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mcatmay
member
Crying baby? (as always, long and wordy)
mcatmay
member
The little girl has suddenly become a fussy baby and I can't for the life of me figure out why. She is a kid who will happily play on the floor by herself for 15 minutes at a stretch - i can leave the room for a couple of minutes to put on a load of laundry and she'll be happily babbling to herself. We've NEVER (as in EVER) had a problem laying her down to sleep at night - she loves her crib and will roll around in there until she falls asleep.
Yesterday, all of this changed. Some caveats - she may be teething or she had a 24 hour cold on friday - snots, tears streaming from her eyes, drooling to the nth degree, a mild fever - all which resolved by yesterday. She also may be constipated. She seems comfortable but hasn't pooped in two days.
Last night, I went to put her down for the night and she lost it. She was initially fine for about 5 minutes and then started crying. It reached epic proportions. I went in there and soothed her every five minutes and, eventually, after 25 minutes, she fell asleep with me stroking her back and whispering to her.
This morning, she would happily play for maybe 2-3 minutes and then she would realize I was there and start crying. I dropped her off at daycare late, she saw one of her favorite DCP, took a while to smile at her but eventually did. I was running around putting stuff away and making up her crib and she saw me again and started crying.
WHAT is going on?! Is she upset with me or is she upset at not being with me? She usually stops crying when i pick her up but then she wriggles in my arms like crazy. My laid-back, 'nothing fazes' me kid is suddenly a kiddo that isn't pleased by anything. Could this be her feeling bad from teeth or some constipation? Or is there something else i should be thinking about? (Sorry this is so long!!!)
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Re: Crying baby? (as always, long and wordy)
Do you see or feel teeth? LO was and is the worst teether. He was up for 4 hours in the middle of the night yesterday because he's got a molar cutting and then retracting.
Also their sleep patterns can just change for no apparent reason.
You should also google wonder weeks. A lot of LO's routine changes correlated with these.
Finally, the cold could totally be the cause, too.
she is most definitely NOT upset with you.
In addition to the cold/teething, she may also have hit the "wonderful" separation anxiety stage. 6mo is a little early but it's not impossible. She may have realized that there is a whole world out there and wants to be up for it, or she wants you to be there for her, b/c she's afraid if she doesn't see you, you are not there. She may also be learning new skills which always disrupts routine. Some wonderful sleepers turn into horrible sleepers the 2nd half of their 1st year.
I myself am going thru the "must pat to sleep" stage with DS, who has never been a good sleeper.
Teething. DD goes through stages like this - up to 2 weeks. And then is back to her happy self. For constipation, have you been giving her prunes? If not, try that. DD had trouble with constipation until about a month ago. Anytime we suspected it we gave her prunes for a few days and that took care of it. I was really against juice (still am), but fortunately DD LOVES prunes.
ETA: I don't remember how old DD was but we had one night where she literally cried all night. After that, we started letting her CIO b/c we realized it didn't matter if we held her or not, she just needed to CIO sometimes. I'm certain she was older than your DD though.
Ditto Sofka that it's way too early for her to be upset with you. She's probably just hitting a new phase, whether it's cranky from teething or separation anxiety, or some other fun thing that you'll have a heck of a time to pinpoint. I can see constipation causing her troubles too - if she's uncomfortable and you holding her makes her feel a little better, she might not want you to put her to bed or leave. Honestly, it could be five things together all making her upset at the same time. Try picking one or two things that seem likely problems and see if addressing those issues (like meds for teething and working through constipation) helps some.
Don't let a day or two of crying freak you out about what you've done to cause it. Babies change constantly, so you need to stay on your toes and run with it. Just wait 'til the toddler personality shifts where she goes from happy to WORST DAY EVER in the blink of an eye :P
Thank you all for the suggestions!
Mssaint, I can't feel any teeth coming through but, because of her occasional fussiness and prolific drooling over the past week, i mentioned to the DCP that she might be teething. One of them grinned at me and said, 'yes, mommy, of COURSE she's teething!'. Bloody hell, totally made me feel like a FTM - DCP can recognize what i only suspicion.
Sofka, i'll google separation anxiety and i'll ask the pedi about karo syrup (we have our 6 month appt tomorrow - yay vaccine grumpiness!). Birdgirl, i sent her to the DCP with prunes today - gave her some yesterday with no effect- hope they work their magic today!
QueSarah, 'laid back' doesn't come to me naturally ;-) I'll keep working on it, though.
you should also be giving her water. Now that she's on solids she needs to drink as much water as she's taking in solids, i.e.: 2oz of peas and 2oz of carrots = 4oz of water that day.
https://blogginaboutbabies.wordpress.com/2009/04/14/wonder-week-26/
When I was looking this up I realized my LO is in the midst of wonder week 55. You have my sympathy!
I don't think I'd give this one too much weight - lots of people suspected DS was teething long before he actually was. He was a drooling mess starting at 3 months and didn't get teeth until 9 months. For us, DS being generally less bubbly/happy than usual means he is under the weather, and sometimes teeth. We'll usually see the cold symptoms within a day or so of the grumpiness. Teeth usually show up when he is constantly chewing on his fingers (vs. just putting everything in his mouth).
DS also started getting much more attached around 6 months, which everyone also thought was early. We used to put him down "drowsy but awake" all the time, but it stopped working at bedtime around that age. I ended up nursing him to sleep or nursing and handing off to DH to put him in the crib (for some reason he'd complain less for DH than me).
I think we Ferber'ed around 6.5 months - I would have liked to be able to soothe him to sleep while he was in the crib, but he would just get more upset. It only took a couple of nights of checking in after 2-5mins of crying for him to get it and we could go back to putting him down drowsy but awake.
GL!
I never heard of this one...I'd check with your pedi about fluids. We were told just to give some prunes. One jar of the earth's best prunes a day did the trick!
this is for eBFed babies. Not just for constipation, which it will help with but in general, as soon as eBFed baby starts solids, that baby needs to start drinking water.
good to know. I eBF until this week and never heard the specific ounces of water to food recommendation. I read to offer water at meals to help get him used to the idea of a cup. DS isn't a big drinker in general though and I was concerned we'd be subbing water for BM at that age.
That was the impression that I was under as well, umdbride. I looked quickly at wholesomebabyfoods.com and kellymom and both suggest milk should fulfill all water requirements. BUT i've got an appointment with the pedi tomorrow so i'll ask him then!
I just want to echo umdbride here. This is exactly what we went through. One time she was really cranky and having trouble sleeping, everyone including her DCP thought it was teething, it turned out to be a UTI, so just keep an eye out. But she eventually got really ill (vomiting, high fever) so I knew it wasn't teething. But DD did start freaking out at bedtime around 6 months and that's when we Ferbered. Good luck!