checking in

I just got online for the first time in over seven months. Wow. The world keeps turning and sometimes good things happen to good people. Monica, I can't believe that I completely missed your pregnancy. Not that I could have "been there" with you. I can barely be here for myself!

I'm not complaining. Not a bit. I just accept the reality that, for me, being a mom (at least at this stage of motherhood, we'll see what the future holds) means that pretty much everything else falls away.

Before I write anything more I have to say:


*Our baby girl Sophia was born on March 7th, just two days shy of being "full term" (36 weeks 5 days) at 6 lbs and 2 oz and 20 inches long!
*She came home with us the very next day (a "take home baby," yay!).
*Vincent, not quite two yet, came into the hospital room to meet her and said "Baby Sister, you get off my momma!"
*She was born with a lot of dark hair that stood straight up like a faux-hawk, so cute. My MIL kept trying to smooth it down, not listening to me when I explained to her that this is what her hair just does; the result would be baby girl looking like she had been through a wind tunnel--hair all at an angle (still cute).
*As one of our residents is known to say "she looks like a living doll." She is, too. So sweet I call her sugar.
*She started sleeping through the night before 3 months. Really. I'd put her down at 9 pm and she'd sleep until 6,7, sometimes 8 the next morning. Since I went to sleep then, too, that meant that I was getting my sleep, too. Holy cow--having been on the other side of that I feel like I've hit the jackpot.
*She was "colicky" though--after a couple weeks and until almost three months, she would scream from about 7 pm until 9 (if we were lucky) but usually closer to midnight. Nothing "worked," I'm convinced that it's neurological and some babies just have to go through it. We just loved her, held her--did the 5 S thing--and eventually she would fall asleep. Fortunately Mr. C would take her if it went passed 10 or so, then bring her back to me after an hour or two. It's funny how you almost forget this once it's over (Vincent would cry night and day, though, I don't know that I'll ever forget that! Mr. C, on the other hand, actually said to me at some point "We didn't really go through this with Vincent, did we?" I guess the important word there is "we" since he was so intimidated by Vincent that he hardly took him until he was much older.)
*She's almost 7 months old now and is sleeping in her own room in the crib. If she wakes up and cries I wait and she stops within 2 minutes or so. It was so hard at first to let her cry, but I learned the hard way, so I got through it. I'd watch the clock and, sure enough, within just a few minutes she would fall back to sleep. Since she was right next to me in the bassinet I knew that she was OK.
*And now, after almost 2 1/2 years, Vincent is finally going to sleep on his own, in his own room, even in a big-boy bed! He sleeps through the night (minus a couple of tumbles out of bed when he was getting used to the new bed) and even goes down for his nap without too much complaining.
*That is why I am able to be here--I've taken back the night! All I knew of helping babies sleep was Sears vs. Ferber, I really thought that you either fell on one side of the spectrum or the other. I wanted to hold and cuddle my boy as much as humanly possible. Fortunately I know more about sleep needs, etc. now and things are going amazingly better (and no one is doing much--if any--crying, either, so wah-hoo!)