trapped?

Okay, here's the latest giant question in our household these days- to pacify or not to pacify? I'm talking, of course, about using a pacifier, which goes by lots of names apparently- a binky, a comforter, a soother, or as we refer to it in our humble little abode- 'the plug.' I know that this is oftentimes a very heated topic, and even though our little baby is number three, this has never been an issue for us before. But I fear that we have fallen into what we're calling the pacifier trap this time around. When the big kid was a baby, he was as colicky as could be. I tried a pacifier. Lord, I tried everything. He just cried and there was no soothing, pacifying, comforting or plugging him. Eventually, he learned to control his little long fingered hands and fell in love with his thumb. According to some camps, this is much preferable to becoming attached to a pacifier. (I'm not quite sure that's the case for him, since he still quite frequently resorts to it in his sleep, so I'll go to wake him in the morning and there it is shoved firmly in his mouth. The dentist has already advised us to start saving.)

With the toddler, I think I tried the pacifier, but the thing was, she was just mellow. (Definitely using the word was, for she has become a full-fledged whining and demanding almost-two-year-old. She's a peach, I tell you.) So, the pacifier was again a non-issue. She went to sleep just fine at an extremely early age and slept through the night like a champ. Never in our wildest dreams did we ever imagine our family growing beyond the four of us, so I honestly thought this was an issue well in our past.

Fast forward to baby number three. Surprise! While he comes nowhere near the colicky records that the big kid broke back in the day, he is also not as low-key as the toddler was. He's somewhere right in the middle, which I guess is only fair. About two weeks ago, I started to use a pacifier at night when putting him to bed, as he actually would take it, and as soon as he started sucking on it, he'd fall right back into the coma-like sleep that he usually only ever attained by nursing. Yea! I thought my problems of having to nurse him multiple times at great lengths throughout the night were gone. If only.

This week, something had changed. Starting back on Monday night, he simply began to wake immediately upon the pacifier falling out of his mouth, and despite several attempts to 'replug' him, his sleeping stretches would hardly ever go past 15-30 minutes. And to add some fun to the mix, he also decided to repeat those sleep patterns during the day-- naps have been few and far between. By Wednesday night, I'd had enough. I simply could not spend another entire night hovering somewhere just above real sleep with my hand stretched over to the co-sleeper holding that darn pacifier in place. So last night, we forced my sweet little (subjective term for a 15+ pound baby) 3-month-old baby boy to try to sleep sans-plug. Oh boy, what fun that was. Lots and lots and lots and lots and lots of trips upstairs to soothe him, sshhhusshhh him, rub his belly, rock him, etc, etc. Not fun for any of us. (Amazingly enough, given the fact that we live in this little townhouse, the other two kids weren't affected at all. Let's hope it stays that way.)

That brings us to today. Another fun-filled day of the baby being unable or unwilling to sleep. A whole lotta crying going on. By dinner time, I was actually in tears thinking about the evening to come. Lovely husband and I had a whispery debate about the 'right' thing to do, as baby boy lay in his co-sleeper crying after I nursed him and laid him down. Not that it's a disagreement, we just were literally at a crossroads and were unsure of which way to turn.

Since I'm the one who is turning into the human-pacifier in the middle of the night, lovely husband acquiesced to my desire to let him cry for a little bit. I went in to read a chapter of our current book with the big kid, with the plan to return to the baby for round one (of who knows how many?) of comforting as soon as our reading was finished. Things went according to plan, and when I returned to his bedside to rub his belly, he was quiet within two minutes. No nursing. No pacifier. Not even picking him up. I watched him for a minute and made for the exit. I'm not too proud to say that I actually crawled out of the room, at least as far as I imagine he could see if he just happened to actually be lying there wide awake. Yup, I'll crawl on my hands and knees if it means he might stay asleep for a little bit.

That was a half hour ago, and so far, so good. It's so weird that you'd think I'd have this thing down pat by now- this being number three and all. But there are times that I feel like that first-time mom all over again, even though in theory, I should be 7 years wiser with a whole lot of experience under my (ever-expanding) belt. Go figure.