Becoming Mother

A book and a blog for first-time mothers

Tag: advice

March 20, 2020

Online Learning for Those Who Just Can't Anymore

So I’m in the unique position of being able to look at the pandemic through the lens of the exhausted higher education faculty member as well as the eLearning professional.

In the past year, I’ve started working as an eLearning professional at a community college. Before that, I taught for 15 years as an ESL instructor with almost all of that teaching done in the face-to-face modality. I have also taught online and used a flipped learning approach frequently over the past few years.

My Lens as a Teacher

Just last week, a new group on Facebook emerged: Pandemic Pedagogy.

In the first few days, as instructors swarmed to the site, it became clear that there were a few currents of sentiment that went like this:

Just… like… how the hell am I supposed to teach online?

I’m utterly exhausted from teaching already, and now I have to do even more work?

I’m an adjunct instructor and I don’t get paid for this extra work. LET’S REVOLT.

Be kind to your students! Their lives are completely disrupted, just like ours, and they may not have reliable internet access! Figure out how to maintain educational equity!

I’m falling apart because the kids are home and I’m creating all this new content and I’m not keeping up with grading and I keep getting desperate emails from students and I’m worried about my health and the federal government is a mess and I can’t find toilet paper anywhere and my spouse says my job is so easy because it can be done online and I CANNOT DO THIS ANYMORE.

My empathy for teachers everywhere right now is real. This flat-out sucks. Teaching online isn’t “easier.” Having done it, I can say that it is definitely more time-consuming, as you are constantly communicating with students, generating or posting content, and trying to keep up with grading.

Then, multiply all those efforts times THREE, FOUR, or FIVE and you start to understand why some teachers are seriously ready to bail out in the middle of semester and work at Kroger or Amazon (They’re hiring!).

What I want to say is that you have every right to be frustrated and stressed about the situation. I hope you take your moment to blow this whole thing off for a period of time. But when that moment passes, and for most of you I think it will, please know that no one (at least reasonable people) is expecting you to perform miracles.

So when the anxiety keeps you up late at night, you are definitely not alone.

My Lens as an eLearning Professional

As an eLearning professional, I’ve been reviewing hundreds of courses over the past week to check whether the course is ready to go live on March 23rd.

At this point, we are not looking for stellar courses. Quality Matters alignment is out the window. We are simply looking at whether students can access an updated schedule and can find the content that they need for the first week or so of class.

So let this be my first reassurance: If you’ve got an easy to find document/post where students can tell what they should do on which date, you are already ahead of the curve.

As for the rest of it, here are some snippets of advice:

On Getting Oriented

Consider prominently posting an introduction to the second half of the course on your LMS course page. Video is best because it establishes visual instructor presence, but even a nicely worded document can do. Reassure your students that you will get through this course together. Practice kindness with your students and ask them to be kind to you. Go over any FAQs that you want to make sure that all students know before you embark on this journey. Make what works for you. Providing this kind of introduction provides reassurance and stability to your students that they desperately crave right now.

On Teaching Synchronously

Please, please don’t feel that you have to generate all new content for every lesson. Don’t feel that you have to record all of the lectures that you would have given face-to-face. And if you’ve been given different advice from administrators, I implore you to do what is best for your students anyway. This is not the time to listen to bad advice.

Here’s the truth: Students do not want to watch you teach synchronously during the same hours that you had been spending together face-to-face. Their lives have been completely disrupted. Their kids are out of school. Maybe they lost their job or are working a new one. Maybe they have limited connectivity at home.

This doesn’t mean that you don’t teach your content. It means that you find accessible ways to do so. If you used to teach for 50 minutes on a topic, extract the key points and boil it down to 10-15 minutes, followed by a series of exercises, problems, or case studies, whatever works for your field. Make sure your students have access to the answers so they can assess themselves and track their understanding. Remember that your students can re-watch the videos. There is an incredible amount of repetition, re-clarification, and reiteration that happens in in-person teaching that is simply not necessary in online teaching. Say what needs to be said and move on. They can re-watch the videos and ask question in the forums that you provide. (And don’t be afraid to embed instructional videos that others have made. If the videos are on YouTube and allows for you to embed it on your course page, the content creator benefits from the additional views.)

My advice is: Offer an optional synchronous office hours time, maybe just 1 hour per week, where students can drop in and ask questions.

Be prepared: It’s likely that the ones who come won’t even want to talk about the class in the first session. They may just need someone to process the disruptions in their lives. This is how you build rapport, community, and more importantly TRUST. If your students trust you, they are more likely to stay engaged over the long haul and struggle through the challenges of learning in an era of disruption. You don’t have to be specially trained to do this. Just BE KIND and listen. Acknowledge what they are going through. If you feel like it, share how this crisis has affected your life.

I also encourage you, with the permission of your students, to record your office hours and share the recording with the class, to build that sense of community for your students who are not able to attend synchronously. Even simply watching an asynchronous recording of you talking with other students can go a long way toward helping all students feel connected to you in this time of uncertainty when everyone is so isolated.

On Organizing for Student-Centeredness

Give students a course schedule, an updated syllabus, or even a basic pinned announcement or post that is your students’ cornerstone for the course. Tell them what to do on a weekly basis so they can keep track. I recommend labeling modules by weeks or dates and organize content inside of those weeks. Students don’t want to go to 8 different modules to pull together all of their content for one week’s work. (Spoken by a teacher who has organized her class like this! Learn from my mistakes!)

Rest assured: No one is expecting you to do a stellar performance this term.

On Online Quizzes

If you’re going to administer a quiz online, please preview the quiz as a student and consider any tweaks that can make it less stressful for students. Do what works for your situation and remember that some of your students are likely to have spotty connectivity, which can make it stressful for them to do an online quiz between a certain time period, especially when it’s timed.

