I didn’t sleep well last night at all, and it was NOT Sophia’s fault; at least not directly. It was more a result of my paranoia. Sophia can roll over now. She did it for the first time last Tuesday, to my applause and exuberant encouragement. She rolled from her back to her stomach, which takes more head strength and coordination than rolling from stomach to back–or so I’ve read. The problem is Sophia’s new skill leaves her stuck on her stomach like a beached wale.
It’s really quite cute actually. At first she has this very pleased look on her face and holds her head up high, she looks like a skydiver mid-flight. But the longer she’s there the more her legs kick and head droops and she eventually gets too tired to hold her head up and then the crying starts. Muffled crying too, because she can’t lift her head and doesn’t realize that she can turn it to the side, so its planted face down on the floor. That’s usually when I step in and lift her out of her stuckness and we happily resume play-time.
The only down side to this new development is that she does it in her crib. On Monday night, while I was at work my husband said he heard her crying, about an hour after putting her down for bed. Not only is this unusual for Sophia (she usually fusses for a minute or two then finds her thumb and sucks vigorously until she drifts off into baby dream-land), but my husband said her cry “sounded” different. He went into check on her and found her face down, and a little scared that she couldn’t roll back over.
Since then I’ve checked on her almost constantly during naps, just to make sure she hasn’t rolled over. Prior to this we’ve employed the Cry-It-Out method, and it has yielded positive results: Sophia can put herself to sleep almost anywhere in a matter of minutes without coddling or rocking. She’s pretty independent when it comes to sleep. But lately any cry or peep, I HAVE to go in and check. What if she rolled over and can’t get back? For now we’ve suspended our CIO policy; check-ins are mandatory.
I imagine that her instinct with tell her to turn her head to the side or that she will eventually figure out that she’s strong enough to get back to where she started. But last night I wasn’t so trusting. She slept soundly until 1am and then stirred a bit. I woke up, checked on her to find out that she was fine and had just kicked her blanket off. I tucked it in around her waist and went back to bed. About fifteen minutes later I heard a muffled cough, I leapt out of bed and in the pitch black of our bedroom, bolted straight for her crib forgetting the Japanese folding screen that separates the six feet between our bed and her side of the room. It toppled with a crash and an “Oh, shit!” After I had collected myself, assured my husband that everything was OK, and righted the upset screen I peered over the side of her crib. She was on her back, sleeping soundly, with the blankets still tucked in around her, her thumb in her mouth (the culprit that muffled the cough). I woke again two more times before 7am to check on her. Both times she was fine.
She probably will be fine, I just worry to much–too many episodes of 60 Minutes and other tragedy-exploiting “investigative reports.” To assuage the worry, along with our hill run today we will be incorporating a “core session” (aka “tummy-time”) to help her learn to get from her belly to her back, which will hopefully prevent further night-wakings–MY night wakings.
Run Far Girl 