Annika's almost 6 months now. She hasn't shown much interest in food, really. But the last couple of weeks have been a little rough, with her. She's up too much in the night. Last night she slept well through the evening, fed a lot at 12, then 2:20 a bit, then a few times (ARGH) between 2:30 and 5:15, then really well between 5:15 and 6ish, after which I had trouble getting back to sleep. And then the little squick woke up just after 7! I fed her AGAIN, then dumped her on Amps with instructions to beg the nursery to have her, and drop them both off there as soon as possible. He finally left in a torrent of in-and-out, door clanging, baby-screaming, Nina-singing chaos at 10. I got up shortly after that, went to work, and was still tired all day.
Anyway, it's like this with babies, and we should feel lucky that the past couple of weeks have really been the first time the little sweetie has actually ever been any real trouble. But now the theories come out of the woods: is it that she can't fall asleep on her own? (probably). Do I feed her to sleep too much? (probably, yes). Should we try 'cry it out' (CIO)? should we try 'pick up, put down' (PUPD)? Should we wait until she's actually 6 months (15 more days, folks!) and is officially "ready" to sleep through, and "ready" for behavioural sleep interventions (no acronym common)? Should we ignore it and realise that she'll grow out of it whatever we do, and just not stress about it (ahhh, probably, yes)? When things get hard, the urge to do something grows, obviously. But what? And now that mumsnet, and the internet in general, are out there, all these theories and plans and other peoples' anecdotal experiences and disagreements and similarities to us and differences from us are laid out, easy to find. And how is it that she naps at nursery? They don't breastfeed her to sleep or drive to Clevedon in the car (last post). Apparently she'll sleep for 1:15 there, compared to about 6 min 30 seconds around here ...
Well, anyway, she seemed a little reachy at mealtimes, and going for inappropriate choices, like pints of ale. So yesterday we bought some baby rice. I didn't think she'd go for it, really, as despite being really quite interested in breasts (mine), she isn't a big eater. She was pretty puzzled at first, kind of sucking the spoon, turning her head away and then back again, spitting it out, opening her mouth again. But she took to it. She sucked it down, and then we made some more, and she gobbled that too. So maybe she's been hungry, poor little 9th-percentile-for-weight child.
Anyway, about babies and sleep, I had read online that when they do something new, like roll over, pull up to standing, or start "solid" foods, they can get excited about it, and wake up thinking about it or practising it. I was telling Amps this when we realised that I had just suggested that 3 tbsp of lukewarm, tasteless, sludge could actually be so exciting as to keep someone up at night.