Final Thoughts

So if you just seriously can’t anymore, you are definitely not alone.

Keep your class simple and clear.

Do what you can.

Be kind.

We are all just trying to get through this.

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July 20, 2018

Postpartum Weight Loss Reality Check

Someone, somewhere started this saying, “Nine months to put it on, Nine months to take it off.”

Ha, I say.

Nine months?

I wish.

For both of my pregnancies, it took a solid 15-18 months to get it all off.

And it took the magic of intermittent fasting to get the last 10 pounds off.

First, disclaimers. Everyone is different (duh) and I’m not a medical professional (obviously).

But here’s what I experienced.

Basically, the experience of pregnancy and birth puts your body into metabolic overload.

Chugga-chugga-choo-choo!

Then, after birth, your body continues in its highest gear for a period time, before it completely powers down. It takes a while for your body to figure out it’s new normal metabolism. We’re talking months. Even if you’re eating well and exercising.

I’ll detail it out here:

Birth – 6 Months Postpartum: The Engine Slows to a Crawl

  • Birth – 1 month postpartum
    • Exercise: Moving self through the house
    • Diet: Eating whatever I was hungry for–and I was hungry a lot
    • Lost 10 pounds

It’s too bad that I was too sleep deprived to fully appreciate how quickly I lost weight in that first month postpartum. Pretty sure I’ll never lose weight that quickly ever again in life.

  • 2 months – 5 months
    • Exercise: Walking, light aerobics and weightlifting, 3-4 days per week
    • Diet: Eating whatever I was hungry for–and I wasn’t hungry as frequently
    • Lost
      • 2 months postpartum: 3 pounds
      • 3 months postpartum: 1 pound
      • 4 months postpartum: 1 pound
      • 5 months postpartum: 1 pound

I started keeping track of my measurements around this time.

Why? I’m sure some of you are asking. Why would you do that to yourself?

A few reasons. First, any change in my measurements gave me motivation to keep going–especially since I started out with six inches to lose from my hips.

  • 6 months
    • Exercise: Light jogging and weightlifting, 5-6 days per week
    • Diet: Keeping intake to 1600-1700 calories per day
    • Lost 0 pounds

Undoubtedly, six months postpartum was my peak dissatisfaction with body. I mean. Really. Lost 0 pounds.

When the dust settled and my body figured out that it wasn’t carrying another human being anymore, my metabolism settled on a nice comfortable rate of losing 1/4 pound per week. It wasn’t the rate that I wanted, but at least I was moving in the right direction.

7 months: Second Gear

  • 7 months
    • Exercise: Medium-impact aerobics and weightlifting, 6 days per week
    • Diet: Keeping intake to 1600-1700 calories per day, eating more protein
    • Lost: 2 pounds

At 7 and 8 months postpartum, I had recovered enough (Kegels, ahem) to get back into my higher intensity aerobic training. It was a gradual ramping up of intensity, being careful to avoid injuries. This higher intensity training helped to kick start my metabolism again and begin the path back to my previous fitness level.

8 months – 13 months: Figuring Out How To Keep the Engine Going

  • Exercise: Running and heavy weightlifting, 6 days per week
  • Diet: Aiming for 1500-1600 calories, eating more vegetables and protein
  • Lost
    • 8 months: 3 pounds
    • 9 months: 2 pounds
    • 10 months: 2 pounds
    • 11 months: 1 pound

Over time, I saw my metabolism slow again. At 11 months postpartum, I was still 10 pounds away from my pre-pregnancy weight. And I just wanted to be done with the whole thing.

Nevertheless, I just couldn’t stomach counting calories at all anymore. I had been pretty laissez-faire about it from eight months postpartum onward, but at this point, I just cringed at the thought of keeping any more tallies of calories. Instead, I would just eyeball what I was eating and try to keep meals in an acceptable range.

My husband recommended adding more protein to my diet. So I added some peanut butter to my oatmeal. I didn’t change anything else. Just added the peanut butter.

  • 12 months
    • Exercise: Running and heavy weightlifting, 6 days per week
    • Diet: Not counting calories–added peanut butter to daily oatmeal
    • GAINED 3 pounds

It turns out that adding the peanut butter was not such a great idea. So I went back to my old routines.

  • 13 months
    • Exercise: Running and heavy weightlifting, 6 days per week
    • Diet: Return to old diet without the peanut butter
    • Lost 2 pounds

This is the month when I was ready to do something drastically different. ANYTHING different.

Enough already! I’m running 3.5 miles three times per week! I’m eating healthy! I’m tired of just dropping 1 or 2 pounds a month!

This is when I heard that one of my friends (Thanks, Cate) was doing intermittent fasting. She said that for two days per week, she was restricting her calories to 500 calories. On the other days, she would eat normally.

Oh brother, I thought. That can’t be good for exercising.

“You can exercise,” she told me, after I asked.

“Really?”

“Yeah, look it up.”

So I did.

What’s really funny is that I had been reading The Secret Life of Fat by Sylvia Tara for several months–but I stopped reading just before I got to the section about intermittent fasting.

Secret Life of Fat

There are different ways to do intermittent fasting, and eating 500 calories two days a week didn’t really fit in with my need for daily consistency.

But there was a version that would work great for me: Fasting for 16 hours and eating for 8 hours.

For me, that would mean skipping breakfast. Then eating lunch and dinner.

The idea behind intermittent fasting is to extend your body’s natural fat-burning mode, which happens when you sleep. While you sleep, your body consumes its energy from the day before. When it runs out, it starts burning your fat reserves. As soon as you start eating, your body stops burning fat and starts working on the food. If you can keep your fast going for a few months hours, you give your body a chance to burn more of your fat reserves.

And if you exercise in the morning on top of intermittent fasting?

Powerhouse.

