Goodbye Sleeping Cora, it was Nice While it Lasted

I thought the sleep thing was, well not fixed per se, but moving in a positive direction.  We had three or four days of naps that lasted longer than 30 minutes.  She started going down without crying for 20 or 30 minutes - just talking or closing her eyes. 

And then.

You knew it was coming.  And then Sunday she only took one nap longer than 30 minutes.  Yesterday both naps were back to 30 minutes, and the second one involved crying for 25 minutes before falling asleep and then crying every five minutes between sleep spells for 20 more.

Why?  (shaking fist at the heavens)  WHY??

So fine, I'll zen it out today and try to accept and love and feel peace about the fact that I am back to a very grumpy baby who can't sleep and is miserable.  But what happens?  Everything else in life seems to have a cause and an effect.  If you do something one way, you can expect a certain result.  I followed the same pattern that worked for 4 days and got a different result on day 5.  It's crazy-town.  I live in crazy town.  I guess some might say I'm finally where I've always belonged.

This morning James was sharing a quote from the Paralympian (spelling?) who is here this week to do a speaker's tour for him.  He was inspired by it and he walked over to where I was sitting on the floor holding Cora and snapping my fingers and bobbing my head trying to get her to stop crying.  He said, "I bet I'm going to hear a lot of inspiring things this week."  I looked at him, looked back at Cora and my snapping, bobbing self... and my angry child and said, "Yeah, me too."

Cooking with Cora

I always wondered why my mom seemed so distracted all the time.  In fact, I used to wonder if she was getting Alzheimer's at the premature age of 40.  It seemed like all the time she would say things like, "I feel like I'm losing my mind."  or "What was it I was just doing?"

Turns out you just have to have a baby and then you can say goodbye to your mental capacity of yore.  I remember reading in the What to Expect book about how pregnancy makes you forget things.  I assume that is hormonal or physical in some way.  It never tells you that after you give birth you actually lose your mind completely and it has nothing to do with YOU.

I love pinterest.  Anyone who says they don't and has spent more than 10 minutes on it is lying.  Period.  I cook new recipes from pinterest on a weekly, even daily basis.  And so far I have had great success with them. 

I know there are websites dedicated to pinterest fails.  You see beautiful creations and then you make the same thing and it looks like poop.  Or at least not at all like the pretty pinterest picture. 

This week I had a cake fail.  Unfortunately I can't blame pinterest in any way.  I can only blame Cora.  And blame her I will - in fact I look forward to blaming her for many, many things to come.  I'm sure she is looking forward to the same.  I mean, blaming me for all her problems.  It should be mutually rewarding.

This is the cake I tried to make:

A delicious pecan pie-like cake that looked melt-in-your-mouth delicious.  Oh man, my moth is watering now just looking at this picture.

This is the cake I made:

If you think they look the same it's time for you to see your local eye doctor.  There is not one similarity between these two cakes.  In fact you can see the caramel (not) goo in mine is just pooping out all over the plate.  And looks and tastes nothing like caramel.  Just one difference worth noting.

Why such disparity?  I messed up every single part of this recipe.  Each stage of it.  I made the caramel crap, put it in the fridge only to discover that while trying to bounce Cora and put banana in her mouth I had somehow forgotten the 1/2 cup of cornstarch.  So I took the goo out of the fridge and mixed it in after the fact.  I'm sure the part where it all got cooked together wasn't important.  Clearly.

In making the cake I forgot to add something as well.  Perhaps that is because I was tryng to keep Cora from scratching her face off while screaming at me.

And finally you may notice that there are 3 layers in the top cake which I completely missed in making TWO cakes.  Which may or may not have impacted how long it needed to back and the density, and how much goo was in the cake.

Yup, a baby-fail.  Pinterest, I still believe in you.  You haven't failed me yet.  But as for cooking with Cora....FAIL.  I think James can now look forward to a lifetime of mediocre food.  And I can honestly say....I was a great cook.  I've tasted other people's food so I know this.

It may also be worth noting that when I finished assembling this cake, and after Sopo (our nanny) arrived I looked at it blankly and told her, "I want to punch that cake."  I wish I had.

Please let the 30 minute nap phase END

Today is the 6th month anniversary of Cora's life.  I'd like to say it's gone so fast, but honestly it feels more like a year to me. 

As a special half-birthday present to herself and to me, she decided to take two naps that were longer than 30 minutes.  TWO.  All I can say is that sleep (hers) is a miracle.  I felt like a princess in one of the old Disney movies.  I wanted to dance around the house singing in a very high falsetto voice as birds and woodland animals danced around me and landed on me smiling and chirping. 

Upon reflection, I'm glad that didn't happen.  I'm not a huge fan of birds or woodland animals and it would terrify me if they suddenly started landing on me and dancing around me.  But still.  You get the point...I was SO HAPPY.  Even now as I write I have a huge smile on my face. 

