Thanksgiving Vent

Kalyn

Just thought a thread where we could vent might be nice...

TL;DR: “yes mom, I am going to hold my baby if it helps him sleep (especially when he’s been fighting it for over an hour)!”

We moved to a new place when babe was a month old and things have been a little rough. We’ve been blessed with a patient, happy, relaxed little guy... So my mom hasn’t seen my son since he was about four weeks old when she helped us move out here...

Anyway, my mom travelled 9 hours to visit for thanksgiving and she has been very helpful and overall it has been very nice to have her visiting. I will be sad to see her leave tomorrow.

However, she keeps giving parenting advice. Like, suggesting I leave my three month old cry for a bit before getting him... he doesn’t have the cognitive ability to recognize that his needs are not life or death yet, and leaving a baby that young to “cry it out” only leaves him crying harder and more panicked and harder to calm down.

Anyway. This evening, baby was fighting sleep pretty hard. My hubby danced him to sleep (he prefers to fall asleep in our arms) and then put him in the cosleeper.

He lasted about five minutes before he started fussing. Fussing is a normal baby thing in REM sleep (we are paralyzed during this stage of sleep, babies are not and so noises and movement are normal) but he started crying, so my husband got him.

My mom tried to take him and get him back to sleep, to no avail. I took him and finally laid down on the bed with him. He finally, fell into a light sleep. My mom proceeded to tell my husband about how we need to set boundaries with the baby because otherwise...

Anyway. I’m just annoyed that she thinks that my willingness to hold my three month old (who is fighting sleep) as he sleeps is “spoiling” him and is going to lead to poor boundaries...

But let’s not even get started on how horrible her boundaries have been my whole life and how hard I had to work to set boundaries with her...

I’m glad she’s learning, it’s just frustrating. And I’m glad she’s here. We miss home. But don’t tell me I’m spoiling my baby - for as long as he needs to be snuggled in my arms to feel comfort, they’ll be available to him. He will learn to be independent as he gets older, and we do put him in the cosleeper and his crib to sleep. But when he struggles, I leave him snuggle.

Thank you for coming to my TED talk. 😂

How’s your family time going?