14 months – 18 months: Intermittent Fasting = Quick, Permanent Results

So here’s what happened to me:

  • 14 months
    • Exercise: Running and heavy weightlifting
    • Diet: Eating in an 8-hour-window, 10:00 a.m. – 6:00 p.m., no calorie counting, aim for lots of protein, good fats, and vegetables.
    • Lost 4 pounds
  • 15 months
    • Exercise: Running and heavy weightlifting
    • Diet: Eating in an 8-hour-window, 10:00 a.m. – 6:00 p.m., no calorie counting, aim for lots of protein, good fats, and vegetables
    • Lost 4 pounds

And I’m still going. At almost 18 months postpartum, I’ve returned to my pre-pregnancy weight–and I’ve lost an additional 2 pounds.

If you’re thinking about intermittent fasting, I will say that the first week is probably the hardest. I was extraordinarily hungry until I would eat at 10:00 a.m. But drinking water helped. After a week or so, my body had re-adjusted to a new normal and it’s not nearly so hard to make it to 10 a.m. now, several months later, as it was then.

Not only did I lose weight, but I think that the fasting helped to reset everything in my body.

Read: PMSing and periods have been pretty tame and I haven’t really been sick at all–even though my petri-dish children have given me plenty of chances to travel into the depths with them.

Furthermore, allowing myself to feel hunger for a period of time helped me realize that I was still thinking about hunger from a pregnant mindset. During pregnancy, hunger = nausea. And when I was pregnant, if I allowed myself to go hungry, I paid for it with wanting to throw up.

But not anymore. Now, I can feel hunger again, without the nausea.

More than anything, I’m just thrilled to be back at my old weight, wearing my old clothes, feeling like my old self. It definitely didn’t come easy.

So if you’re out there, trying to lose the baby weight, I’m with ya, girl. It sucks. It really sucks.

My advice to you when you first get into (or back into) exercising: Embrace humility.

No one looks great exercising when they’re first starting out.

And it’s not about “looking hot” anyway, right? You’re over that, right? You just had a baby come out of you. Remember how crazy that was?

Tell yourself you’ve been through harder things then this.

High five to you for hangin’ in there.

I think you’re amazing.

 

bump-pictures-2

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41 weeks, 3 days: Totally done.

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Two days postpartum (No Kate Middleton here. I think she has some special line in her genetic code?)

 

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4 days postpartum

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Two weeks postpartum

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2 months postpartum: Beginning of exercise, still in maternity clothes 

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6 months postpartum: Down to my old yoga pants.

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15 months postpartum: Wearing my old jeans. Jeans, I say!

 

 

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January 3, 2018

I Wore a FitBit for the First Year Postpartum: Here’s How Much Sleep I Lost

Over the past year, my blog post about my changing heart rate throughout pregnancy and the resulting increase in total calories burned per day has become the most heavily trafficked blog post on this site.

So I figured I’d tackle postpartum sleep loss next.

Because, guys, postpartum sleep deprivation is no joke. (Except when it is.)

So, here we go.

Last Days of Pregnancy, Labor, and Immediate Postpartum Period

I gave birth on February 2nd. You can see that in my last days of the pregnancy, I was sleeping around 6 or 7 hours at night (not pictured: the six or seven times that I had to get up each night to pee). I was also taking a nap in the afternoon since my daughter was in daycare and I was wasting my maternity leave by being way beyond my due date. (That wasn’t really part of the plan… But hey.)

Note: Dates are in descending order. That’s the only way FitBit will let me view the data.

Pregnancy Labor Immediate Postpartum Sleep

The last time that I had some solid sleep before giving birth was Wednesday, February 1st. That night, I finally went into labor around midnight (at 41 weeks, 4 days).

It looks like the next time that I slept was on the day that I gave birth.

Do not be fooled. I was completely incapacitated after giving birth and losing 1200 ccs of blood. The same is true of February 3rd. I was lying in a hospital bed, trying to recover, but not really sleeping.

The next time that I actually fell into a light sleep (definitely not REM or a deep sleep) was February 4th.

That’s a full 72 hours without sleep.

Believe it or not, this was an improvement from my first birth, when I went about 96 hours without falling into at least a light sleep. (Wednesday, August 14th, 6:00 a.m. to the night of Saturday, August 17th)

Yeah.

First Week Postpartum

Even with having the help of my husband and mother, on most days during that first week postpartum, I was getting about 5 hours of sleep in a 24-hour period, but only in frustrating 1-hour increments.

Week 2 Sleep

Why?

There were plenty of times during the day when I could have let my mother do the feedings and caught up on sleep.

But honestly, during that first week, I just couldn’t fully power down. I can’t pinpoint one reason. Was it my fluctuating hormones? Was it racing thoughts? Was the stress of recovering and adjusting to life with a second child?

Sure. It was all of these things. It was probably also the additional stress of feeling like, Oh my God, why aren’t you sleeping! Everyone has everything taken care of! Use your time wisely!

Not the most restful thoughts you can have.

So I was exhausted. I hurt everywhere. The afterbirth cramps were intense. I was still bleeding a lot. Breastfeeding was (once again) complete hell and I was dealing with the emotions of stopping completely. The baby was eating every 2 hours and we were figuring out that, just like his sister, he was allergic to dairy. The house was in disorder. The other child was feeling left out. My husband was trying to keep the ship running.

And every night, from midnight to 6:00 a.m., it was just me and the baby. Although it was emotional and beautiful in its own right, it was also incredibly exhausting.

This is when intense sleep deprivation began to take hold. Not only was I unable to sleep because the baby was eating all the time, but my body began to realize that it had lost its placenta (no more all-is-right-and-good-in-the-world levels of progesterone for me anymore).

This week, by far, was the absolute worst for me. 

