First, a funny story about Rebekah, then we'll get to Andrew...Scott and Rebekah were at the playground the other day (I was at home holding Andrew, naturally) and, according to Scott, a little two year old boy who was there came up to Rebekah with his arms out. Scott assumed he was going to give her a hug, but instead he got really close and planted a kiss on her lips. Rebekah was stunned. She walked over to Scott and sat on his lap for a little while and then looked up at him and said in a bewildered tone: "Kissed a boy?"

Andrew is still sleeping in 2 hour increments at night and needing to be held all the time to sleep. There are times when he is awake where we can put him down for 10 minutes or so but not while sleeping. His naps are very irregular and short and he often wakes up every 10 minutes during the nap and needs more soothing to get back to sleep. At the peak, around 6-8 weeks he was crying/fussing about 4 hours a day (usually about an hour and a half during the day, plus another 2.5 hours at night.) The only thing that soothes him during this time is vigorous bouncing. And he will not accept mechanical subtitutes--we HAVE to be holding him or he screams. If we stop bouncing, his crying escalates, and usually, even if we sit down (but still bouncing), the crying still escalates. During the day, he will not go to sleep without getting some fussiness in and without lots of bouncing. (We recently purchased an exercise ball that I bounce on while holding him, which has given my biceps a break, although it is quite the workout for your abs. I have no idea why I didn't think of it earlier.) We also cannot get him to sleep during the day unless we bounce him like this (and his fussy spell usually ends with him faling asleep; although sometimes he sleeps for 10 minues and is up again, fussing). He settles down at night between midnight and 1:00 but still only sleeps in 2 hour increments. Scott suggested he might have colic, especially given that since he would be crying a lot more if there weren't two of us at home and we had to put him down more and/or if I didn't have the resources to spend all day holding him, bouncing him back to sleep when he wake up every ten minutes, etc.

Colic is unexplained crying, which most babies have, but at an extreme level, at least 3 hours a day for 3 nights a week for at least 3 weeks in a row. I originaly did not think Andrew had colic since my understanding of colic was a baby that screams for 6 hours straight at the same time every night, and Andrew's longest spell at night is "only" about 2 or 2.5 hours. I wasn't counting all the daytime fussy spells; however, I started doing more reading on the subject (I got the book Your Fussy Baby by the Healthy Sleeping Habits Happy Child author, who has done a lot of research on infant colic) The author says there that you should add up all the time they spend crying for no reason and if it is more than 3 hours, they are colicky. There are also a lot of other features of colicky babies that describe Andrew well--they tend to have short, irregular naps, are easily startled, are difficult to get to sleep, and they usually have very unsettled sleep when they do sleep. (Apparently, only sleeping in someone's arms is not unusual for colicky babies). They also do not start sleeping for 3 to 4 hour stretches at a time until much later than normal babies and the fussiness ends a lot later than in normal babies. About 15-20% of babies have colic. It is harmless and he should outgrow it in 3 to 4 months. They also take longer to learn to self-soothe, so the author doesn't recommend letting them cry as part of sleep training until they are at least 4 months old. No one knows what causes colic but most of the scientists/researchers agree it is not a stomach or digestive issue, which is what a lot of people believe. And, as an update to the last post, we have definitely ruled out any food intolerances since I got the stomach flu again and was on a jello/gatorade diet for long enough to know for sure this time that his fussiness is not related to my diet. (There should be a limit, by the way, as to how many times you can get the stomach flu during the newborn stage...)

We went to the doctor twice this week for Andrew (and saw two different doctors, although the first one was technically a nurse practitioner). The first one was for his two month checkup--he's very healthy, gaining weight, he's moved up to 35th percentile. When I told the nurse practitioner about his sleeping patterns and fussiness, she could not get over the fact that I slept while holding him and lectured me on how unsafe that is. She then asked if we had ever tried putting him to sleep in a car seat, instead of a crib. That was the point at which I realized we were not on the same page. I went home and we renewed our efforts at putting him down, but all this did was create frustration and more bouncing and less sleep.

We went back in to the doctor a few days later for something unrelated and this time saw our regular pediatrician, who was asking about his sleep. She agreed that he is colicky and said that he would start to settle down sometime between 3 and 4 months, so really we just had to wait it out. She was a big fan of the Weissbluth book Healthy Sleeping Habits Happy Child and agrees that with colicky babies, you really should not let them cry for too long as part of sleep training until they are about 4 months old, since, although no one knows what causes colickiness, they seem to be "neurologically unsettled" until the fussy period is over and really are not able to learn self-soothing skills before then. When I asked her about how he would only sleep in our arms, she said that she had seen that before and that usually it starts to resolve itself when their fussiness goes away and they start sleeping a little more soundly. I told her about my schemes for trying to teach him to sleep on his own (as well as the things we had tried already) and she said that for right now, we should just do whatever gets us the most sleep and worry about teaching him to sleep on his own when the fussiness goes away, around 3-4 months. Around the time the fussiness drops off, he should start sleeping better and more soundly and we should start then to again try to put him down to sleep on his own.

So needless to say, this visit was much more helpful. I am also happy to report that Andrew has had two nights in a row where he slept for more than 2 hours, although the latest twist is that I cannot seem to get to sleep when he is sleeping or get back to sleep after he wakes up, so now I am actually more tired than ever...I think my brain is just really confused as to what its supposed to do after being so sleep deprived for so long that it will take time for it to get better. I am also surprised at how many other mothers say they had this problem too--and they agree that the only thing worse than not being able to sleep because you have a crying baby is not being able to sleep when you have a sleeping baby.

But we are starting to see Andrew's little personality and his big, handsome smiles. He is a sweet boy when not fussy. Above is a recent picture.