The Family *roll

Things are tough here in babyland. Right now Daniel is pacing with Ellie upstairs: back and forth, back and forth. I can hear her protest cries and Daniel’s steps growing heavy and more stamp-y and frustrated-sounding with each circumnavigation of our small second floor.

Eleanor used to be a great night sleeper and would give us 4 to 7 hour stretches of nighttime sleep ever since she was just a few weeks old. Since Ellie has never been particularly good at naps, these relatively long stretches of night sleep were our salvation. Sure, we’ve had a couple of days here and there where she would wake more frequently at night but nothing too terrible. Right now, “too terrible” about sums it up. I don’t think I have slept more than 90 minutes at a time for the past week. Daniel and I have been a good team only having one late-night fight where we managed not to say anything too awful to each other.

I’ve read and re-read the major sleep books (Weissbluth, Ferber and Pantley are all shibboleths in the new parent world) and a host of internet sites. I’m fairly confident we’re doing appropriate things (keeping track of her naps and schedules, bedtime rituals, swaddling, always sleeping in the crib etc) but nothing appears to be helping. And each night it’s a different scenario so it’s hard to address a moving target.

When she does sleep, Ellie is full of smiles and engages with us and her toys. When she doesn’t, she’s a mess of baby. We never thought that things would get worse after three months since so many of the books and other parents assure us that’s when things start getting better.

Not so with this little one.

Time to go relieve D.

Please sacrifice your best, prettiest goat to our sleep gods.