Some things you cannot do when you’re getting this little sleep:

  • Have a coherent conversation
  • Drive
  • Make decisions
  • Basically, anything beyond mother-infant survival is way too challenging

At the end of this week, my mom (who had mercifully been staying with us after the delivery) returned home. My husband and I looked at each other like, What now? How are we going to get some sleep and not lose our minds?

We made a compromise.

Second Week Postpartum

We decided that my husband would take the evening feedings that happened before midnight. I would get the feedings after midnight. I would try my damnedest to get some sleep before my first night feeding. In addition, on the weekends, my husband would take all of the night feedings so I could get some restorative sleep.

And because he was extra awesome, he allowed me to tag him in when I told him that I was seriously losing my mind. Because, quite honestly, sleeping like this is simply unsustainable for weeks on end.

Week 3 Sleep

Things you still should not do when you’re sleeping like this:

  • Drive
  • Make important decisions
  • Make plans (for anything)
  • Read (you won’t remember what you read)
  • Shop (you’ll forget what you bought)

Third Week Postpartum

By some miracle, our baby started to shift towards only two night feedings by this point, leaving me responsible for just one feeding since my husband took the other one. This is not a common occurrence, so if it happens for you, just express your undying gratitude to the Universe. Seriously.

By this point, I had mostly recovered from the pain of childbirth and postpartum blood loss. I had more energy and was able to independently take care of household responsibilities like dishes, cooking, laundry, and vacuuming.

This dramatically improved my mood. I mean, obviously, right?

If you’re getting this much sleep, driving might be possible, but honestly, it’s really best to only drive if you’re getting at least six hours of sleep every night.

Week 4 Sleep

Fourth Week Postpartum

After about one month after birth, we started to find our rhythm with taking care of the house, the new baby, and the preschooler. We were still doing night feedings, but they were becoming more manageable.

I need to emphasize at this point that my increase in sleep by four weeks postpartum is a direct reflection of my husband’s willingness and ability to step into his role as an equal caretaker. Without his help, I would still be getting minimal sleep by this point.

So hats off to you, Doug. You kept me from losing my mind.

Week 5 Sleep

So when did the baby sleep through the night?

Okay, first, if you’re trying to make friends with other new parents, don’t ask this question.

But I’m game for it. So…

“Sleeping through the night” was a process for us. Our baby slept ten hours in a row for the first time when he was two months old.

BUT…

… it was just a one-night reprise from the continuing pattern of night feedings that stretched on well past four months. At five months, he started to want to put himself to sleep. No more rocking or holding him while he got drowsy. Odd, but I acquiesced.

By six months, his eating schedule got all screwy and he started to develop a middle of the night feeding again. And we had had enough of it. He was a huge baby. There was clearly no need for him to be eating in the middle of the night. He was healthy. He wasn’t teething. Coupled with the crushing reality that things were not going to resolve by themselves, we made the decision:

It was time to Cry It Out.

It took three nights, but it was the best decision we made. Hands down. He dropped the night feeding and learned to tank up in his first and last feedings of the day. No one was worse the wear.

What did your average sleep look like throughout the year?

Here is what my average number of hours of sleep looked like from February 2017 to December 2017 looked like in summary, with some annotations to help make sense of what you’re seeing.

Sleep in 2017

Sleep in 2017

Keep in mind a few things:

1.) I had lots of help.

2.) I had a pretty long maternity leave (at least compared to most women in the U.S.)

3.) I did not breastfeed.

4.) I committed myself to working out in the morning because it improved my mental and emotional state. This meant that I would get up at 4:30 a.m. on most mornings to exercise before the kids woke up and before I had to get ready for work. Yeah, it was hard, but it made me feel so much better. So I made adjustments to help commit to this goal, like going to bed way early (like 8 p.m.)

5.) There were plenty of bouts of illness, teething, and unexplained fussy nights that were peppered throughout the year.

6.) Our baby did not have acid reflux or prolonged colicky periods or other conditions that made him unable to sleep for long periods of time. With the exception of the dairy allergy, he has been very healthy.

***

Postpartum sleep deprivation is real and it’s tough.

No way around it.

If you’re reading this while you’re pregnant with your first child, don’t despair. There are some things that you can do to prepare yourself for the realities that await you soon.

1.) Establish clear expectations about care-taking responsibilities with your partner.

Talk openly. Talk honestly. Agree that no one really wants to lose this much sleep, but damn it, you’re in this thing together. Tag each other in when you’re down for the count.

2.) Do not be too proud to ask for help.

You cannot do this alone. You will need help. And lots of it. You are not Superwoman and there is no glory in trying to be. Few, if any, will know of your struggles to simply get through the day. Every woman who has been through this understands the pain and exhaustion that you are experiencing. They are, quite often, thrilled to help.

3.) When it gets tough, remember that you’re not doing it wrong.

You’re not doing it wrong. It’s just plain hard. No one has an easy time of this, and any woman who says it was not that bad is airbrushing reality.

4.) Ask those who are close to you to let you know when they think you’re not okay.

Losing sleep can bring you to the edge of psychosis. If you go days and days without sleep, you will start to lose your grip on reality. And from your perspective, you may not realize that you’re not fine anymore. If you cannot achieve restorative sleep even when you are provided the opportunity, it is probably time to seek help from your medical provider.

5.) Buy ear plugs and a sleep mask. You’ll need them for daytime sleeping.

Sleep_mask

6.) Coffee.

I mean… obviously.

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Good luck on your postpartum journey, Friends.

It’s a crazy way to live and in the hard moments when your head is warm and fuzzy and everyone around you is so blissfully unaware of how LUCKY they are to have slept more than four hours last night… it feels like it will go on forever and you will forever be stuck in the vicious cycle of Never Enough Sleep.

But you won’t.

Press on.

Please let me know how it’s going for you in the comments below.

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August 3, 2017

My New Book: A Birth Story Guaranteed To Make You Cry

After I gave birth this past February, I thought,

Well. How am I going to write about that?

