Baby Nuthouse: brilliant insights from early motherhood

Six years into this parenting thing, I thought it would be fun to share a few journal entries from the early days with my first newborn.

Unfortunately, I could not find any coherent journal entries from the early days with my first newborn. Sentences were nowhere to be found. Instead, I had written stuff like this:

Tues.
9 a.m. - got up, changed diaper, took shower
9:45 - fussed, even while held, ate
10:05 - asleep/sleepy
10:10 - in bed
10:15 - fussed, put in sling
12:30 - put in bed
12:40 - woke up, ate
1:15 - play time on floor
1:40 - went for a walk
2:30 - got back
2:40 - ate and napped
3:45 - woke up
4:00 - fussed, ate
4:30 - in bouncer (making dinner)
4:50 - in sling, fussed
5:00 - in bed, cried
5:10 - picked up, cried, tried rocking, squats, nothing works
5:20 - ate a little, fell asleep
5:25 - in bed
5:35 - cried, in sling, fell asleep
6:10 - woke up, fussed

Clearly, I had no idea what I was doing.

It is now obvious that I should have just kicked back with a good novel and let the fussy baby sleep slumped over my shoulder. Or, alternatively, put him in his crib and let him cry it out while I took a nap or maybe a long bath. Either way, things would have likely turned out just fine.

Instead, I researched theories and methods about infant sleep and made lists of my boring daily activities hoping to recognize patterns and establish a schedule. Which never happened. And things turned out just fine.

Now when I pick up my son, his feet dangle below my kneecaps.