TIP #6 FOR BECOMING A GUILT FREE PARENT: 

Prep your stink-eye for the constant advice givers

People love to give advice when you talk about your struggles as a parent. Sometimes you might be looking for some advice to put on your “try everything” list but sometimes you just need a space to vent about your problems.  Like when you just shout to the world or talk to the tree in your yard, or the imaginary elephant that appears at 2am when you are being woken up yet again. (His name is Elijah. He wears a onesie and likes to sing Disney songs. We have become good friends.) While people are ultimately trying to be helpful, they somehow believe that they are now the “baby whisperer". The only thing I can tell you to do to these helpful people is to smile and say “sounds like a good idea”. You probably already tried their idea or are not going to try it but don’t bother stretching out this conversation. Even though my last tip said try everything, it doesn’t always mean following everyone’s advice. Follow your own instincts.  I read somewhere that to shut people up about their advice just say “I will bring that up with my doctor the next time I see him/her”. People tend to stop providing their input after that because they know a doctor wouldn’t listen to them either.  

I also don’t want to sound like an a’hole here and say that everyone is providing terrible advice. I am just saying to take advice with some grain of salt. You sometimes just want someone to listen to you and actually talk back. Elijah, for example, is a terrible listener. He just likes to sing Frozen songs all night and steal my wine. A lady once told me to put my kid on a dryer and run the dryer on a full cycle and it put that baby to sleep like a charm. I am glad that worked for her but I have no intention of leaving my kid up on a fire hazard machine that bounces around like crazy, and jack up my electric bill. And what would I do? Just sit on the floor?  Watch the dryer go round and round while it creates a soothing sound that will put me to sleep too?  Oh now it makes sense.

The best advice though is from the old ladies who back in the day had no power and 27 children and things worked wonders for them – well first off they are liars, they don’t remember the first year (or probably many afterwards), and they had 27 kids who likely helped light the candles anyway. And who really wants advice from someone who had that many children – I have some advice for them – try contraception.  I can barely get through two children. I can’t trust someone who clearly got on the crazy train a long time ago. Toot toot.

Try everything but sometimes be rational and instead of saying “your advice stinks”, just smile and talk to Elijah in the morning.  

TIP #5 FOR BECOMING A GUILT FREE PARENT: 

Try everything now (and worry about paying the shrink later)

I am a big believer that not everything works for every kid. It is the same for adults. While I like to read a book for an hour or so before I sleep, my wife can fall asleep within ten seconds and that is not much of an exaggeration. This superpower of my soul mate is something that drives me crazy. Usually after a minute or two of me reading and she is somewhere between a nice dream and full REM, she will say “maybe you should go to sleep now and put down your book”. Then I remind her, like I do most every night, “dear, not all of us are like sleeping beauty.” I need a little coaxing to get myself bed ready. I think it is the same for children. Some like one method to help them sleep, eat, or poop, while others like something else. Why do we think that one thing will work on all children because a book or magazine said it would? My motto – try it all. Something is bound to work. Even if they finally succumb to exhaustion, you can at least say you won! I didn’t realize how competitive I was until I had kids. 

When our first kid was very young, she wasn’t a great napper. That might not come to you as a shock. Why else can I write a blog at 2am after being woken up for the 5^th time and am sitting on the couch debating whether or not to cry, drink coffee (or wine), or do a ridiculous google search that will leave me feeling awful.  Sorry – I got sidetracked which isn’t a shock either – look a squirrel! Anyway we were at a cousin’s birthday party and they had a swing and my cousin suggested we try to put our daughter in it for a few minutes. I was a little hesitant because no other method was working, no matter how many books/websites/magicians I tried.  But the heavens opened up and the angels sang a lullaby and she fell asleep. The next day I was at the store buying the exact same model and set it up as soon as I entered the door. I am pretty sure my wife opened the box in the car and was starting to put it together on our way back from the store. I would have taken the floor model and strapped it to the roof of my Mazda but they said it would be a liability issue. They didn’t understand just how desperate I was. Our first kid slept in this swing a lot and it wasn’t life threatening or morally wrong (remember that blog post from September). So months before our second child arrived in our lives, I had the swing set up. I was ready to put that child in there and have a sleeping kid from day 1. Well she had a different game plan about sleeping. She liked the swing fine enough (it kept the acid reflux under control) but she wouldn’t dare close her eyes. So the swing has 8 different levels of speed. I am pretty sure that level 2 is fast enough but one day I was so frustrated with lack of sleep that I put it on level 5 to see if maybe she likes a fast swing unlike her sister. It was like something out a carnival ride – she was like a blur in the seat. Yet still her eyes did not close. I think level 8 is like Mach 3 and they go so fast that they break the sound barrier and you can’t hear them until 10 minutes later – which is just enough time to finish drinking your cold cup of coffee (which is something you will take a liking to). My long winded point here is that you need to try everything because you just don’t know what might work. You need to have a process of elimination to say at least you tried bouncing, swinging, jumping, driving, singing Celine Dion or AC/DC. My lullaby version of Thunderstruck is worth listening to. 

