making the decision to resign

Well, I officially resigned from my ‘day job’ today. I stopped working last May, and A was born in June. I am able to take a year’s maternity leave, and so was due to go back to work in about three month’s time. I have thought a lot about my plans for work.

If we were still living in Perth, where I would be returning to a familiar job, and would have family to help with childcare, then I might be ready to do a day or two of work a week. But, returning to my old job would also mean doing nights on call, and given that I am lucky to get four hours consecutive sleep, I can’t handle the phone ringing all night too and waking us up.

But we are not in Perth, we are in Brisbane. To go back to work would mean finding and starting a new job in a new city and state – a stressful process. I would also have to find day care for A, and this is something that I am not ready to do yet.

To be honest, I don’t miss work yet – I am sure that I will, but not yet. I love being at home, and I have enough to keep me busy – A takes up most of the day, and when she naps, I furiously write my novel which I hope to have finished by the end of the year. If I don’t write it now, while I am not working, then I’ll never do it. I have just had another article published and am finalising my research paper – so I definitely have enough to keep my mind occupied.

So I wrote to my old boss today and resigned from my position, and it’s a good feeling. I have worked for my whole adult life, and I remind myself that I deserve to take time off now to be with A for a little bit longer.

Fathers feeling left out

A is becoming quite cllingy with me, which is completely normal at this stage of her development. Also, A and I are rarely apart, and through breastfeeding, she is depending on me for food and comfort. Yesterday, when my husband came home, I was showing him how well A can crawl and trying to get her to crawl to him, but she just kept looking at me and coming towards me. In the morning, he got her out of bed when she woke, and when I came through, she started smiling and again, moved towards me.

My husband made a comment in jest about how she likes me more than him, but of course I’m sure that he said this because a part of him feels this. I imagine that it is the same for most families, where generally (though not always of course) the father is out at work and the mother is the primary carer and attachment figure for the baby. A used to take a bottle from my husband which meant that he could feed her some evenings and on a weekend morning, but as she is still refusing to take milk from a bottle, he has lost out on this bonding time too.

When I worked with women with perinatal (pre and post natal) mental health problems, I was amazed that we didn’t include fathers as part of the routine assessment. In child and adolescent psychiatry, I would expect all family members who lived at home to attend at least the first assessment appointment, as I believe strongly that noone in a family develops mental health problems in isolation from the rest of the family. Everyone has a part to play in both causation and cure.

Dads are 50% of the parenting ‘team’ and can easily be forgotten, both by the mother-infant dyad (who are completely besotted with each other in many ways) and health professionals. I do think that my husband feels a bit hurt when A comes to me over him, despite knowing that it is developmentally very normal. I will remember – both at home and at work – to remember the importance of including dads and acknowledge their feelings too.

Starting to crawl

Wow, it’s a week for milestones – this morning, A crawled across the floor properly for the first time. She has been ‘almost’ crawling for ages now, probably two months. She would be able to move her hands, or legs, but never both together. Over the past week or two, she has managed one or two ‘crawls’ but today, every time I put her down, she consistently crawls over to the toy that she wants (or the dog!).

Because of her practice runs, and her trying to pull herself up, she has had quite a few bumps to the head over the past weeks. She has some bruises, and even a little black eye from falling sideways onto a toy. It is tempting to stay by her side, and put cushions around her so she can’t hurt herself,  but I feel that this is all part of the learning process for her. Obviously I don’t leave her on a hard surface or anywhere that she could get hurt, but falling on the rug or carpet is part of being a child. I get frustrated when I see children who are never allowed to explore, or to put anything in their mouth without it being disinfected, or to test their independance. Children (and adults ) learn by successes and failures. If A falls to the side and bumps her head, she will remeber that next time, she needs to put her hand out to stop herself falling. I can’ always be there to catch her, so I’d rather she learn things in a safe environment. I don’t want to teach her that the world is a dangerous place, because generally it’s not.

I am excited by this – like with her first tooth a few days ago, I am thrilled to see her growing up and moving away from the baby stage.

Teething and the first tooth

A got her first tooth yesterday! She has been teething on and off for a couple of months: she would go through stages of biting, drooling, pulling at her ears and being a bit miserable, then it would stop. For the last few days, she has been doing that, particularly pulling her ears and chewing on her own hand and fist. I had a feeling that those first teeth were close, so I felt in her mouth after we went out for yum cha (A even tried some Chinese vegetables) and I felt it! A sharp little tooth on the left middle bottom gum…

She had a bad night last night, being up at midnight, then 3am til 4.30am – even my usual magic trick of breastfeeding didn’t settle her back to sleep at 3am! Instead, she needed cuddles and teething gel. I am going to give her some ibuprofen tonight if she is still grizzly.

