Mystery Baby

Oh my goodness crying baby. Here we thought we were in the clear. At about 4.5 weeks, we seemed to have gotten Regan's crying and how to soothe her figured out. Paul and I were talking about how that 6-week crying curve didn't seem to apply to her because she seemed to be crying less and less instead of more and more. Well, we jinxed ourselves. She's back with a vengeance. Yesterday and the day before, she just cried or fussed basically aaaaalll day long. Only way I could get her to stop was to hold her on my chest, and even that didn't always work. Could be something I ate (I'm going back to cutting way down on the dairy) or could be just her baby ways. Is it possible that she's worried I'm going to leave her for a few hours again? She cried for two days after I did that. She's too young for that to be the reason, right?

She has really been a mystery lately. She also wasn't sleeping much at all during the day. She used to nap in her swing in the living room with me, sometimes with the TV and bright lights on. I didn't used to have to do much of anything to get her to fall asleep during the day, just put her down and cover her up. Now, after several hours of her being awake, I have to feed her, swaddle her, rock her and oh-so-carefully put her in her crib with the lights off and the door closed. And I usually expect to hear her fussing on the monitor in 30 minutes. Maybe she's becoming more aware of noise and light. Maybe her tummy hurts too much to sleep. Who knows? Her nighttime sleeping hasn't changed much. She's still up about every 2 hours, with an occasional longer stretch. She has slept a lot more today because I've focused on making sure she does. I'm hoping she still sleeps tonight. I'm sort of stumped. Aren't babies supposed to sleep like, well, babies?

She seems to be eating less too. Sometimes she'll latch on and chow down like usual. But other times she'll latch for a swallow or two, then fuss, the root, then latch for a minute, then fuss... and on and on. Or she'll latch and eat well, but just for a couple of minutes. Or she'll root around when we touch her cheek, but won't eat.

I never thought I'd be one of those "note-taking" parents, writing down every little thing. But I feel like I need to tote around a laptop and spreadsheet to keep track of everything. Memory must be the first to go when sleep deprived. Hopefully some patterns start emerging soon. I'm ready for some kind of routine to be established.

Massage scheduled for tomorrow! Can't wait!