Cry Me Out

I am awfully afraid of sleep training. In my past life as an idiot without any children, I judged many a parent in my heart for their seeming incompetence/obsession with their children's sleep habits, and I even went so far as to make some vom vom vomitous predictions while pregnant (yes, you heard me, pregnant, not even with a child in my freaking arms yet) about which 'method' we would 'do' with our extra special offspring. Slap me. Slap me across my damn face.

Anywho, JP the monster baby is screaming his 10-months-old-today head off in the other bedroom right now, because I had the audacity to hope (see what I did there? You're welcome) that he might go to sleep without being nursed into unconscious bliss, then tentatively and oh-so-gingerly transferred onto a fluffy pillow of dreams and unicorns, where he would lightly slumber whilst the entire rest of the household would tiptoe around and scream silent curses at each other for the remainder of the evening should anyone have the misfortune to close a cabinet door too enthusiastically. End scene.

I can't for the life of me figure out why this kid doesn't sleep.

Admittedly, we were a tad more schedule-driven with Joey. in face, we did Babywise fairly hardcore, and feedings, nappings, and the like were all more or less fixed in place. With John Paul...I feel like we've been in emergency triage for his entire life. From ca-razy post-partum depression to a surgery at 6 months old to our recent move to Italy, we've always had 'something' major going on, pressing down, a foot crushing our throats and demanding we fix our attention elsewhere. But now, it's time.

John Paul, you're a big strapping 10 month old, and I can't nurse you to sleep twice a day and wake up 1-4 times per night to top up your gas tank anymore. I also can't handle not ever knowing, on a given day, if you're going to nap. Not when, but if. I have become my formerly childless self's worst nightmare.

Pass me a drink.

Last night was our first official 'cry it out' venture in Italy. It was more or less successful, if by successful you mean 3+ hours of varied intensity of bloodcurdling screams, punctuated by deep philosophical pillow talk peppered with 'will he need counseling?' and 'does this seem like something the neighbors might call the cops for?' queries. Riveting stuff, I know.

The upshot is that he did, technically, cry it out to put his sad self to bed, and he didn't nurse last night....though he did get a conciliatory bottle of actual formula around 3 am from Daddy dearest, which seemed to satiate him until the godly hour of 7 am.

So why do I feel so awful|?

I don't know, maybe it's the prolonged sleep deprivation, maybe it's the lingering uncertainty over reading too many entries at BabyCenter.com, or maybe it's just the straight up wicked hormonal cocktail that floods mah brain courtesy of my endocrine system whenever his crying sessions begin.

Whatever the case may be, I hate hate hate hearing my babies cry. And I hate being so sleep deprived I press the same button in our building's elevator 5 times before Dave nudges me and points out that I'm pressing the floor we're already on. Awesome.

The moral of this story is, we're on night two of cry it the frick out, and God help us if he wakes soon...