27 May 2010, by Jaime Teo
Rules Vs Reality
Before Renee was born, Dan and I spoke about how we were going to care for her so that we would be on the same page. We agreed on the following:
- Cannot pick her up every time she cries because she might come to expect to be carried every time she cries (ie: spoilt). Besides, crying could exercise her lungs.
- Cannot feed her every time she cries because she might grow fat come to expect to be fed at whim (ie: spoilt) plus books say this bad habit is called grazing which discourages a proper feed before bedtime.
- Cannot bounce her when carrying her because she might expect to be bounced all the time and who has the time to do that day in and out (ie: spoilt)
- Cannot let her fall asleep in your arms because she might expect to be carried to sleep all the time (ie: spoilt)
- Cannot have absolute silence in the house when she’s sleeping else she might be used to the silence and have a problem sleeping elsewhere (ie: too pampered)
- Cannot only let Mommy and Daddy carry because she might develop an aversion to other people carrying her, disallowing Mommy and Daddy from a proper meal or social time with friends in future (ie: overly dependent)
- Cannot let her sleep with us because she might not want to sleep in her own room in future.(ie: overly dependent)
From books and websites, we also read that we should start as we intend to continue so that our child will not grow up a confused individual. For eg: If we intend to let her sleep in our bed, to be prepared to do that for a long time else she might have separation anxiety issues when we want our bed space back. Or wonder why she doesn’t wake up beside warm bodies anymore. Or worse, think that we are abandoning her. See how one decision can impact a child?
In short, we wanted to be firm parents, with a well disciplined child on hand. No kicking, crying baby for us in the aisles of the toy department and surely these things are taught from Day 1.
So the first month when Renee was home, we were sure to tell visitors to not carry her when she’s asleep(which she was almost all the time), and to not bounce/sway her in their arms if they were carrying her. We left the radio on and made sure we spoke at regular volumes around her. We also said prayers of thanks that Renee wasn’t a ‘difficult’ baby!
Then the second month arrived. A friend warned me that the second month may be more difficult because their waking hours increase plus many babies get colicky and will tend to be fussy. I kept my fingers crossed and it didn’t work. Her incessant crying bent our wills and all our well intentioned ‘rules’ went out the window. If it took bouncing/swaying/walking around to get her to stop crying, we did. If she finally got to bed all cried out, we made sure we kept our volumes low so as not to wake her up. It was almost hilarious, the difference in our stance and I’d be laughing if I wasn’t feeling so helpless in the face of her cries.
To cut a long story short, we discovered after a week that she had gotten an ear infection which was causing her considerable discomfort. =(
Boy, were we glad we didn’t stick to those rules, or stick her in a sound proof room to let her “cry it out to exercise her lungs”. I mean, how bad would we have felt if we had done that!
I think many times, we equip ourselves with information and try to keep to the ‘rules’ we lay out. But often in life, we may have the best laid plans and things still do not pan out as we hope they do. It becomes a matter of trying to cope with the situation and doing things to the best of our abilities.
I’m beginning to have an inkling that parenting is all about that.
4 Comments
Jaime Teo
June 15th, 2010 at 8:30 am
diddylove : *salute* for being able to stay with the rules! You must have an angel baby!!
pollynn: I agree! sometimes when I’m up at night, I google comments left by other mothers and am strangely comforted that what I’m going thru is the norm.. 😛
aurorin: Dan and I are just figuring out the WHEN. we tried to let her cry it out last night and instead of just having to deal with a fussy before bed baby, we had to deal with fussy entire night baby… I think she was uncomfortable. Maybe trying to enforce rules at a later date is better.. Thanks for sharing!
aurorin
June 7th, 2010 at 3:26 pm
Hi Jamie,
Have been reading your blog and following it for a while. I have an 18mth gal and like you, when Avery first arrived, we had plenty of rules. Of course, alot of them went right out of the window during the past 18mths. I guess for first time parents, it is always good to know the “rules” (it gives you some parameters to work with??!!) but then learning not to sweat it if those rules are broken. Over time, we sort of got a gist of what’s to reinforce, and most importantly, WHEN. For the first 6 mths, it became more of our priority that our kiddo is comfortable, safe and healthy. We established whatever good routines we could (sleeping in her cot etc) but decided we just can’t hack the whole ‘let her cry or she will be spoilt’ rule. We could only do it after she turned one because by then, we knew physically, she can cope with it (and mentally, so can we). Even then, we knew her enough by then to know when the crying was the ‘whining’ sort and when it was truly distress.
So.. all the best in your parenting journey, i am betting that both you and Dan are going to have a blast in the coming years with Renee. 🙂
pollynn
June 4th, 2010 at 5:47 am
boy, do I relate to you a 100 percent babe! I’ve got a 3 month old daughter n our grouses are EXACTLY the same.. then again, I guess all new parents are gg through the same stuff.. Haha.. In any case, its really comforting to know that we’re not alone! All the best! Cheers! 🙂
Diddylove
May 27th, 2010 at 10:46 am
Thumbs up Momma Jamie, love this writing. I’m also a new mom of a year old baby and did practice the golden rules from 1-7. There are many comments or even remarks passed on me but I never regret staying on my rules. My husband and I were truly glad that our boy is doing all great and fine!
Every stage and milestone have different lessons or difficulties. But we have our “mother nature” to overcome almost every bits 🙂
Welcome to motherhood!
Cheers