It’s a real milestone, physically and psychologically for us. For A, her body is preparing for moving onto a solid diet. She also keeps feeling the tooth – partly I am sure because her gum is itchy or sore, but I also think that she is wondering what this sharp thing in her mouth is! I imagine that she feels it when she sucks her thumb, and on her tongue when she feeds. It must be confusing for her to have this new appearance in her mouth.

For me, I was so excited when it appeared. It’s bit like when they first roll over, or sit: it’s a sign that she is growing up. The arrival of the tooth shows me that she is moving away from being a baby, that she will soon be finished with breastfeeding and pureed food. I suppose there is a bit of sadness too that she will begin to depend less on me, but that feeling is minor in comparison.

I saw a lady in the cafe the other day with a little baby who must have been about two months old and I realised how much A has grown. I also realised that life has gradually become so much easier: this woman was trying to eat her lunch while the baby was crying, whereas A was sitting in a high chair next to me chewing on a crust of bread while I ate my sandwich.

Everyone told me that they grow up so quickly – and it’s true. Although I think we have a few more sleepless nights to go while the other nineteen teeth come through…

Psychiatrist wins Australian of the Year!

This is a bit of an aside post, as it’s not to do with parenting. I am pleased to report that Prof. Patrick McGorry has been awarded the title of ‘Australian of the Year’. He is a psychiatrist who has done heaps of work in youth mental health. He has also worked with refugees and has made a public comment today about the fact that keeping asylum seekers in detention is a recipe for mental health problems. I worked for a while for an agency who treated torture and trauma survivors (refugees) and  I was horrified at what these people had been through pre-migration, and just as horrified at what had happened to them when they arrived here, so I am pleased that he has made such a comment at a time when the newspapers will jump on it.

Psychiatrists rarely are in the media, as mentally ill people are still unfortunately stigmatised and judged in our community. We hear about doctors who treat burns, cure cancer and cut out brain tumours, but not psychiatrists. I hope that Prof. McGorry’s award helps to publicise mental health issues, particularly in young people.

Keeping up with Joneses

I have noticed that we mothers seem to constantly compare our babies to other babies, or what the books say is normal. I am not a competitive mother, and my mothers group are all fantastic and grounded – but it’s hard not to compare A to the others in terms of development. Looking back, I think that I started solids too early with A, and it probably had a lot to do with the fact that the other babies were eating solids, and I felt a ‘peer pressure’ (driven by myself, not others) to start. I also can’t help but look at babies the same age who are already crawling and cruising on furniture and note to myself that A isn’t doing that yet – even though she is developing perfectly normally.

I am still having issues with A’s sleep, with her generally waking twice a night. I had another attempt at settling her without feeding her two nights ago: after two hours, at 4am, I gave up and gave her a quick breastfeed and she slept within minutes. In my frustration, I have looked at so many articles on the net and in books, and of course compare her to the babies in mothers’ group. All but a couple sleep very well, generally 12 hours a night – which makes me feel that A should be doing that too.

I have been thinking about what’s normal. Books say that babies of this age (7 and a half months) ’should’ be sleeping through the night, and that they ’shouldn’t’ need any milk overnight, and that they need to ‘learn’ how to settle themselves without food. But who says this is what should happen? At times when I am tired, I catch myself asking what is wrong with A, or what I am doing wrong for her to be waking at night. But with babies, who are after all individual people, there are no rules about what they should and shouldn’t do. A is ‘a ‘normal’ baby, and I am ‘normal’ mother, and therefore it must be ‘normal’ for babies to wake in the night time too. It is ‘normal’ for some to sleep through, and for some to wake. I do not want to ‘train’ her to cope without me at this age: there’s plenty time for that.

I think that we need to spend less time wondering about what other babies are doing, and what our babies should be doing. They are individual people with individual needs and personalities and as parents, we need to let them be themselves until they are ready to move onto the next stage.

Thumb sucking in a baby

A is now officially a thumb sucker. I was a mum who said I would never use dummies – but when she was about a month old, I gave her a dummy as otherwise she wanted to feed almost constantly, and it was great! The dummy was very useful when she got inconsolable – she’d take it and almost instantly calm down. She never needed it at bedtime, but sometimes she would fight her daytime sleeps and it really helped.