Because what I felt in labor had been deeply spiritual. In my first labor, I sensed God’s presence, but not in a physical way. What I experienced was beyond my physical senses.

But this time… I had seen things.

I had actually physically felt things that I couldn’t explain.

I knew that a blog post would become buried in this website over time. That’s not the way that I wanted to share this experience with an audience. I wanted something more permanent. Something more discover-able and more available to as many people as possible.

***

So I published a short Kindle book, called Why Your Middle Name is Jacob: A Birth Story.

From August 3-7, I will be giving away free copies, so I encourage you to download your copy today and share with anyone whom you think would be interested in it.

Important: You don’t need a Kindle device to read the book.

As long as you have an Amazon account, you can read this book. Just go to Amazon’s website, log in, find the book, put it in your cart, and checkout (for free). Then choose “Your Account,” and then select “Your Content and Devices.” You will see the book there and you can read it in your web browser.

Included in this e-book are six additional essays that I wrote in the early postpartum period, curated and compiled for a larger audience.

  • The World is Good Because it is Bad: A Letter to My Unborn Child
  • Postpartum Hemorrhage
  • These Holy Hours
  • Week 6: A Great Time to Return to Work
  • Week 7: And Now My Watch Is Ended
  • Is There Room in Motherhood for Feminism?

Kindle Direct Publishing only allows me to give away free copies of a title every 90 days. Please take advantage of this free promotional period while you can. After August 7th, the book will be available for $2.99.

If you download a copy, please review it on Amazon.

As an independent author, I rely on you, dear reader, to share your thoughts on my work.

I greatly appreciate your support!

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March 1, 2017

Week 4: Gentle Sleep Training

Now that I’ve used the words “sleep training,” let me disappoint you.

I’m not in favor of trying to “train” your newborn to sleep.

I don’t think newborns are “trainable.”

Newborns are gonna do what newborns are gonna do.

However, the words “sleep training” are the words that everyone uses when trying to figure out how to get their babies to sleep longer.

So what exactly am I in favor of?

Training yourself to recognize and follow your newborn’s sleep patterns.

***

When our first child was about one month old, I found an amazing book that forever shaped our decisions about how we structured our days with a baby.

baby-sleep

I don’t rave about many baby products.

But let me RAVE about this book.

This book removed the mystery about how babies decide when to fall asleep and how their sleep patterns change as they grow throughout the first year.

It’s not a book based on a parenting style or a fancy technique.

It’s based on science. It’s based on human biology.

The Overall Takeaway: If you soothe your newborn to sleep after he/she has been awake for 90 minutes, he’ll fall asleep and stay asleep for a nap.

Dr. Polly Moore, a sleep researcher and scientist, based her advice in this book on the “basic rest and activity cycle,” which states that human bodies function on 90-minute periods of rest or activity. For example, our attention, alertness, and sleep cycles follow these patterns.

At roughly three weeks old, newborn babies start to establish 90-minute periods of wakefullness. As long as the baby is getting enough to eat and isn’t suffering from other physical ailments, you should be able to see these patterns emerge as early as three weeks.

You can’t train your newborn to stay awake for 90-minutes or to nap for long periods of time. However, you can pay attention and learn how your newborn wants to structure his sleeping patterns. By learning your child’s tired signals and making sure he gets all the naps that he needs during the daytime, you are helping him to reach the Holy Grail of baby-dom: sleeping through the night.

You can do this by taking a few days to log your child’s sleep. Like this:

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Many of these periods of wakefullness last for 90 minutes. However, some don’t. The night feedings usually only last 30 minutes to one hour. Long enough to eat, burp, have a diaper change, and fall back asleep.

What’s important to see in this list of times is that this three-week-old’s naps are already beginning to follow the body’s rhythms. (Note: Forty-five minute naps = Half of a 90-minute increment and three-hour naps = Two 90-minute increments)

Of course, sometimes naps are cut short because the baby didn’t get enough to eat and wakes up to be fed. Or sometimes, he has a huge poop and wants to be changed. But the older the baby gets and the more established his sleeping habits become, the less likely the baby will cut his naps short in order to eat or be changed.

***

Last Saturday, we realized that our baby was starting to establish these 90-minute periods of wakefullness.

I remember reading years ago when we were caring for our first child that the first few weeks of a baby’s sleeping habits are unpredictable. I learned that babies sleep a lot in the first few weeks and that they can pretty much fall asleep anywhere. And stay asleep no matter what is happening around them.

Until last Saturday, I didn’t realize that we had drifted into the zone of 90-minute periods of wakefullness.

I didn’t realize that our baby had started to become unable to block out the noise and stimulation around him.

While our friends came over for breakfast, he remained awake. And awake. And awake. Until about 11:30.

Then, he lost his shit.

Screaming. Inconsolable.

We took him out in the stroller and he gave us the thousand-mile stare. At a fork in the road, my husband turned back to go home while I continued on for a longer walk.

Big mistake.

Henry started downright wailing. He screamed so hard his face turned crimson and went completely silent as he tried to scream without taking in oxygen. He coughed and choked to bring more air into his lungs.

They were the saddest screams I’ve ever heard.

I rushed home, but it was the longest quarter mile ever.

Because we deprived him of sleep that morning, he was completely out of whack for the rest of the day. He couldn’t stay asleep. He screamed and nothing helped. By 10:00 p.m., even my husband had written him off and pronounced that there’s nothing we could do to help him.

I took our son and sat in the glider. Then, I placed him on the ottoman in front of me. I let his hands clutch my fingers while he screamed and screamed.

Five minutes passed. Ten minutes. Fifteen minutes.

I tried all the usual soothing techniques as he sputtered and gasped for more air to continue his wailing.

Then I returned him to the ottoman and rocked him again. This time, his screaming slowed and his eyes rolled back in his head, the way that newborns do.

