Friday, January 16, 2009

I Lack a Control in this Scientific Experiment

I've said before that Jillian often seems like one huge science experiment. There is always some sort of problem to be solved from how to get her to sleep through the night to how to convince her to drink a bottle in one sitting rather than leisurely sipping with several breaks over the course of an hour. When trying to tackle these problems, I inevitably form a hypothesis about a possible solution and then test it out. The problem is that I lack a control in this whole scientific experiment.

Here is an example. Jillian likes her pacifier to get to sleep. Lately she has been waking up as many as four times a night fussing. She's only a little awake and not hungry as I found out after a couple of irksome late nights where she fell asleep less than an ounce into her bottle. All that I have to do is get up, stick her pacifier in her mouth and go back to bed. While this disrupts my sleep a bit, I'll happily take a quick solution that I can complete while half asleep over an hour long feeding even if I end up getting up a few more times each night. What I don't know is whether the pacifier causes these wake-ups (e.g. it falls out, she wakes up, and her paci addiction is so strong that she must have it to soothe herself back to sleep). Or is this a phase that she is going through and the paci is actually my savior because it allows me to get more sleep?

I totally need an identical control group baby who I never gave a pacifier too to answer this question. Of course, that would require taking care of another baby. It's probably easier to just keep waking up and giving her the pacifier.

As a side note, Jillian's grandma loves dressing her up and taking pictures. It's sort of the kind of torture that only a helpless infant will put up with. Here is how she arrived home yesterday. Luckily she seems to be a good sport.

10 comments:

RBandRC said...

I think the pacifier is a soothing mechanism. When she develops the ability to soothe herself she may not need it. For example, Lemy is just now starting to suck her thumb regularly so we don't have to replace the paci at night. :)

She is too much in that outfit!!! :)

jenn said...

I have no control for you- but I will say that her hat is amazing! I want one! (well- maybe one for Caiden too!)

Barry said...

We use to put a ring of pacifiers around Jake and Trev in their bed so they could easily find them and plug one back in.

PS - I found one of Jillian's pacifiers under my couch the other day...

Monica Fayth said...

I have no idea about the paci thing, but she sure looks cute in that outfit :)

Anonymous said...

My daughter is 15 weeks. She falls asleep without the pacifier. But wakes up partially and I have to give it ti her before she really wakes up. This happens anywhere from 1 time a night to 20 times. There is no ryme or reason do it.

Jennifer said...

I'm not expert by any means, but my DD wakes up frequently throughout the night, but now she's old enough (15 mos) to either go back to sleep on her own or find her pacifier. Apparently we all wake up frequently, but we just go back to sleep on our own. Jillian probably just relies on the pacifier to get to sleep and when she wakes up she needs it back.

Of course I really should get my DD of the pacifier, but I'd much rather have her use the pacifier than suck her thumb. It's much easier to take away the pacifier when she is ready than her thumb. I was an unconscious thumb sucker.

Kelly said...

OMG she is SO cute!! Loving the Biker Chick!! She just needs a leather onesie;)

Nicky said...

We used to have to get up to give LL his pacifier several times a night. The frequency has gradually decreased so that now he often doesn't need it put back in the middle of the night, but occasionally needs it once or twice. We think he's still waking up just as often, but he's getting the hang of falling back to sleep without it. That's the theory, anyway. We are also lacking a control.

I used to have a really evil manager, and we joked that he was the kind of guy who would purposely have twins just so that he could keep one in the basement as a control....

Sunny said...

LOL - Biker chick, I love it. :)

About the paci, I know it's annoying. But I second the previous commenter who said better a paci than her fingers... otherwise she could end up like my SIL, who sucked her thumb FOREVER (she was still sucking at age 5 when DH and I started dating) and had to have extensive dental work done because of it. Keep encouraging her to develop her coordination, and soon you can just toss a few pacis in the crib and she'll be able to grab one on her own and pop it in.

Jamie said...

Not only is she a good sport, I think she likes it!!