They are the devil's advocate. Sure, they seem innocent enough, but inside them is a Pandora's box you can live to regret. Look how cute the baby is sucking on her pacifier, isn't she adorable? Ohhhh... what a cutie there. Oh yeah. She's adorable alright, no doubt. Wait till she can't get at that damned thing and see how adorable she gets.
We give our children pacifiers because the motion or action of sucking releases endorphins, theoretically. So, if they have a pacifier, they're cool. That's right, with almost no exception. The problem is, once you give em the pacifier and they get a taste of those endorphins, they get addicted to that rush (yeah, stole a line from an old hair band, sorry). More accurately, they lose sight of how to soothe themselves (if they ever had it); they rely on the pacifier to provide the soothing. It's not unlike booze really. We would rely on an external force of some sort to make us feel good, right? Well, pacifiers are the 90 proof for babies. Without the mind altering drunken side effects, that is (or really any side effects for that matter). But, just like anything, it can be overdone, and left to run unchecked, can run amok. YEAH BABY, I used the word amok!
Joy is now over a year old. Sometime around 6 months old, my wife and I ganged up on her and made her go cold turkey on the pacifiers. It was a few cranky nights, but at 6 months old, she was off the pacifier! Man I felt like a king. I felt I could do no wrong. I mean, who else but perfect parents would have already weened their 6 month old off pacifiers? Nobody. But. Us. Heh. Funny thing happens from anywhere to 8 to 12 months... Teeth. Suddenly my accomplishment wasn't really, so much. I don't know how it happened, but pacifiers got back into Joy's mouth. It probably seemed unnatural for a baby who was still crawling to NOT have a pacifier. My wife and I kind of point the finger of guilt back and forth, but I know it was her and she knows it was me. We're probably both right, and both wrong. Bottom line though, we have to endure the pacifier weening again. Or should we?
If you ask 10 "experts" on this subject, you'll get 12 answers. By the way, if you ask 10 "experts" just about anything about any subject, you'll get 12 answers (at least), so really spend a little time reading, a little time googling, but spend the most time thinking, and come to your own conclusions.
I spent a LOT of time thinking about this, from a strategic standpoint, and usually about timing. When would be a good time? 6 months worked out great, until teeth came along. So, now when do we do this? For the past 2 months or so, I've been plotting, and re-plotting, and re-re-plotting etc etc. I could not come up with a good strategy. Every time that came close to being a 'good time' turned out to be a bad time for any one of a million reasons (read: excuses), some mine, and some belonging to others, but all excuses. I mean, reasons.
Lately Joy has been having bad dreams. Her little brain is growing every day and learning every day and absorbing literally everything it can. When we have a demanding day, we gotta vent, right? She doesn't know how, so all she can do is process her day in her dreams. I feel for her, I really do. How can I tell her that something she saw today that scared the shit out of her is really some cute cuddly thing and is not to be feared? I can't. She reacts oddly to the oddest things. Case in point: her gramma bought a big stuffed pig that wears a santa hat, and when you squeeze it's paw, or hoof or whatever pigs have, it grunts out "Jungle Bells". The first time she saw it, and heard it, it scared her so much she fell over. Talk about tugging at your heart strings. As we all played with it, she got to enjoying it and even danced to the grunts. But there was an initial response that was fear and anxiety and probably a whole bunch of other bad stuff I will never know about until her therapist tells me. Her brain has to process all that, and that kind of stuff happens 50 times a day. Imagine how you would feel...
So we're having bad dreams. She needs a pacifier to fall asleep, and sometimes throughout the night, when she wakes, she can find it again, and scoop in into her mouth and mom and dad get to sleep all night. That's been the exception rather than the norm lately. Usually what happened is, she would push it out of the crib and on to the floor while sleeping, so when she awoke, she couldn't find it, and started to cry. I can't even count how many times we've had to get up and "re-plug" as we call it. Last night, she was having bad dreams, and having a really rough night (read: nobody got any sleep). I would get up, re-plug, change diaper, and my wife would get up, change diaper, re-plug, etc etc. We would do this several times before realizing the other was doing it too. Joy got to the point where she was so upset, only holding her tightly and rocking her would calm her down. Even the pacifier didn't work. She pulled it out of her own mouth and threw it on the floor herself!
