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January 8, 2003
DON’T MOVE MY CRIB
We moved last November, and the move didn’t set well with Jordan for awhile. He had basically grown up in our apartment and was used to his bedroom. He could be laid in his crib and he’d mess around for awhile and fall asleep. But the move disrupted his ease of mind, I guess, and for a good two weeks he wouldn’t sleep in his crib in his new room without me or his mother asleep in the room with him. And that would have been all right, but for the fact that we didn’t necessarily always want to go to sleep beside his crib every night.
Neither could we always be assured that he would stay asleep once his eyes were closed. Several memorable nights, he would jerk himself awake every few minutes to make sure someone was laying beside him. One night, he didn’t even look to see if someone was there, he just raised himself up with his arms, shot forward with his legs, caught the bars of his crib, all in one motion, stood up and started wailing.
To be fair, his room was a mess for a week or so, and that could have given anyone nightmares, especially if all you knew were the kind walls of your bedroom. It took a good two weeks for him to quit acting frightened of his room, but he’d still need someone to sleep in the room with him if he woke up while being placed in the crib or if he woke up at night.
Those were horrible, sleepless nights. The first week or so was exacerbated by our moving, which caused often inappropriate responses from me to Jordan’s change of mood. I didn’t like it. He’d always been a good kid in his 11 months, so why was he torturing me now? And part of the problem was that I didn’t know what to do to ameliorate the situation. Nothing seemed to work, speaking of which, I couldn’t get any done, either for my job (which I do while at home) or for getting moved in. Jordan seemed to want every second of the day and night. I didn’t appreciate this new personality that had taken over my child.
But finally, as I said, Jordan started acting more normally. He’d go to sleep on my shoulder and I’d lay him in his crib, where he’d stay most of the time. Soon he started sleeping through most nights, another small victory. And now he’s finally started falling asleep on his own in the crib, if he’s tired. Big victory.
And now we’ve gotten the house looking more and more like somebody lives in it, I’ve been able to get three or four hours a day of work in for the past month, and Jordan and I have come to an understanding that I will make the rules and he will find a way around them, if not break them to my face. But more about that later.
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