By the time my daughter was born, both she and my wife had been through the ordeal of 3-day-long labor. Now, anything that takes 3 days pretty much has “exhaustion” written all over it, let alone labor. While it broke my heart to see my wife endure the agony, tedium, and frustration, I forgot to consider what a taxing ordeal it was for the kid, too.
Naturally, I became worried when she slept through almost all her first few days on earth and was barely awake the rest of the time. Some of our friends clairvoyantly encouraged us to treasure that time and rest as much as we could because very soon we would not have that luxury, for a long long time. Boy, were they right.
Look, all things considered, my kid is far from the worst-case scenario in terms of sleep. I’ve talked to friends whose kids either refuse to sleep at night or worse, would cry incessantly for hours on end. (I’m happy to report they are still alive, the parents.) Our daughter mercifully spares us from that kind of anguish. Nevertheless, she is far from the best-case scenario either. On that note, even the best-case sleep arrangement with a newborn is not something people normally volunteer to adopt, so we are not exactly winning the lottery here.
If Time Is Money, Then Sleep Is Currency
As a friend of mine adequately puts it, “Sleep is a precious commodity to new parents.” It is usually only when babies sleep that we can sleep, cook, eat, do house chores, and work. You know, those life things. When we yearn from our souls for our babies to sleep a little longer, we are really not coveting the chance to hit the movie theatre, splurge on a spa session, or indulge in video games. We simply want to make life happen. That’s not too much to ask, is it?
So you see why it becomes a tad nerve-wracking when the baby stirs in her sleep at the creaking sound of the floor, flushing of the toilet, mistimed alarm, loud and abrupt construction noise, sirens on the street, and engine revving in the middle of the night. (Good for you and your nice ride. Now please leave.) I often catch myself holding my breath when I see her fussing in her sleep and pray desperately that she will not wake up. The simple thought of that makes my skin crawl and my hair rise. Like, right now.
That’s why no one should be surprised to catch me acting like a cat burglar in my own home. Yes, I tip-toe half of my waking hours, grind my coffee in the washroom, angle the tap in such a way that the flowing water makes minimal sound with the sink, and pad my doorframe with tissue paper so the door closes with a “thop” rather than a “clank”. At first, my wife was puzzled at the length I would go to noise-proof our life for our baby, to which I said, “Oh, sweetheart, I’m not doing this for her. I’m doing this for us.”
Here’s One Way to Slice It
I know, this is not sustainable, and I’m this close to developing a neurosis. So I have no other choice but to up the ante. I measured our daily activities according to the consideration of my daughter’s sleep. I call things that rile her up “wakie makies”, and things that calm her down “sleepy happies”.
Diaper change, “wakie makie”. So are bathing and tummy time. Also among them are cooking, dishwashing, nail trimming, nose cleaning, tongue scraping, well, basically any hygiene-related care. We can do them to deliberately wake her up or intentionally tire her out. At the very least, we position them farrrrrr from any nap. On the other hand, breastfeeding, storytelling, taking a walk, steady noise, swaddling, and burping are “sleepy happies”. They are helpful to ease her into her naps and sleep and can be highly useful to calm her down when she cries.
With that, we can plan our days. For example, we try to change her diaper as soon as she wakes up, especially during the night. Doing it after the feeding and burping only results in a girl with wide-opened eyes, ready to play. That’s, not, good. I also take advantage of her awake time to get all the “wakie makies” out of the way. Just tonight, I rapidly cleaned up the dishes and garbage while she was being breastfed. Otherwise, I would have to handle them as if they were made of delicate crystals if she was asleep. If somehow we have to cook while she naps, you can bet that the range hood and white noise machine are on full blast.
We Will Prevail, Or Else
Do they help? Yes, to a certain extent. But make no mistake, the cards are stacked against us. There are simply way too many “wakies makies” than “sleepy happies”. To make matters worse, many of the former are entirely out of our control. Case in point, as I’m writing this paragraph at 00:15 AM, some car decides to roam up and down our street to show off its fancy engine, over and over again. Then there is my daughter, tossing and turning at the noise, and for some reason, rotating. As I’m looking at the baby monitor, she looks like the spinning hour and minute hands on a clock. I don’t know if I should feel anxious, amused, or perplexed. I guess I’ll have them all to go.
It is a war of attrition alright, but by no means a war against my daughter. Sleep is elusive to all three of us, but we are not falling on our swords yet. There is still room to over-engineer our life. There must be more tricks and tips that will make our life more restful but bizarre. The best part is, even if it doesn’t work, at least I’ll get a kick out of it.
~ Du