Day 148

I have a confession…I have a high needs baby. Now I know this statement is controversial. Is she really high needs or has she just become spoiled? That is a great question…I am very aware that Hadley might be a tad on the spoiled side, BUT I think it goes beyond that. I was dead set on not raising a spoiled child. I did not want to have a baby that had to be held all the time. However, sometimes that is all I can do to get her to calm down. She has had a number of issues in her short little life, starting with the NICU, then RSV at 7 days old. I have also gone through a lot in the duration of her short little life and have held her a lot for comfort (and the daycare teachers hold her a lot too), but it’s more than that. She, like her mama, can work herself into an awful crying/hyperventilating mess pretty quickly and it can be pretty scary. She will get to a point where I am afraid she will not be able to breathe and once this happens she is gasping for quite a while after I am able to calm her down. So she can never be a cry it out baby- it just won’t work for us. She will not fall asleep unless there is skin to skin contact- this can be my cheek against her, our arms touching, me draping an arm over her, or when all else fails, she will reach up and grab my face (she always has to make sure I am there). Once she is asleep and you think it is safe to put her down, it usually isn’t- no matter how deep of a sleep she is in 95% of the time she will wake up as soon as you put her down. I have found I am able to put her down ONLY if I wrap my arm around her after doing so. I then have to slowly remove my arm from her after several minutes  and then she will sleep for maybe 3 hours tops (that was a new record this week).

So needless to say, she isn’t an easy baby by any means, and I wish that certain people in her life (or rather those that are in her life only when it is convenient for them) could even begin to understand this. This is why I cringe at the idea of these people having her alone- they don’t know what her cries mean, they haven’t taken the time to try to figure out these things- it’s hard to do when you have seen Hadley less than five times.  I am very thankful that Hadley has grandmothers on both sides that have been around her enough to know her and know what is in store for them when Hadley is with them, this makes me feel immensely better when she is in their care. Even though she is rather needy, she is as cute as button and without fail, will smile at you every single time she has your attention. Those smiles are what keep me going on those rough days (and nights).