He had passed out.

***

That night, I reread Polly Moore’s book and realized that we had crossed into new sleeping territory now that Henry is a month old. Now, he’s having trouble blocking out sound and light and stimulation. Now, he needs quiet. He needs a lack of sensation to stay asleep.

We followed the 90-minute wakefullness cycles the next day.

Wow. What a difference it makes when your baby has those needed naps.

***

What I learned from this book is how to determine the best windows to put my baby to sleep. I learned how to recognize emerging sleeping patterns. I learned how to best accommodate my baby’s needs for sleep, including the importance of napping rituals throughout the day that will help a baby establish solid sleeping patterns later.

For us, this means that we don’t take our baby out during his nap times.

Which basically means, he stays at home 90% of the time until his awake periods extend to three hours (around 6-8 months). If we go out, we’ll keep him in the car seat and put on a white noise maker so his naps don’t suffer too much.

It’s a restrictive life, for sure. But he’s not going to be this young forever. I’m willing to make changes in my life for a few months.

For us, establishing good sleeping patterns early on–as we did with our daughter–rewarded us exponentially later on. Our daughter slept through the night regularly (with the exception of teething and sick days) at three and a half months. When she started daycare at five months, it only took her a week to adjust to the new environment and resume her champion napping abilities amidst other crying infants.

***

Every rule has an exception. Here are two cases when the 90-minute wakefullness rule doesn’t pan out as predictably into regular napping patterns.

Babies who are suffering from medical conditions: like acid reflux, food allergies/intolerances, etc.

Babies who are in the midst of a growth spurt: All babies go through growth spurts and they are notorious for throwing all routines into chaos. Naps suffer. Babies wake up from naps early and have trouble falling asleep. They eat too much or too little. They cry. Nay, they wail. They turn into monsters for several days. In fact, we’re going through one right now. From 7:00 p.m. to 11:00 p.m. last night, he was awake, asleep, awake, asleep, hungry, pissed off, asleep, awake, screaming. You get the point.

But when this growth spurt is over, he’ll be pleasant again. And he’ll show us his newly learned moves.

***

There’s a lot more that I can say about how babies change in their sleep needs from birth to the end of the first year, but I’ll let Polly Moore do that for you.

As I said before, there are not many baby products that I am willing to rave about to the point of spending my valuable time actually writing about them…

But this is one of the rare few.

If you’ve got a baby at home, check it out. Seriously.

9 Comments
January 24, 2017

Week 40: Ticking Time Bomb

Tick, tick, tick.

I knew it was possible that I would go beyond my due date again. I went to 40 weeks and 5 days with my first child.

But who really wants to believe that they’ll be put through that again?

But, here we are.

clock

So what do you do when you’re past your due date?

Hand off responsibility of raising your children. Let Grandma take center stage. Send your kid to daycare without an ounce of guilt. If you can’t do either of those, turn on the TV and embrace the zombification of your kids because it’s preserving your sanity.

Walk. Because it’s the only exercise you can really handle at this point. And moving at least 30 minutes a day gives you a better chance of going into labor.

Do yoga. Practice your breathing. Get in some good down-dog and butterfly poses.

Lie on your side. Because it takes the weight out of your back and pelvis. Which now feel like jelly.

Avoid people. Or at least the people with whom you have to engage in small talk. You don’t want to constantly think about the fact that you’re beyond your due date. But it’s the only thing on everyone else’s mind. Don’t get pissed about it. They either can’t help themselves or they don’t know what else to talk about with you.

Read. Start books that you don’t mind if you don’t finish. Because you probably won’t.

Nap. This is the best part. By far. Especially since you’re only sleeping in 45 minutes increments throughout the night now. Because you need to pee, or shift sides, or eat at 3:00 a.m. (Because, of course, the baby is hungry again.)

Google the probability of going into labor on this particular day. I liked this website. I currently have a 57.93% chance of going into labor today. Tomorrow, the probability increases to 61.79%.

Do puzzles. This one is driving me nuts right now. But I’ve got a feeling I’m ready to bust this case wide open.

puzzle

Write. Whatever you want. Without much thought. Because it’s mostly about passing time and not so much about imparting words of wisdom.

Be still. Honor the beauty of silence and suspension. Because soon the day will be full of crying and cooing, dishes and laundry, visitors and friends.

Let go of the perpetual need to accomplish. Because soon “accomplishing” will have much, much different definitions than it does today.

 

11 Comments
October 19, 2016

Cure for the Election 2016 Blues

Like other Americans, I’m working hard to detach this election year from my emotional well-being.

I’m reminded of this clip from The Tudors (one of my favorite series of all time), in which two of Henry VIII’s advisors discuss a translated poem about what it means to have a happy life.

On the left, Henry Cavill plays Charles Brandon, one of Henry VIII’s lifelong advisors. On the right, David O’Hara plays Henry Howard, another member of the court.

What strikes me about this scene is the emptiness of a life lived in the pursuit of power. Both of these characters spend years and years scheming and blackmailing that result in some gruesome plays of power that end the lives of others. Including thousands of innocents.

All in the name of rising above others.

But in the end, the things they long for are things that they could have without any power at all.

They long to live the lives that many of us are living right this moment. 

While this election season drones on and we watch politicians seeking to bury each other in quest of power, let’s not lose sight of what truly makes a happy life.

The happy life be these, I find

The riches left, not got with pain

The fruitful ground, the quiet mind

The equal friend, no grudge nor strife

No charge of rule, nor governance

Without disease, the healthful life

Wisdom joined with simplicity

The night discharged of all care

For much of human history, no place like this has existed in the world. I think our greatest challenge is to exist in the tension between seeking to improve this nation while still being grateful for it.

Let’s keep it in perspective.

Let’s remember that we owe many of these elements of a happy life to the simple fact that we live in this time period, in this country.

