learn how to get himself down.
Repeat.
Repeat.
Repeat.
Then I left the room and sat in the hallway as he cried. If I ever thought I was a good mom, this really made me think twice. Who lets their kid cry like that? But, I stuck to my guns and peeked around the corner of his door to check to make sure he was okay and after about 10 minutes of being alone he finally widdled himself down and slinked into a peaceful sleep.
I'm a little baffled it worked.
I have read oodles and oodles of parenting books and many of them say "you just have to let them cry" - not ignore or neglect them, but let
them figure it out. It is the hardest thing to do - that's
your baby and hearing them that upset... well, it's difficult not to swoop in and save the day with a little mommy sugar.
Are the books right? Who knows, but I'll let you know if he's still mad at me in the morning ;)
xoxo, cb.