So, being the opportunist I am, I took the opportunity to un-pacify that girl.Last night, I took a pair of scissors and snipped off the very end of one of her pacifiers (I read about that method on some baby site), after she threw it on the floor. I had rocking duty, so I held her tightly to me, and rocked, and rocked, and rocked until she was about to fall asleep. Notice she still does not have the pacifier. I put her in her crib, and placed the modified pacifier within her reach. She grabbed it and stuffed it into her mouth. She was immediately so pissed off I thought she would jump out of that crib and yell at me. But about 15 maybe 20 minutes later, after a good bit of fussing, and me wanting to kill myself for torturing my child, she fell asleep. It was 4:00 am. I went to bed.
That was last night, and aside from about 30 minutes or less of having to pacify her because we were all out at a concert today, and she was well into 'nap time', we have been without. Bedtime tonight was interesting. She usually goes to bed at 6:30, and tonight she didn't until close to 8:00. Other than the pacifier, our night time routine was the same. She needed a little rocking to fall asleep, and I waited in her room with her until she did (I won't do that for very much longer), but it's now a little past 10, and she's still sleeping quietly. I'm so damn exhausted I can't clearly see the keys on my keyboard, and I have to think how to type. I'm going to bed and sleep while I can. I'll report more in the coming days.
Sunday, December 16, 2012
Sunday, December 9, 2012
Christmas And Rushing
So, Christmas is upon us, and that brings any number of things to any number of people. To some, it's just another day; to others it's a joyous event; to others still, it's a nightmare. Whatever its effect on whatever people, it probably falls somewhere in one of those 3 categories, and it can probably change day by day. We had a busy day today; we got a tree, a wreath, a bunch of icicle lights, a truckload of diapers, Joy's Christmas present, etc etc. A regular shopping day for us, and we got a lot of stuff.
Up until today, we were the only ones on our block without lights on the house. I usually don't care too much about that sort of thing. I mean, lights on a house used to be kind of an oddity. Now, it seems, it's a requirement, at least in our neighborhood. We know a family a few blocks away who go completely nutty with the lights. Nice enough folks, just nuts about the lights; I may have mentioned them before... I digress. I didn't want to be the only one on our block without lights somewhere outside the house. As if I needed to somehow prove I wasn't a grouchy old bastard, I felt the need to light up the place. Of course, the first thing that comes to a guy's mind is something that would show up on a photo taken from Mars. That is not terribly realistic (not entirely UN-realistic either...), so we decided on some icicle lights hanging from the gutters all across the front of the house. Ya know, a little understated but still festive.Not exactly Norman Rockwell but also not Grouchy Old Bastard either.
As usual, I waited until most of the day had elapsed, and I was a little tired. We put Joy in the front yard in an "exer-saucer" (you'll have to google it if you care) to contain her a bit and still let her be a part of the action. The action being me putting up the lights, and my wife preparing the wreath and other decorations. It was a festive joyous moment. I felt good. Until I started to unravel the lights out of their boxes, then my demeanor diminished. It was getting cold (snow in the forecast in a few hours), and the wires of the lights had taken a set and didn't want to unravel to a row of nice icicles. So, I ended up with less of a string of icicles and more of a big jumble of lights hanging from the gutter in one long, snake like bunch. The clock was ticking, the daylight was getting short, it was getting cold (did I mention that?), Joy had decided awhile ago that it was time to go inside, and there I was, rushing to finish. I HATE to rush. I'm one of those guys who would get up an hour or so early before work just so I could sit with my coffee for awhile. I hate it. I find myself rushing alot though. There is always a serious time constraint looming directly ahead, and I am always fighting to meet it. Whether I am trying to do whatever task before the baby wakes, or before the glue dries, or before the wind picks up, I am always rushing. In projects, that is. It doesn't seem to matter what that project is, either. It can be anything, like emptying the dishwasher, or mowing the lawn, and this is just an example. Could the lights have waited? Yes but that would mean I would have to clean up my stuff only to bring it out another day. Spending more time that I might not have. If I don't get it done NOW it might not get done; I might not get another opportunity. Would that be the end of the world? No but then I would be the Grouchy Old Bastard Without Lights, or worse yet - I would be the Hillbilly With Only Some Random, Half-Assed Lights. So I had to rush, and not do a good job. That's how it goes when I rush, I don't do my best. I do my best for now, and sometimes that's all I get to do.