We have come a long way from the days of burning people at the stake for being the wrong kind of Christians or having our heads cut off because of our political dissension.

Let’s remember to love what we have.

stamps

 

6 Comments
June 1, 2016

Baby Registries: What to Add, What to Skip

Now that my daughter is almost three years old, I wish I could go back in time and re-do my baby registry. Wouldn’t it be great to know the things that would end up being a waste of resources and the things you ended up using all the time?

So that’s what I’ll do in this post. Obviously, every household and every baby is different, so I’ll try to keep this list to items that seem pertinent to most parents I know.

diaper_cake

Don’t Just Add: Get Several of Them

1.) Car Seats

If you live in a household with two cars, register for two car seats. Even if you’re thinking, Well, we’ll save money and just drive the kid around in one car. There are far too many situations that are guaranteed to happen when just one car has a car seat. (If you both work, the person with the car seat has to leave to pick up a sick child–end of story.)

We registered for one convertible car seat and a stroller/car seat combo. Our rationale: A convertible car seat isn’t great for newborns. You need to purchase extra padding to fill the car seat before you place the baby. We also wanted to have a car seat that could be easily detached from a base without having to unstrap the baby. That was actually a good idea because it helped preserve her naps if we took her out and she fell asleep in the car.

Here’s what we ended up using:

Convertible Car Seat: Britax Marathon (Cost: about $230)

Britax carseat

 

Stroller/Car Seat combo:  Britax B-Agile (Cost: about $250)

Sat, Feb 19, 2011 2:40:02 PM

Oh, and you’ll need to buy a car seat base for this puppy. They don’t advertise that important fact too much. Here is the base (Cost: about $65). You’ll need two of these if you have two cars.

car seat base

The cost is adding up, right? See why you should register for these?

2.) Swaddle blankets: Register for several packs of these

swaddle

If you’re a first-time parent, trust me: You will want to learn how to swaddle a newborn. It chills them out so many times (as long as their not in pain or hungry, at least in my experience).

We tried several kinds of swaddling blankets, including the ones with Velcro that seemed that they would be the easiest to use. But truly, I thought it was easiest to use the very large, durable muslin blankets by Aden and Anais. They were not hard to fold and wrap, the swaddle was tight enough to keep her little limbs from breaking out of it (most of the time), and they washed so, so well.

But these aren’t just swaddle blankets.

They are…

  • car seat covers when you’re outside
  • nursing covers
  • impromptu burp cloths and bibs
  • comfort blankets that your child can use well into toddlerhood
  • Place them on the ground, fill them with dirty laundry, collect the four corners, and they are a lightweight laundry basket!

A sound investment.

Cost: About $50 for a pack of 4

3.) Bibs

Most bibs are just bibs. But not this one.

burpy bib

Behold Aden and Anais’s Burpy Bib.

As you can see, this bib provides a whole cape of protection. Which you want. Your kid won’t just stare straight ahead while he eats. He’ll look around, rest his chin on his shoulder, you get the picture.

We got three of these guys and we used them all the time from about 6 months to 18 months, washed them regularly, and they held up beautifully. And they’re reversible! Cute patterns on both sides!

They are secured in the back with a single, durable, snap closure. The name “burpy bib” comes from the fact that this doubles as a nice burpcloth that you can put over the shoulder. Too bad we didn’t find this bib while we were still using burpcloths. I’m sure we would have used them all the time.

Cost: About $22 per pack of 2.

4.) Sheets

These ones specifically.

crib sheet

Once, again Aden and Anais have created a light, breathable, durable sheet that washes well over and over again. While we had other sheets that lost their elasticity and tore at the corners, these have held up over time. And the patterns are so damn cute.

Cost: About $25-30 per sheet. (That’s why you register for them.)

Add!

4.) Becoming Mother, a.k.a, my book

Book-Cover-Becoming-Mother-Kindle

Okay, so I’m a bit biased here, but really, how many pregnancy books share with you the actual, nitty-gritty experience of becoming a mother? Don’t expect a guidebook or a handbook. Here, you’ll find just the plain, messy truth.

Read some published reviews about it here. You can add it to your Amazon registry or you can buy it now here.

Cost: Print, $12.99. Kindle, $4.99.

5.) Highchair

We thought we would be fine with just an attachable seat that we would strap to a dining room chair. But it turns out that I really wanted her to be at my hip level while standing, not my knee level. We usually pulled the highchair into the kitchen where we could wipe up the spilled food more easily, so I spent a lot of time standing in the kitchen, eating, and cutting up pieces of avocado and banana for her.

We liked Graco’s Duo Diner. The tray was easy to detach if I grabbed from the front or the side. My husband hated the detachable white surface because you could pull it off, and there might still be food stuck on the side that presses against the baby’s belly. (That never bothered me though.) The liner washes well, so when your child inevitably makes a mess or vomits, clean up is easy.

Cost: About $150.

highchair

6.) Snoogle

I slept with this every night from 4 months pregnant to 6 months postpartum. A true lifesaver for all the wonky ways that pregnancy realigns your organs and spine.

Cost: About $50

snoogle

7.) White noise maker

We had one for her car seat to help her sleep if we needed to be out of the house with her during a nap. They did wonders for blocking out sound so she wouldn’t wake up. We used Cloud B’s Sleep Sheep.

Cost: About $28

sleep sheep

At home, we used the MyBaby SoundSpa Slumber Whale. Sound options include a heartbeat, ocean waves, white noise. Music options include Twinkle, Twinkle Little Star, Rock-a-Bye Baby, and Braham’s Lullaby. It also has the ability to project images on the ceiling, but we didn’t really use this. You might though.

