Tuesday, August 18, 2009

Tummy Time

I’ve never been a super-paranoid person. I am the one who says, “That’ll never happen to me.” If there is a tornado warning out, I go outside to look for said tornado, because it won’t hit MY house. I’ve led a fairly uneventful life, and I plan to keep it that way.

Samantha, up until now, has always slept on her back. We swaddled her for a good 6 months, and she was unable to roll over in that thing, she could just move her head side to side. (leading cause of bald spots on the back of babies heads) She could wiggle around a little bit, enough to get her blanket over her face, but that was about it. And when she sleeps, she ALWAYS has to have her blanket over face. She has been this way probably since she was a month old. Want to get her to go to sleep? Put her down and throw her blankie over her head. I would joke that she would wind up being the poster child for SIDS. Not a good thing to joke about, but it was just weird how she always wound up completely covered from head to toes when she was basically in a straightjacket.

Now that she can roll around a lot and is THIS CLOSE to crawling, she apparently likes to sleep a little differently. As in, on her stomach. Which I discovered today. And I don’t like it. My usual attitude of, Everything Will Be Fine and It Won’t Happen To Me has not yet kicked in. I haven’t done anything crazy yet like, wake her up just to roll her over, but I am not going to lie when I say I didn’t think about it. I know that it is perfectly normal for babies to sleep on their stomachs, especially once they get big enough to roll all over their cribs. It is just weird for me. I’ve never really worried too much about the SIDS thing, (because the leading cause of SIDS is babies sleeping on their stomachs and she always slept on her back) except for the blanket over her face, which, let’s face it, is probably more of a danger at this point. So I’m trying to be rational, and not think of all the worst case scenarios which really do play out all over the world every day. Instead, I’ll just kick myself for not taking a picture this afternoon, to mark this momentous occasion. My kid now sleeps just. like. me.

2 comments:

Pamela Gold said...

I do the exact opposite. If my son rolls onto his back while asleep, I roll him back to his stomach because he's always slept so much better that way. I was paranoid in the beginning but now I don't even think about it. Even when he was swaddled (which was all of a week or two because he always got out of the damn blanket somehow) he figured out how to roll onto his stomach. She'll be okay... but as the mom, you'll probably sleep with one eye open and your sense of hearing will be ten times better since you'll be listening for her breathing!

Jennifer Mahoney said...

Keira does the same thing now, she actually started to roll over at 3 months in her crib. Now, when she falls asleep in my arms rocking, I lay her down(sound asleep) and she immediately rolls over, butt in the air and arms folded under her chest! The cutest thing, but at first worried me to death! I wish you guys would come to Cali for a visit! Would love to meet Sam!