You do sometimes wonder if you are going to mess them up with all your trial and errors though. A comedian once was talking about how his son had terrible diaper rash and they knew they had to dry it off before they put on a new diaper. They decided to use a hair dryer after a bum change. He said the boy’s face would light up when he would turn on the hair dryer and the crying would immediately stop. He became slightly concerned because he could picture his son in 30 years from now paying a prostitute to blow dry his rear end. Hopefully we don’t mess them up too much but psychologists need work too. Consider it your contribution to the economy. 

TIP #4 FOR BECOMING A GUILT FREE PARENT: 

Become a Liar

So last month I said how much I hate liars and that everyone around you is one. And now this month I am saying become one. I know - I hate myself for saying it but it is why people lie when parenting. It makes you feel better. You lie so that you can somehow convince yourself (like other parents) that everything is great. (I think this might be true for people with pets too). And because we are sleep deprived, we forget what actually happened and this story we created may have actually been the truth. We have no idea what is real. We aren't sure if we are in the Matrix or not.  When people ask about how things are going, you put on your best poker face and tell them everything is supercalifragilisticexpialidocious – Mary Poppins was clearly suffering from a lack of sleep to come up with that word. Of course, people may tell from the bags under your eyes or the lack of coherent sentence structure that you are lying. But that doesn’t matter. Become one of those people I complained about last month. Do what you have to do to cope, and lie to everyone else about what really happens.

A co-worker of mine told me that her kid slept in their bed for years (and I mean years) but she wouldn’t tell anyone because she thought they would judge her. When she had company over, she would go into the kid’s room and “unmake” the bed. That way her guests and/or in-laws thought the kid slept there but came out to their bed in the mornings. The reality is anyone who has been a parent in the last ten years will not really judge you. Those who have had kids greater than 10 years ago have no real recollection and are liars anyway.  But even if no one will judge you, it definitely feels better to pretend to the world that everything is magical in your house – because Pinterest and parenting books tell you that you should have things figured out by week two of your child’s life.  If you need to lie to cope, go ahead. Just make sure you get your story lined up so that folks like me don’t come in and keep asking questions until the truth comes out. You need to have all your witnesses, alibis, and facts lined up. This co-worker unmaking the bed was a brilliant move and I probably would stop asking questions after I CSI’ed their house and found the bed unmade.  I am not sure I have enough energy to actually keep that charade up for years but hats off to her for that level of commitment. She should definitely be an undercover agent for the FBI or something.

The trick to lying though, is to figure out how much lying you should actually do. You don’t want to be one of those people that tell others that everything is great and magical all the time (because people like me will want to throat punch you) but you also don’t want to scare the crap out of anyone who has new children (or is pregnant). I can only imagine the look on people’s face if I told them how many times I screamed and cried myself. They probably would have me committed to an institution where I would get fed all day and have someone clean up after me and get lots of sleep – WAIT! What was I thinking?! 

So you have to be truthful enough to remind people that things sometimes suck and that you can join together in solidarity. However, you don’t want to put the whole truth out there and have your matrix world come crashing down.  Take the red pill instead and stay in Wonderland, Neo. No one who is sleep-deprived actually has the energy to bend over backwards and dodge bullets anyway. 

TIP #3 FOR BECOMING A GUILT FREE PARENT: 

Parents are liars when it comes to their kids

Those people who tell you that their kid came home from the hospital sleeping and slept every night thereafter are liars. They deserved to be high fived mind you (in the face…..with a chair). No one has that kind of success. I believe that they somehow convinced themselves of this or have forgotten it after years of sleep deprivation – which is a form of actual torture. Don’t believe anything parents tell you about the wonderfulness they had. Take everything with a grain of salt. That kind of magic or luck does not exist with children. If for some reason, you know it to be true, then you should no longer be their friend.

A friend of ours had a kid that seemed to sleep constantly. They would come over and bring the baby and we would play cards and the baby would sleep for a few hours (in a carrier). I became really resentful of them and their kid and it would ruin my card game which only pissed me off even more. Now what I don’t know is maybe this was just the regular nap time or that they went home and the baby was up all night – they wouldn’t tell us because people are liars and they knew I would probably high five them (see above). We are still friends with them but only because I pretend they have it bad at home and I accepted that they are liars (and they have way too much dirt on me to piss them off).

