The night of the long baby

It is almost 10 am Helen, Molly, Murray, Maisy and I are all still in bed - the joys of being able to work on a wireless laptop.

That was a long night ! Molly became a breastfeed refusenik last night despite being obviously in need. She sucked and screamed intermittently all night and slept hardly at all.

I made 3 attempts to put her into the crib (Yes Molly, the really, really, really precious, beautiful antique Arts & Crafts crib that I spent hours preparing for you to SLEEP in !) none of which was successful. On the first occasion we thought we would try letting her settle in the crib - how bad an idea was that ?!!! Helen somehow managed to fall asleep for a few minutes (Er possibly through fatigue ? - Ed.) but 20 minutes later the screaming had not subsided by a single decibel, so that idea got a big thumbs down. I have never been an advocate of leaving babies to cry.

The other two occasions were after she had apparently fallen asleep. On the first occasion, I laid her down really slowly and carefully into the crib, maintained body contact with her for a few minutes to ensure she did not wake immediately and like an old pro slowly withdrew the pressure before retreating back to bed. Molly continued sleeping peacefully until about 4 seconds after I climbed under the duvet. The second time I tried the same thing, I think she managed maybe 7 or 8 seconds. So at that rate of progress in about 2 or 3 months we might get it up to a few minutes.

We changed her nappy, tried to feed her some more, put her in the bed between us so that we could hear her scream from a position of greater comfort, got up walked her around the room. I even tried singing to her - yes I know that I should have known that would not work. Those who have heard me 'sing' will be acutely aware of my shortcomings in that department.

Eventually we succumbed and fed her about 7ml of formula from a syringe - it worked like magic to put her to sleep, albeit fitfully at first. I walked around with her some more and took her into the nursery and sat with her on the couch while Helen got some sleep. After the third abortive attempt to put her into the crib (see above) I got her back to sleep and laid her between the two of us, where she slept the sleep of the just for about 2.5 hours. However, we were not granted the same luxury because it was 05.45 when I climbed into bed with her and just 1 hr 15 mins later it was time for Emily & Charlotte to get up to go to school !

I suppose the smart money would be doing what Helen and Molly are doing now - catching up on their sleep. Even the dogs are lying here snoring for Britain. Sadly, once I am awake that is pretty much it. I think I might sneak down for some breakfast.

I wonder how Alan & Libby are doing - I have now put a link to their blog on our blog page towards the top of the page on the right handside, under the heading "Links" for those who require subtitles for the hard of thinking.

I also wonder how Lucy, Adrian and Harry are getting on with breastfeeding, sleeping etc. They are such cool cats that they have undoubtedly taken to it like ducks to water - if you can unravel the mental picture presented by that mixed metaphor.

Where does the expression "I slept like a baby" come from ? Has its meaning become corrupted ? Shouldn't it's true meaning be "I woke up every few minutes all night screaming for food" ?