After my son’s first two weeks on this earth, colic reared its ugly head, tormenting us ““ and likely our neighbors ““ for the 12 weeks that followed. His crying wasn’t limited to just the days ““ it continued into the night for hours on end.
During week seven, his nighttime crying began to fade, allowing everyone in the house to sleep in four-hour uninterrupted blocks. By week nine we were up to six hours straight and by the end of week 10, he could go from 10 p.m.-6:30 a.m. The bags under my eyes began to diminish and my sanity slowly returned… it was bliss.
I attributed the Sandman’s return to the Baby Whisperer and her magic solution: the dream feed, something we started (not coincidentally) in week six. Dream feeding is based on the premise that young infants get one long block of sleep during the night, so to extend their longest downtime ““ and also get some sleep yourself ““ the Baby Whisperer advises a dream feed between 10-11 p.m. To dream feed, you carefully lift your baby from his bed and feed him without waking him/her. By doing this, your baby restarts his initial sleep clock.
The dream feed was our saving grace in those early weeks, the answer to many of our problems. By the time his colic disappeared around week 14, we were amazed by the perfect, happy little being that was blossoming before our eyes.
And then came week 19.