So the lights went up as did my blood pressure. I did get them up and working before nightfall, so I guess we will call that a win. In the end, they actually looked ok. A little goofy but... festive at least. Now I am NOT the Grouchy Old Bastard without lights. You can see them from inside, though the window. Joy seems to like them. She will stare at them, gesture towards them and babble something in her native tongue.
Two seconds of that makes it all worthwhile.
Up until today, we were the only ones on our block without lights on the house. I usually don't care too much about that sort of thing. I mean, lights on a house used to be kind of an oddity. Now, it seems, it's a requirement, at least in our neighborhood. We know a family a few blocks away who go completely nutty with the lights. Nice enough folks, just nuts about the lights; I may have mentioned them before... I digress. I didn't want to be the only one on our block without lights somewhere outside the house. As if I needed to somehow prove I wasn't a grouchy old bastard, I felt the need to light up the place. Of course, the first thing that comes to a guy's mind is something that would show up on a photo taken from Mars. That is not terribly realistic (not entirely UN-realistic either...), so we decided on some icicle lights hanging from the gutters all across the front of the house. Ya know, a little understated but still festive.Not exactly Norman Rockwell but also not Grouchy Old Bastard either.
As usual, I waited until most of the day had elapsed, and I was a little tired. We put Joy in the front yard in an "exer-saucer" (you'll have to google it if you care) to contain her a bit and still let her be a part of the action. The action being me putting up the lights, and my wife preparing the wreath and other decorations. It was a festive joyous moment. I felt good. Until I started to unravel the lights out of their boxes, then my demeanor diminished. It was getting cold (snow in the forecast in a few hours), and the wires of the lights had taken a set and didn't want to unravel to a row of nice icicles. So, I ended up with less of a string of icicles and more of a big jumble of lights hanging from the gutter in one long, snake like bunch. The clock was ticking, the daylight was getting short, it was getting cold (did I mention that?), Joy had decided awhile ago that it was time to go inside, and there I was, rushing to finish. I HATE to rush. I'm one of those guys who would get up an hour or so early before work just so I could sit with my coffee for awhile. I hate it. I find myself rushing alot though. There is always a serious time constraint looming directly ahead, and I am always fighting to meet it. Whether I am trying to do whatever task before the baby wakes, or before the glue dries, or before the wind picks up, I am always rushing. In projects, that is. It doesn't seem to matter what that project is, either. It can be anything, like emptying the dishwasher, or mowing the lawn, and this is just an example. Could the lights have waited? Yes but that would mean I would have to clean up my stuff only to bring it out another day. Spending more time that I might not have. If I don't get it done NOW it might not get done; I might not get another opportunity. Would that be the end of the world? No but then I would be the Grouchy Old Bastard Without Lights, or worse yet - I would be the Hillbilly With Only Some Random, Half-Assed Lights. So I had to rush, and not do a good job. That's how it goes when I rush, I don't do my best. I do my best for now, and sometimes that's all I get to do.
So the lights went up as did my blood pressure. I did get them up and working before nightfall, so I guess we will call that a win. In the end, they actually looked ok. A little goofy but... festive at least. Now I am NOT the Grouchy Old Bastard without lights. You can see them from inside, though the window. Joy seems to like them. She will stare at them, gesture towards them and babble something in her native tongue.
Two seconds of that makes it all worthwhile.
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