Once at a party I was talking to a new parent and asked how things were going. He said it was going well and that their 4 month old was sleeping through the night. I felt my blood pressure rise – why is this kid sleeping through the night already and I have a 9 month old who has no idea what sleep is and how to make it past four hours.  I was about to stand up to pick up my chair to high five him but I am not built for jail so I unfortunately have to lead a good life. So I decided to seek some clarification instead. I asked him about what kind of drugs they are using because clearly it can’t happen without that. He proceeded to tell me that they usually put her to bed at midnight and she sleeps until 4am. Now maybe you have the same look I had on my face – HUH?! That is not sleeping through the night.  In no book anywhere is that considered through the night. Then I thought – oh! He needs to say this to make himself feel better and make him look like a good parent, according to all the books. He only told me the truth because I kept prodding. Liars – they are everywhere. Put on your detective hat and get out your blinding spot lights and start interrogating. Sooner or later they will break and then you can unfriend them on Facebook - the cruelest type of punishment you likely can dish out when you are exhausted but it will still feel amazing. Let's do an evil laugh together.   

TIP #2 FOR BECOMING A GUILT FREE PARENT:

Anything learned can be unlearned (is that at word?)

I realized this after we had our second child. You see my brain wasn’t working for a least 3 years after our first child so I was unable to rationalize much in the beginning. I was stressing - which if you knew me that wouldn’t be a shocker- about whether or not to give our second child a soother. My wife and I talked it over, went back and forth, and read many parenting books to figure out what “expert” had the best advice we needed to hear. Then I reminded myself that we were able to get rid of the soother from our first child after her having it for two years and it only took a few days. One night was horrible and the others became better only in relation to the first.  My wife actually left the house while I was stuck in the room with our screaming daughter on the first night (She can't stand being the bad cop). I could only think that somehow this kid is going to hate me for life because of this. She will be in front a therapist talking about how she is always scared that things will be taken away from her and the therapist will say “did your father ever take away your soother?” and a breakthrough will happen and I will be labeled  as “jerk”.  Meanwhile her mother was nowhere to be seen and can remind her kids that she wasn’t even around when the traumatic life event happened and she gets to keep the good cop uniform. She did show up a couple hours later smelling of Tim Horton’s coffee and a little hint of gloatnut (that is donut and gloating combined if you were wondering).

Sure, I know that we as parents caused the problem, rushing in the room as soon as we heard the soother drop out of her mouth.   I may have walked around with the monitor up to my ear for months and have a slight hearing problem in my left ear. But the point is she stopped using it. I still wake up though at 2am hearing the faint sound of a soother drop somewhere in the world, which is followed by the sigh and shuffle of a tired parent.  We don’t get to choose our superpowers and I don't look good in red spandex pants.

My point is, there are no 16 year olds still using a soother or needing to be rocked to sleep. Somehow we break the bad habits we caused these children. Our first child turned out to be a wonderful kid, so I know that I did something right – at least so far because she is too young for therapy sessions. The tip to remember is to know you will have some bad times breaking habits. But the other side of the coin is that you may have gotten some relief from by using some coping mechanism that some book told you that you shouldn’t.  Just be sure you are the parent who gets to go to Tim’s instead. 

TIP #1 FOR BECOMING A GUILT FREE PARENT:

If it is not life threatening or morally wrong - then proceed

This was told to me by a public health nurse once and I have never forgotten it. My wife and I were worried that our daughter had been sleeping in the car seat carrier for many hours and seemed comfortable, yet she was not in her crib where she was supposed to be. This was of course according to the schedule I had laid out from one too many parenting books. The nurses’ point was that you need to do what you have to, to survive. From that point forward, I became less concerned about what I did unless it was somehow really wrong and going to jail might be considered a consequence. I am not built for jail so I know I have to stay on the good path. 

A colleague of mine at work told me stories about he would bring his child home from the car in the carrier, then put the carrier in the crib, and then go do whatever it was they needed to do. Then when the baby cried, he would put the handle up on the carrier, and then swing the baby back and forth until she fell asleep and then put the carrier back in the crib. The kid is fine now – no major back surgery. The muscles on the one arm of my co-worker though is fairly massive and he looks like both versions of Popeye. And least his process led to some physical exercise– something that does go missing when kids arrive!

Another parent was talking to me about sleep issues and about what to try or not to try. She quietly asked me if I have considered “other things” to help her sleep. Well I was very interested in this now. I felt like I was getting into some black market products. She then looked around to see if anyone was listening and said “I gave my kids so much Tylenol it was like a fifth food group.”   I will never forget this. The level of embarrassment by her and epiphany by me. I immediately went to the pharmacy and thought that a little bit of coaxing with medication isn’t that bad. Turns out though our daughter was one of those kids that the medication worked the opposite way. She would start screaming an hour later and her pupils would go all big and black and you couldn’t touch her. She might have been having a “bad trip”(Could be a good news for those teenage years when she wants to experiment). So we then moved on to Advil. So far so good.