Most importantly Cora was happy too.  I could tell the sleep made a difference to her.  She could focus longer on toys she was playing with and she didn't cry or fuss as much.  She was a different child.

Sleep scoreboard: she slept for almost 13 hours last night (until 8am), and then she slept for an hour and 15 minutes this morning, an hour and a half after lunch, and a 30 minute topper at 4pm.  If she did this every day....I would LOVE being a stay at home mom.  No one understands how killer a 30 minute napper is if they haven't had one.  Ladies, you know who you are.

How did it happen?  I have some ideas.  And look, I KNOW all children are different.  I also know that this may not repeat itself again tomorrow, or ever.  But if it does, here's what I think went down...

Cry. It. Out.

I read recently that the baby's sleep brain is different for daytime and nighttime sleep.  So even if you trained the baby to sleep through the night it might not work for daytime.  I can confirm, it did not.

For some reason I had a much harder time embracing the CIO method for naps.  Whenever I let her do it for even a little bit it felt wrong and painful.  Her cry was miserable - I felt like she must be sick or in pain and I was ignoring her.  And sometimes she would cry, sleep for two minutes, wake up and cry again for a couple more minutes, sleep a couple and repeat for 20 minutes.  That was the longest I could do.

Yesterday I decided to do what Weissenbluth suggested and to put her down for an hour nap.  I also decided no more putting her down asleep.  I would read her a book, walk around and sing to her until she yawned and got sleepy, but not asleep at all.  Then, when I put her down, if she cried the whole hour so be it.  If she went to sleep and woke up and cried for the rest of the hour, so be it.  She was doing an hour in the crib. 

Scary.

So I did it.  And she cried during both naps for about 35 and 25 minutes respectively before she fell asleep.  One nap she did 45 minutes and the other one she did an hour.  She didn't wake up crying for once.

Today I was scared and geared up for 35 minutes of crying again.  This time for nap #1 I put her down and she cried for exactly 1 minute, then she slept.  She awoke once or twice around the 30 minute mark and cried, but only for 30 seconds each time with her eyes closed and back to sleep.  She slept for 1 hour 15. Nap #2 she didn't cry when I put her down. She played in her crib for 5 minutes and then fell asleep.  Same restless crying around 30 minutes, but went back quickly and slept for 1 hour 30 minutes. 

I know some people hate the cry it out method.  But all I can say is that I tried EVERYTHING with this child and so far, I am a firm believer in it working.  It worked for night sleep, and now I feel like it may work for daytime.  I think we gave her too much attention and she couldn't let herself sleep because she wanted our attention.  The only way to let her know we were making the break was to go cold turkey.  And when she was able to finally stop fighting the sleep I feel like it was a relief to her.

Again, I may have to take this all back tomorrow, but right now it feels right.  And for any other moms out there looking for options - you know your baby best - but it won't hurt to give this a try if you're at the breaking point.  If Cora can repeat this miracle and we start getting naps....well, there simply are no words.  Bring on the woodland animals.

Oh Bernadette

This post will be short and sweet and completely unrelated to Tbilisi.  Except by the long stretch that it is about life overseas in general.

James and I have a phone setup here through Magic Jack that allows us to have a U.S. phone number so that we can talk to friends and family back home....all for the low, low price of 29 dollars a year.  It's been pretty good so far. 

A couple of times we've lost a dial tone, but we just had to unplug and replug in the adaptor and all has returned to normal.  Last night however, we couldn't get the dial tone back and all the lights had gone out. 

I couldn't call (see above), and so I found the live chat function online, waited until they were open for business (around 8pm our time) and then began to explain and troubleshoot via a very slow chat. 

They were helpful and explained that the adaptor probably just wasn't good and that they would send us another.  In the beginning of the convo, I gave my name, and then again I gave it at the end as we were going through my address, etc.. for her to send the transformer.  I was trying to get off the chat after about 45 minutes of this fun, when I was surprised to read:

shauri: are we done?

Long pause

Bernadette: One moment please...

Bernadette: Thank you for waiting., I have already processed the AC adapter Order Number: TS37, shipping will take 2-4 working days.

shauri: thank you.

long pause....no response.

shauri: um, bye

long pause

Bernadette: You are most welcome. Thank you for your cooperation and patience. I hope I did an excellent job at addressing your concern. It was a pleasure to have assisted you Jeff. Is there anything else I may help you?

shauri: I would just say response time and possibly remembering who you are chatting with.  Otherwise you did great.  By the way, this is Shauri...not Jeff.

Less long pause
Bernadette: Sorry Shauri, I mistype :)

Yes Bernadette, yes you did.  But at least that smiley face makes me feel better.  Long pauses are now officially cleared up.