However, when she was about four months, she found her thumb. It’s always been her left thumb. About a month after that, she would refuse the dummy. It could be a problem if she was overtired and flailing her little arms around as she couldn’t keep her arms still enough to get the thumb in there! It was also at this time that she started being able to sleep through the night (OK, it only lasted about a month!) but it was a great way for her to self settle.

In swimming this week, she had her thumb in her mouth for much of the lesson, and the teacher said, “Oh, she’s a thumb sucker, that’s so cute!” So A is officially a thumb sucker. She now does it out of habit rather than just to settle. She does it when she has had enough food, when she is watching the dog, when she is her buggy…

My husband is not happy about it and tries to pull it out if she’s just doing it out of habit (rather than when she’s tired or upset) and I have done that too at times. But then I wonder if we’re drawing more attention to it by doing this, and turning it into a game. In the grand scheme of things, it doesn’t matter. I know that some claim that it can affect speech development and teeth, but I don’t see this as an issue for us at this point. She doesn’t do it when we are reading, singing and ‘talking’, and she has no teeth! If she’s still doing this in 6 months or a year, then I might worry about it. I saw a statistic online that the American Dental Association don’t consider that it is an issue for teeth unless it continues past 4 or 5 years old. And I am sure she will grow out of it by then.

I see it as a way she has learned to settle herself, and taking that away from her now (even if we were able to!) would create more problems that it will solve. There are pictures of babies in utero sucking their thumbs even before they are born – so clearly it is a natural instinct. I have a friend (who will remain nameless!) who recently revealed that she still sucks her fingers when she is going to sleep – and her teeth and speech are fine! It’s just a habit that some of us have, and with a happy, healthy baby, who cares if she is a ‘thumb-sucker’?

Stay at home or working mum?

I was watching Dr. Phil today (yes, I admit it!) and they were discussing stay at home mums and working mums, and the issues around this. I have been thinking a bit about this as A gets older, and most of the women in my mother’s group have either returned to work or are planning it.

I am lucky enough to be able to choose to stay at home with A at the moment, and I know that not everyone has the luxury of choice, for financial reasons. The loss of my income to our family is significant, and I am plagued with feelings of guilt about not bringing money in. I have always had a job since I was a teenager, so it is a big change for me. Of course, things are not about ‘me’ any more, but about ‘us’ as a family, but it still feels strange for me. I also had paid maternity leave, and believe strongly that all women should have access to this. I have had the feeling at times that if I returned to work, then we could buy a house, or go on overseas trips, but I think that being at home with her is more important and valuable than that.

I have no urge to go back to work yet, and always planned to be at home for at least the first twelve months of A’s life. I believe that this first year is particularly critical for an infant’s development and my choice is to be with her full-time at this stage. I don’t feel that I’d be able to put her in day care yet. I’m not sure that any mother ‘wants’ to I suppose, but again it comes down to necessity and making choices for yourself. If I had family around me, I may have been much more willing to consider some part-time work, knowing that they could care for A.

Child care is talked about as if it is one entity, but of course there are many options and huge variations in the quality of it. Options range from hiring a nanny to come into your house, giving a consistent one on one figure in the familiar surroundings of your home, to home day care, and centre based day care. And of course, the outcomes for children will depend not only on the type and quality of day care, but also on the age at which they go into care and the length of time they spend there. A child who has full-time day care from eight weeks is a different situation to one who attends three half days a week from age three. And the variable that is often not considered is the quality of the relationship with their parents.

In the 1980s, there were a couple of studies which said that having more than 20 hours a week of childcare in the first year of life was associated with a more insecure attachment relationship between mother and child, but these results were controversial. Other studies found no such difference, and a study was designed to answer this question: The NICDH (National Institute of Child Health and Human Development) Study of Early ChildCare and Youth Development. This followed up 1364 children randomly chosen from birth from across the USA, and is still going as the children become older. They found that child care factors themselves (hours, age at entry, quality, frequency of changes in child care) did not predict poor attachment. Children were more likely to be insecurely attached when they had ‘dual risk’  i.e. problems in the relationship with their mother/parent as well as child care factors. Also, good quality child care could ‘compensate’ for a poor mother-infant relationship more than in low-quality care.

(Howes & Spieker: (2008). Attachment Relationships in the context of Multiple Caregivers. In Cassidy and Shaver, (eds.),  Handbook of Attachment, 2nd ed (pp 324-325). New York:  The Guilford Press.)