Cost: $30

white noise maker

8.) Crib & Mattress

We weren’t a co-sleeping family, so she went to a crib fairly early in life, right around 8 weeks. We got a 4-in-1 convertible style crib that could morph into a toddler bed and later on, a double bed. I can’t remember the exact model that we purchased, but once you’ve seen one crib, you’ve kind of seen them all. Here’s one like the one we have:

crib

Cost: About $200

We actually spent more money on the mattress. Here’s the one that we got.

 

mattress

Cost: About $250

9.) Baby book/Memory album

I mean, really, this is what you’re going to hold on to. Not all of those onesies that you’ve stashed in that one container because you’re too sentimental to let go. You know what I’m talking about…

Everyone has a different level of involvement in creating a baby book. I wanted something structured, but that still had a lot of space for personalizing. I also wanted one that would hold information for the first 5 years. Here’s the one that I got.

baby book

10.) Glider/Rocker

You’re going to be doing a lot of this, so you might as well go big. Here’s the one that we loved.

glider

Cost: $500 (yeah…)

11.) Baby monitor

Some people want video monitors, but I’ve found that an audio monitor was almost always sufficient. We had a model that was sold by VTech, but it must have been discontinued. Figures. It died on us at when our daughter was about 14 months old. It couldn’t retain its charge.

So we bought this one by Philips. And it has been wonderful. Wish we had started with this one.

monitor

Cost: About $100

Meh…

… because they were valuable for brief windows of time.

  • Baby Gyms

A cute purchase, but putting a blanket on the floor giving them toys might have been just as effective.

  • Jumperoo

A cute purchase that kept her occupied when she was between 6 months and 1 year old. After that, she wanted to be out and about, all the time.

  • Co-Sleeper/Bassinet

I have to admit that it was nice to have her sleeping right next to me at night when she was a newborn. A co-sleeper gave her a separate space to sleep, while still remaining close. But she outgrew this by the time she was 7 weeks old. If you’re interested in this getting a co-sleeper, I can say that this was a decent one.

  • Pack N’ Play

I think if we had different lifestyles, this might have been a useful purchase. But we strongly preferred for her to sleep at home. We did end up buying a Pack N’ Play when we needed to travel to Minnesota for a funeral and she was about 10 months old. We didn’t think any of us would sleep well if we all shared a bed. We also used it when we were moving and didn’t have her room completely unpacked yet. Other than those instances, we didn’t usually find ourselves in situations when we needed a Pack N’ Play for her to take a nap.

  • Diaper Bags

I found that what I needed to take with me changed so much that I ended up buying three different diaper bags as time went on. I guess you can register for one, but be open to the likelihood that you upgrade and downgrade through the first three years.

Don’t Add…

…because these will only be used for brief windows of time.

  • Puj Bath Tub

A great concept–a baby bath tub that folds away for flat storage.

puj tub

But only while your baby is small. Our daughter was a 7-pound 11 ounce baby at birth, which placed her at 50% percentile. However, her growth accelerated in the first two months. At three months old, she was already 15 pounds–and way too big for this tub. We ended up buying a tub made by The First Years and used it until she was about a year old.  Then it was big-girl bath time.

baby bath

  • Bumbo

Like I just said, my daughter tracked high in height and weight early on. So she barely fit into this contraption by the time she finally had enough head control to sit in it. The first time I put her in it, she immediately vomited. Guess her stomach wasn’t used to being compressed that way.

I duly gave it away after that.

I’ve met more than a few other mothers who were equally meh about the Bumbo. Some swear by it. I guess you can’t know until you have an idea about how quickly your baby is growing and whether you’ll have a need for it.

bumbo

  • Baby Walkers

I’m not such a free-range parent that I’m morally against putting my child in some kind of “containment furniture” (I admit, sometimes, it is nice to have them in something that they can’t get out while I’m doing something else). But my daughter didn’t really get the point of these.

She would sit in it, and try to jump in it, as if it were a Jumperoo. I tried to show her how to use her little legs to move it, but I don’t think she was motivated to make it go. She preferred to just crawl. Even when she was learning to walk, she didn’t want to be in this thing. Honest to God, she preferred to use my husband’s shoe horns as her “balancing sticks” and would toddle along with one in either hand. Aw, memories.

walker

  • Shopping Cart Cover

First, I hated taking my daughter grocery shopping because I could never figure out a good way to put her car seat in the cart. I heard this position was a huge no-no.

Shopping-Cart-Diagram-Dorel

And the safest option was to put in the cart, where I was going to put all my purchases. Which means I couldn’t do a week’s worth of grocery shopping at one time. Plus, I was fairly strict about being home during her naps. So until she started staying awake longer than two hours, shopping with her wasn’t happening very often.

So most of the time, my husband and I took turns grocery shopping without her. It wasn’t until she was a year old that we started considering taking her grocery shopping with us. And by that time, I think we might have used the cover 5-10 times before it was just more trouble than it was worth.

But hey, maybe I would have used it more if I needed to take her grocery shopping. Who can say.

cart cover

 

…because every baby is different.

  • Bottles
  • Pacifiers
  • Diapers
  • Baby carriers (try them out, return the types your baby hates)

Instead, use gift cards for these to try them out.

 

…because people are going to buy them for you anyway.

  • Clothes, shoes, socks
  • Burp cloths
  • Baby shampoo/lotion
  • Diaper cream
  • Towels/washcloths
  • Books
  • All toys, including teethers

 

The key to making a great baby registry is to

  • provide a variety of choices with different price points ($10-$25 range; $30-$50 range, $50-$100, and above $100).
  • register only for items that you’re fairly certain you’ll use
  • make sure to list gift cards as options on the registry

Finally, gratefully accept whatever gift anyone gives you, even if you end up returning it. Baby shower gifts are one person’s good wishes for you and your baby and the last thing you want to do is hurt a relationship over a gift. It’s your relationships with others that will get you through the tough times, so be good to them.

Happy registering!

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