It's hard being a new parent. I reflect on this a lot, even though my daughter is two years old now. I will never, ever forget those first few months, I mean that whole first year. I am still catching up on lost sleep from that time. I had no idea what I was doing and yet I wanted to do it all myself. I would look at other moms and everything seemed so easy for them. Was I the only one having a tough time?
I remember talking to a friendly neighbor about it. We had kids roughly the same age and so I thought she'd understand. But as I looked to her for some head nodding, all I got were tales of how her son goes to sleep easily all the time, 24-7, nah, not a problem, neck wring and all (Ok, I'm adding that in.) While I have come to be happy for parents who have excellent sleepers from day one, at this time I was new and nervous and yes, jealous. And the fact that there wasn't even a remote understanding of what we were going through with the not sleeping thing, well, that made me feel even more uneasy. When she added that her kid was "Superbaby" and that everything comes easy to him, I thought, should I have done more kegels? Would that have made a Superbaby? Please, how to make a Superbaby?
Luckily, I knew other moms with babies who also didn't sleep without some kind of help; kids who fell asleep on the bottle or boob, took 45 minute naps and that was it for the day, only slept in the car, would only slumber in the bouncy seat (that was us for 3 solid months.) I thought less and less about sleep issues and resigned myself to the fact that this was life right now. It was a life with way less sleep so I should just get used to it (more coffee, nap when you can, eat high protein foods, kvetch with others like you.) What else would I doing with myself but be bjorning my kid to sleep, rocking a baby in a chair or slinging a kid around? This was life and that was ok. What, I was missing out on Entertainment Tonight?
Then one night when I had finally gotten my kid to sleep (bottle, then jiggling -- oy my back! -- 45 minutes of my life gone in a haze of "monster walking" while bouncing my baby), my husband went out to get us some delicious takeout grub. He came back upstairs with an interesting story.
"Guess who I just saw?"
My mouth filled with aloo motor gobi, I asked "hngfshueht?"
"Superbaby! And he's been wheeled vigorously on our block because the daddy says that is the only way he will fall asleep!"
"He said that?" I said. Why was that making me so happy?
I felt for Mr. Superbaby because I knew that pain all too well but I was also secretly glad that Superbaby needed a little help to fall asleep too. So yeah, I felt "better" but it also bummed me out that this neighbor (truth be told, they were nice people, except for the, you know, whole competitive thing) felt compelled to lie to us when we were in the same boat. I mean, couldn't we have supported each other? But that's the thing you have to remember -- people lie. They're as freaked out as you and so maybe they stretch the truth a little -- or a lot. Now I see that it's ok, if it makes them feel better. Just don't let it get you down. Your kid will sleep. You will sleep. It will happen.
And that's no lie.
