According to many of my mommy friends, this "phase" is apparently typical for babies his age. It is an age where parents are often working on various transitions, as we are. He's starting to want to do things on his own terms and develop some independence, but the world is still a confusing and scary place for him. I also think that life is getting progressively more frustrating for him as his cognitive development speeds beyond his physical capabilities. I'm sure it's terribly frustrating to try to carefully manipulate and study objects in your environment with hands that just aren't quite dexterous enough to grab that dangling toy as it sways back or forth or hang onto it long enough to get a good taste! He has been more fussy in general, his nap schedule is less predictable and he's not napping very well, he's all "two steps forward, one step back" with the nighttime wakings, he's going through very clingy periods throughout the day... he's just not the "easy baby" that we've been accustomed to caring for all these months! I've said it many times and I'll say it again... change is the only constant!
I think I need to renew my commitment to a "baby-led" parenting style. I've always tried to let him lead in many ways, but when I take a step back I can see that lately I've been making little power plays and trying to seize control little by little. That's just no way to live in peace with your baby. There are certain issues that I'm forced to press, like the bottle. Others, however, can wait. I think I need to let myself focus on one thing at a time. It may seem like 4 months is a good time to start transitioning him to his room, but maybe it's just not. Maybe it's not working because we're trying to "work on" too many changes at once. We've been "working on" the nighttime wakings and self-soothing, "working on" bottle-feeding, "working on" figuring out a nap schedule, and "working on" getting him to nap in his room all at that same time. Soon it will be time to start introducing solid foods, too!
I think it's time to prioritize...
- The bottle has to be number one. I have a little over one week before my first scheduled shadowing experience (of sixteen that I'm supposed to complete by May!), during which I'll need to leave him for at least 4 or 5 hours. He simply must take a bottle.
- Nighttime sleep and the nap schedule must be number two. I think they go hand-in-hand - the better he sleeps during the day the better he sleeps at night, and the better night he has the better next day he'll have. These issues have been plaguing us for a while now, but I think that the friction could be greatly reduced by just letting him do what he needs to do. Nighttime sleep has been getting better, little by little, and I'm fine with just continuing along the natural course that we've been on (natural with a little encouragement toward self-soothing, anyway). I think I've decided that I need to go back and spend a week or two letting him determine his own nap times during the day, and hope that allowing his natural rhythms to dictate his sleep schedule will eventually yield a more regular pattern. I thought that I had figured this out already, but it seems like he gets tired at different times every day and trying to get him to go down for a nap at any predetermined time is a bit of a joke. Maybe if I just let him do his own thing for a little while he'll work himself into a more regular routine. Part of the problem is that he wakes up for the day at different times every day. I'm sure that that is influenced by the amount of wakeful time he's had overnight, which still varies. When he wakes in the middle of the night and how long we fight determines when he'll wake up for a feeding in the early morning hours, and that in turn influences when he's ready to be up for the day. You can see how this becomes one big vicious cycle when any aspect of his sleep schedule is disrupted, so making all of these pieces come together is key!
- In favor of taking it one step at a time, I think I'm going to move his swing back to our room for his naps and put off trying to transition him to his room until his sleep patterns are more regular. I thought that we had him napping pretty well when we moved him (he was taking two good long naps every day), but the timing has always been irregular and I think it's important that his body and mind be set on a regular sleep schedule before we go introducing any other changes to the sleep routine.
- I think that we need to prepare to introduce solid foods soon-ish, but it will remain a lower priority for now. I feel like he has been nursing a lot lately (at least every two hours, where as a month ago he was going more like three and sometimes four hours between feedings) and it may be that he's ready for a little more bulk in his diet. That is certainly important, but I still get the sense that it's not super-pressing for him and I'll keep putting it off as long as I keep getting that vibe from him, in favor of getting some of these other issues resolved. I do wonder, though, if perhaps getting him started on alternative food sources might make him a little more willing to give the bottle a try...? Our experience with the bottle leads me to believe that he may not be ready to accept food from a spoon yet either, but we'll give it a try in due time and see how it goes. I've been trying to feel him out on this issue for a few weeks now and am paying close attention for signs that he's interested.
Well, I think that's about all I can muster for this evening. I'll leave you with a video of our big boy's most recent milestone... TODAY, he rolled over for the first time! I caught the second time on video :)
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