Praise be to Gerber and put a kibosh on permissiveness

If you've seen me recently, you may have noticed my raccoon eyes. The cavernous bags under my eyes are the result of Matt effectively abandoning his 10 hours straight sleep pattern and replacing it with an every 1 3/4-3 hours feeding frenzy. Shoot me in my head!!!

As much as I really wanted to nurse exclusively for six months with Matt (since this feeding frenzy happened to Andy at the beginning of his fourth month--as opposed to Matt, at the end of his fourth month), I relented and started cereal today!

PRAISE BE TO GERBER!!! And so begins my Sunday homily.

Now that I've written this, I know I've jinxed myself and what I'm about to tell will just be a fluke. I tried to give him his first batch of cereal as fortified milk. One tablespoon in about an ounce and a half of milk. Needless to say, since he doesn't take a bottle, he didn't take fortified milk in a bottle. My friend, Amber, sent me a fantastic bottle that seems to be more successful than any of the others but still not great (I think, as nervous as I am to ruin the bottle, I need to poke a couple more holes in the bottle b/c one hole just isn't enough flow).

So I decided to just put Matt in the highchair (for the first time) and spoon feed him. When I did this with Andy (did this before figuring out to put it in a bottle), it ended up ALL over his face. With Matt, from the get go I made it far more like soupy cereal than fortified milk. Having tested his response to a spoon a couple of days ago, I just went in for the kill. I had to respoon a few bites but it all made it into him. One tablespoon and a few generous squirts of milk. Can you say chow hound? I then nursed and put him down for a nap. He slept for almost TWO hours in his crib! Those are two milestone---the two hours of sleep and the two hours of sleep in his crib during the day. Not in the swing!

I did the same thing six hours later. This time there was even more cereal. Another nursing and nap time. Almost another two hours went by. During this time, Andy was asleep and John was out. BLISS!!!!

I gave him the thickest consistency tonight. We'll see how long he goes tonight.

So all of this made me think about how I'm parenting Matt as opposed to Andy. I always swore that regardless of birth order, I would not make life easier for one child than another--I would make it equally difficult for them all! But then again there were a lot of things that I swore I would or wouldn't do with my children---but that was all before they actually arrived. I was adamant that I would only tell my children something once and if it was overlooked, forgotten, or disobeyed, it would result in swift and instant punishment. Now I catch myself calling Andy's name two, three, four, even fives times. And then when I do finally get his attention, I'm not always sure what I want to do with him. I still think I'm pretty strict with Andy but I don't have the control (which is an issue I have to begin with) that I had hoped.

So does this mean that I will be easier with Matt than with Andy? Will I just be broken in or worn out enough that Matt will get away with more than Andy? I wondered this today as I reflected on the introduction of cereal. Granted Andy took a bottle by the time cereal was introduced so he was on fortified milk for a few weeks. But I gave him cereal only twice a day--one in his first bottle of the day at daycare and then one in the evening when we got home before bath and his finally nursing. Matt's already had three servings on just his first day! I figured that he didn't immediately go into anaphylaxis, he didn't scream or writhe in pain due to gastro pains and he didn't erupt in hives, so he must be fine. Right?

At four months old, I started to gently Ferberize Andy. That meant for every hour of nap time, he would sleep (cumulatively) for 20 mins and scream for about (cumulatively) 40 mins. But I was determined that he would sleep in his crib and that he would go down drowsy but not asleep. Matt has napped in his crib probably three times since coming home and not being a newborn who sleeps 20-22 hours a day. I wait until the very last minute to put him into his bed at night. Just before he falls into a deep sleep. He opens his eyes and realizes that he's being put down but instantly passes out. And it's great! No screaming, no fussing. But I wonder as he gets older, how long will it take him to get to the point where I can put him down awake and not have him scream or fuss. Am I laying the foundation now for a harder time later because it's just easier to use this method?

I still intend to be just as retentive about the introduction of fruits and vegetables. I'm looking forward to updating the calendar I used for Andy. I can't wait to print it out and post it on the fridge. Eight days for each food, four days in the morning and then four days in the evening (on the fifth day a new food enters the morning cycle).

But will I be less retentive about other things? I wonder what will happen once they're teenagers. Are they close enough in age that Andy won't really have time to wear me down before Matt enters into whatever stage Andy is just finishing?

Is this wearing down and wearing out of parents the reason why teenagers have not had a sense of courtesy and respect instilled in them? Are parents so permissive these days because with multiple children and frequently both parents working outside the home, they just don't have the stamina to fight their children about what they can and can't do? Or is it a sense of guilt or just apathy that leads so many parents to be permissive these days? Or did the need to have it all, I am woman hear me roar mentality of my parents' generation cause many of my generation's women to feel the need to stay at home with their children and compensate for the lack of time and perhaps attention that they did not receive from their out of the home working mothers.

Previous generations had larger families with far more children so one might think that by the third or fourth or twelfth child, they would have gotten away with far more than the first or even second. Women stayed at home and dealt with the children (ahh the mighty Cult of Domesticity) rather than work outside the home but I think, though, that there was just a much higher expectation and thus standard of behavior. I think that the subsequents probably were allowed a little more freedom than the older or oldest. But at the same time, I think just in general there was less tolerance of bad behavior. The days of chasing your child with a wooden spoon or saying, "just wait until your father gets home," may be over but the need for boundaries and discipline are not. So why are parents so permissive these days?

You need a permit to go fishing, a permit to go hunting, a permit to drive and operate heavy equipment, and even a permit to get married. Someone else has to allow or condone it. These things either require a test or training. But no one needs a permit to have a child. All of them have the potential to create dire circumstances but the thought of possibly ruining a person's life from the start hasn't made us, as a human race, realize that maybe some preemptive training should be a requirement. (I get that there is no definitive right way to parent and that we won't all agree on how to parent--I'm not that naive, I'm speaking more abstractly). It may be an inalienable right to have children, but just because you can doesn't mean everyone should. If you're not prepared to put in the time and effort the raise your children (as best you can) then don't have them in the first place. Use whatever means you need or believe in to prevent it. Now don't misunderstand me, I realize there is no perfect parent and we all make a botch of something in our child's life. But as long as you make an honest effort, I respect that. None of our children are or will be perfect. They'll be naughty as kids (ahhem, peeing in drawers, pulling of the mattress...), trying as teens (anyone want to take bets now on how many parent conference I will have to attend and for which one), and sometimes entirely too independent as adults (hopefully they'll be wise with their money and their hearts), but that's normal. What I take issue with are the parents who have children but can't be bothered to make the effort to raise them---the permissive parents. So maybe Matt will get away with a bit more than Andy. Maybe he won't, maybe by the time he's ready to pee in his drawers, I will have figured out a more effective way to discipline. But either way, neither boy will get away with that much (knock on wood) because in the words of one of my favorite dads (Cliff Huxtable aka Bill Cosby), "I brought you into this world, I'll take you out."