1y1m5d : No Sleep Monster

First let me say that I truly believe that babies are meant to sleep like shit. Do you know why there are so many books and consultants and methods? Because babies are doing EXACTLY what babies are supposed to do. It's us crazy adults who expect them to do something other than there nature.

So generally I'm pretty tolerant of MJs sleep shenanigans. From 6 weeks to 4 months my little angel slept through the night and it was a dream come true. Then we hit the four month brain development change, and it all went to shit. Since then, she's slept through the entire night three whole times. We've gone through phases of waking every 1-2 hours, which was total shit, and waking once in the middle of the night, which is manageable.  Recently, we've been on the wake up once pattern and also wake up in the morning really early (around 5am). It's not great, but it's okay.

But this past week or so, it's all change again. For starters, the boob is not the magic potion it used to be. As I mentioned, I'm cutting back on breastfeeding so it's really just an evening activity for us. Well, MJ used to fall asleep very happily with a boob in her mouth. Now she has one, then the other, then would like to scream about it for a half an hour to an hour. I can't console her, cuddle her, rock her, put her down, pick her up, or do anything because what she really needs is to just go to sleep. But she doesn't want to. So after 45 minutes I usually revert to controlled crying (exit room for 5 minutes, come back sooth, exit, repeat) and it usually only takes 1-3 five minute cycles for her to settle. But it makes me feel like shit because I don't like walking out on my screaming baby. On the other hand, I don't like holding my thrashing screaming baby either where it's obvious nothing I'm doing is helping.

I don't know why we've suddenly kicked off on this new phase of sleep misery. But like all things sleep, the one thing I'm sure of is that it will not last and will change.  Teething? Maybe. Sore throat like mommy has? Who knows! It's been so long I just can't imagine what a whole night sleep is like anymore.