Best wishes Bernadette,

Jeff

Happiness

I am happy.

I almost ended the blog right there, but I'm sure that would have left you, the reader, thrilled for me, but a little bit empty. Frustrated perhaps that you had even bothered to click on this link only to read the lamest blog of your life.

Or maybe you would have been happy yourself.  Happy that you finally read a blog from me that wasn't whining about how hard it is to be a mom.  Happy that it only took up one second of your life to read it instead of 20 minutes you could never get back. 

However you feel, I've still decided to share more.

I realized yesterday that I am happy again.  The calm, peaceful kind.  Not the exuberant, I just won the lottery kind. 

I don't know if it was post-partum depression, too many changes at once, or if I just wasn't at all prepared to be a mother, but for the last 5 months I really thought I had lost myself.  The self I knew and liked for so many years.  The self that laughed regularly and loudly, and just felt like life was pretty good most of the time.  A self I thought was gone.

She's not.  She. Is. Not.  And THAT makes me happy.

Somehow I feel like Cora and I have turned a corner together.  She still isn't killing her daytime sleeping (30 minute naps), and she still demands a lot of attention and doesn't play by herself for more than 5 minutes without screaming, but we're good. 

I think there are are a few reasons why. 


First, I think that Cora continues to make incremental (dare I say BABY steps) of progress that make her easier to take care of.  She smiles more and laughs more.  She has slept through the night consistently for over 3 weeks.  She reacts to us and talks to us and engages.  It's nice to know that while I walk around a room for an hour with her in a bjorn that is breaking my back that a smile may be right around the corner.

Second, I am sleeping through the night.  I am starting to feel more sane.  I am starting to create routines in my day that make more sense and I can see a light at the end of the tunnel.  I know things have gotten better and that they will continue to get better.  Not that there aren't or won't be any more hard times...but there will be reprieves and I've figured out that each challenge will pass.

Finally, I got an email from my old pal Katie Outcalt that changed my world view.  My mother insists that others (including, I presume especially, her) tried to tell me this, but for whatever reason the way Katie said it struck home.  The light came on. 

Essentially she told me to change myself, and stop trying to change Cora.  She told me (my words now) that Cora wasn't a problem to solve.  That I should transcend the problem by doing some purpose finding instead.  Sound familiar anyone?

Is it hilarious only to me, that every single time in my life that I have had a problem my dad has given me that exact advice, but that I couldn't figure out it applied in this situation?

I was blinded by all the parenting books and advice of parents.  I sought it out everywhere - on blogs, yahoo groups, from doctors, books, friends... HOW DO I FIX MY BABY???  How do I get her to sleep at night?  How do I get her to eat right?  How do I get her to take a nap for longer than 30 minutes?  And since everyone always had answers....well I figured I just hadn't stumbled on the one that worked for Cora yet.  So I kept searching and asking.

Katie helped me take a step back and relax.  I still tried to open myself to the right techniques for Cora to help her....for example, I ignored the Weissenbluth advice to put my baby down as soon as I saw the tired signals to avoid her being overtired.  That was happening all the time and I put her down every hour.  And she still screamed. Instead I stretched her awake time to 2-3 hours between naps.  And now when I put her down, she lays in the crib without being rocked and falls asleep dead tired.  Still only sleeps 30 minutes but she doesn't cry anymore.

But if that hadn't have stopped the crying, it wouldn't have mattered so much.  Because I changed (and keep changing when it reverts) my attitude.  I decided to center, try to feel peace and love for Cora and to enjoy even the fits or the screaming.  To try to watch it from a 3rd party perspective instead of as the stressed out mom who was living it.  To see it and understand it differently.  And of course, to be grateful for it. 

It's still not easy to feel that way when I'm tired and she's crazy, but I feel different.  I feel like we're figuring it out together.  And I feel happy. 

I still love my birthday present and any alone time I can get.  (Alisha told me that it's too soon in the process for me to be so needy, but I explained to her that being a mother in your 40's is like dog years.  For a 25 year old mom, they may last until the baby is 7 months or 7 years old before they need a break, but for a 40 year old mom it happens at birth.  Everything is 7 years faster.)  But I also love my Cora time, and my Cora.  Peace and happiness can be elusive - it's hard work to find them when you're stressed, lonely or exhausted.  It's rewarding when you do.

Please to Answer

Considering the fact that James and I have only been in Georgia for 4 months, it is somewhat shocking that we are already thinking about where we will move next.

This summer the bid process begins for us again, so we are starting to look at which posts are available and match up to James in terms of timing, type of job, and level.

There are several places that we are starting to lean towards, but before I mention those and get reactions, I'm curious...

Let's assume that we could get a job at any post in the world right now - that everything would line up AND they would offer it to James - please answer two questions:

1. where do you think WE should go?

2. where would YOU go?