Mom's back from Zombieland...kind of

People don't tell you how exhausting parenthood is. Sure, they'll tell you all day long how rewarding it is, how fun it is. But they steer clear of any negativity, lest you change your mind about having kids!

Not that I would have changed my mind...hehe.

Kora's nighttime activities include waking up every 1 1/2 - 2 hours and nursing back to sleep, usually on top of me. It allows me to get more sleep than if I had to go to her room each time, and truth be told I really do love snuggling up to her. However, after 15 months of this, I've realized that something HAS to change. For the sake of my sanity and health. It has to.

So, four nights ago we decided to partially nightwean her*. This means that from the time we put her to bed until about 3AM, I do not nurse her. I rock her, sing to her, cuddle her, beg her, anything BUT nurse her back to sleep. Since she is 15 months old, I talk to her so she'll understand. "Boobs are sleeping. We can nurse later, but not now." I have to say, she actually gets it! The first two nights she gave me very little fussing. And on night 3, she actually slept from 9PM until about 2:15AM! HUUUUGGGEE. She didn't come to our bed until a little after 5AM, and she slept until 7. It's been a lot of work but it's totally been worth it. If we can just get her down to 1 or 2 wakings per night I will be so happy.

Oh, and Enya works wonders. I just turn on her album on my iphone and it instantly soothes. Both me and Kora.

Anyway, now that I see a light at the end of the tunnel, I am committed to blogging more regularly. My goal is to update the blog at least weekly. So, if I don't do it, you have the right to bug me.

Here is an awesome video of Kora. I've been speaking more Chinese to her and she's totally getting it.

* We started to do this back in November and had a bit of success, but we reverted back to old habits quickly. Her teething was getting bad, and I refuse to put her through this when she's not feeling 100%. If she needs the comfort of nursing, I give it to her.

Kora's "schedule"

Somewhere between 6 and 9 months of age, most babies tend to settle themselves into a '2-3-4' daily schedule. This means that a baby will take a morning nap about 2 hours after waking up for the day, then will take the afternoon nap about 3 hours after waking up from the first nap. Finally, the baby will go to bed for the night about 4 hours after waking up from the afternoon nap.

Kora pretty much has put herself on this schedule. She wakes up around 7:30AM, goes down for her nap between 9:30 and 10 and wakes up around 11ish. She then goes down for her afternoon nap sometime between 2 and 2:30, and sleeps for about an hour. She then goes to bed around 8:30. So, more or less, we know her schedule.

What we don't talk about normally, is her nighttime 'schedule'. She is kind of on a '3-2-1' schedule. This means she sleeps her longest stretch first - 3 whole hours. Then her second stretch is about 2 hours, and finally she wakes up about every hour until 7:30 when she's up for the day. This is one of the reasons why I get so irritated when people ask, "is she sleeping through the night?". No. She's not. Well, actually she kind of is. It's not like she's partying in the middle of the night. She wakes up to pee and to nurse. But for the most part, she stays asleep.

Many people talk about 'training' their babies to sleep by letting them cry. They'll talk about how babies needing to learn how to 'self-soothe' and fall asleep on their own. Yes, I realize that by enduring my baby cry her eyes out for a few nights, she may learn how to fall asleep on her own. But I don't. I'm not going to write about the research done that shows it harms babies. Another blog has a wonderful post about this already. What I will write about is that there is a very good reason why breastfeeding puts both babies and mamas to sleep. It is natural mammalian act. Babies are not meant to sleep through the night (although some lucky moms have babies that do quite early in life). As sleep-deprived as I am, I will not rush my baby into this. My convenience will not trump her development. There will be a day when I look back on this time and realize that my baby doesn't need me in the middle of the night anymore, doesn't need my cuddles and kisses, doesn't need my milk. I do not want to look back with regret that I didn't give her enough when she needed it.