The study is large and there are many more factors to take into account, but it seems to confirm that child care itself – particularly if it is high quality – is not a risk factor for poor attachment relationships, and probably what is more important is the quality of the mother-child relationship.

As with most things in parenting, each family makes the choices that are right for them. A mother who feels isolated when she isn’t working, or a family under financial stress, is much more of a problem than a child being in some form of child care.

I have no immediate plans to go back to work yet, and am very happy with that decision – but I know that one day I will be back. I remind myself to enjoy every day I have at home with A, as before I know it, these days will be over.

Letting your baby ‘cry it out’

I have days when I am very frustrated at A’s  inability to sleep through the night. She still wakes an average of twice a night, sometimes three times. I know that an easy way to get her to go straight back to sleep, before either of us have properly woken, is to give her a quick breastfeed: she settles almost instantly and I can be back in bed within 10 mins.

However, I am pretty sure that she is not waking through hunger: she is now eating three big meals a day as well as breastfeeding. She may be thirsty I suppose (though won’t take water when I offer that!) but deep down, I think she is waking and crying for comfort. At seven months, she is now entering the stage of separation anxiety, which is completely normal and healthy at this stage of development. I think she wakes at night and gets upset about being alone.

Last night she woke at 11.30pm and I gave her a quick feed then, but she woke again about 3am. I tried to settle her without feeding her, but to be honest I think she got more upset (perhaps because she is used to being fed). Against my better judgement, I was determined not to feed her when she woke. So I kept trying to settle her by other means, but had to leave her to cry. She cried for 5 -10 mins (I was there checking on her all the time) then fell asleep, then after 5 mins did the same again, and this went on for about 45 mins, then she slept until 7am.

So, I suppose some might call that a ’success’, particularly the advocates of letting babies ‘cry it out’ and ‘learn’ to settle themselves. The thing is, I know that A can settle herself usually. She goes to bed awake, day and bedtime, and settles herself with her thumb sucking and her cuddly toy. Last night just didn’t feel right to me. Babies cry when they need us, and to let them cry just teaches them that we won’t come when they need out help. If I continue to leave her to cry, she may indeed stop calling out at night, but she will still be waking up upset, but just won’t bother crying as she knows noone will help her. I ended up being awake for an hour, and stressed because she was upset. I have no doubt that she was more stressed that she would normally be too, and probably had a worse night’s sleep too.

So what if she has two quick breastfeeds overnight if it settles her, and we both get a good night’s sleep? Even if she doesn’t need the food, I’d rather she knows that I will respond when she cries, and I’m sure that this is healthier for her emotional development.

For me, letting a baby cry itself to sleep just doesn’t make sense.

Baby refuses to take a bottle!

For several reasons, I have decided to start the process of weaning A off breastfeeding. She is seven months old now, and while I am in no hurry to stop, I would like to have a bit more flexibility in terms of being able to leave her. On Saturday morning, I was going to meet friends for coffee and my husband was staying home with A. I was trying to leave the house, but she was due for a feed. My husband tried to give her a bottle but she refused and screamed so I had to feed her before I could go out. That’s not a big deal, but I’d like to be able to confidently go out for a day knowing that she will feed.

The thing is, she used to take a bottle (of expressed breast milk) without any problem, from my husband or from me. But now she won’t even take it in her mouth, let alone drink.

I have been looking for tips and have found many, including staying away while my husbad tries so she doesn’t smell my milk, and letting her start to feed then swapping to the bottle. But she just isn’t interested at all, which is very frustrating.

I’ve been thinking about it from her point of view, and I don’t blame her really! She has fed hundreds of times from me, and to expect her to change quickly is a lot to ask. I know my milk is the right temperature, the right taste and provides everything she needs. I would be angry too if someone tried to take away my favourite drink or food and substitute itr for something inferior. She also gets some lovely skin to skin contact with me when she feeds, and a cuddle and lots of comfort. I did have some success getting her to drink some from a little cup today (she wouldn’t take it from her sippy cup either) but it was very messy!

Her reaction has made me more ambivalent about weaning her, after I was sure that I had made my decision to slowly start the process. It’s as if she knows that I am torn, and is telling me, “not yet mum!” She has been sleeping very badly and wanting lots of feeds at night to settle her, and this is also a flag to me that she is using breastfeeding for comfort as much as food.

For now, I am going to continue to offer milk from a bottle or cup, but I know it’s never a good idea to get in a battle with her over. If she gets upset, I’ll just leave it for a week or two and try again. If she’s not ready, then she’s not ready, and maybe I’m not ready either.