After taking pictures of Dutch’s new shoes, I had the defeating task of putting Dutch down for his afternoon nap. You see, we’ve reached a napping road block. I am a babywise mom* and babywise has done wonders for Dutch. Since 8 weeks old, he has been an absolute champion sleeper. He sleeps 12 hours straight at night took two two-hour naps each day. What was ever better was that babywise taught us to train Dutch to fall asleep on his own, in his crib. So, at nap night, we’d go upstairs, into the dark room, and I’d tuck him in and snuggle and kiss him, then walk out of the room and he’d play with his fingers happily until he fell asleep. It was bliss. Perhaps I wasn’t thankful enough at the time. At any rate, when Dutch became 9 ½ months old, he had just learned to crawl and pull himself up on everything, cruising around on all the furniture and on walls, anything really. When he gained this new skill, he quit sleeping. Instead of putting himself to sleep, he now pulls himself up to standing in the crib, playing and laughing, until that gets old then he just cries and cries and cries. No sleeping is taking place at all. So, you might say, why don’t you just lie him back down? He gets up. Again and again and again. I think I’ve laid him down 100 times and he just gets back up. I spank his hand, say no, a few nights I’ve resorted to pinning down his hands and legs, physically restraining him until he finally gives up and falls asleep. But he’s a strong bugger! And leaning over the crib for that long makes my back absolute toast the next day. So, you might say, let him cry it out. I’ve done that too, going in to check on him only every 5-10 minutes or so. He will wait it out. He will stand there his entire nap time, all two hours. So, perhaps you might think he’s not tired. If I rock him, he’ll be asleep in 10 minutes. So, perhaps I should just rock him to sleep at every nap. That’s what I was doing for three weeks, but a friend insisted I was setting myself up for disaster because then I’m making it so that he can’t go to sleep on his own. Plus, while we’re traveling, I don’t have my rocking chair and dark room. So, the car, nursing, and walking and singing are now my sleep props of choice. I know sleep props are a no no, but right now the rules go out the window.
Anyway (!), I certainly didn’t intend to write that much about our child’s sleep schedule. It’s a little road block on our smooth sailing sleep journey, and it reminds me I don’t have it all figured out. So I won’t be writing a book on infant sleep, that’s for sure.
But after an afternoon of lying Dutch back down a hundred times and finally giving up on a nap after almost two hours, Jeff thoughtfully volunteered to take Dutch for an hour or so to give me time to just read and relax and be by myself. I’m reading The Secret Life of Bees right now. It’s very good. After a good hour of reading, I was recharged . . . and hungry. Dan suggested a Japanese restaurant and I leapt from the couch . . . visions of sushi dancing in my head. Two hours later I was sufficiently glutted with miso soup, sesame salad, sticky rice, tempura (yum!), teriyaki chicken and California rolls. Gracious, it was so good.
The next morning we got an early start for Santa Barbara. Dan generously loaned us his car for the trip, so we loaded up our bags, stroller, high chair, car seat, and cooler full of sandwiches and leftover sushi, and took the onramp to I-5 South. Our drive was supposed to take six hours.
The first half of the trip was great. Dutch took a nap (!) and we made it to Kettleman City by noon. I’ve already written enough of challenging nursing situations, so I’ll leave it at this—nursing in a gas station parking lot in a hundred degree car, surrounded by truckers, is almost as difficult as doing it on an airplane. Enough said.
But we made it out and were feeling good, ready to make the final stretch over Hwy 41 and down 101 to Santa Barbara. But then, we stopped. Construction. Not just any construction, construction out in the middle of nowhere, in some hot dusty hills with no exits, no rest stops, no cell phone reception, and no civilization in sight. I thought perhaps it’d be a 10 minute delay. We sat there in the blistering sun for an hour and ten minutes. People with horse trailers opened their trailers and let the horses walk around to keep from getting heat stroke. People got out of their cars and blasted their radios. Poor Dutch. Finally I got out of the driver’s seat (Jeff needed to do homework so he was on his laptop) and got into the back to play with Dutch, then would hop back up to drive when the line would crawl forward. I know—it’s really such a minor thing. All in all, it was a great trip—even though it took almost 8 hours, and Dutch was an absolute trooper. By the time we got there he was stripped down to nothing but his onesie because it was so hot and he’d eaten his weight in Cheerios.
So what? So what about sleeping schedules and construction? Why write about this? Because now I can look back on the road to Santa Barbara and see that the hour and ten minute delay was not a big deal. We still made it safely, no one was injured, and we weren’t even late for our six o’clock dinner date with Jeff’s mom. It wasn’t a big deal. And it helps remind me that the same is true of Dutch’s little napping dilemma. It feels like a big deal right now. Mostly because Dutch’s naptime is my only free time! (Naps are really more for mammas than for babies.) So while it frustrates me that my son won’t nap and it feels like I spend ½ my day lying him back down on his back or slapping his hand for the 500th time for playing with the electrical outlets. . . it’s really not a big deal. Soon, I won’t even remember it. Road blocks are frustrating, but they’re temporary. The other lesson? Always keep extra Cheerios in the diaper bag, just in case.