3am thoughts: #Part 1
Exhausted in the darkness, a baby on my lap, I wonder whether I'm being punished for my gentle parenting
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My baby is teething right now. This means he is awake at night a significant amount, as I probably would be too if I had sharp little pegs pushing their way through my top gums. I’d call him nocturnal, but he rarely wants to sleep in the daytime either. I’m not sure what the correct term is for a creature that is awake across the entire circadian cycle, but I know the word that best describes my current state: zombie. I stagger around at night between his room and mine, moaning, heavy footed, my sleep-addled mind occasionally misinterpreting shapes and sounds for something more sinister: a pile of removal company boxes with, for reasons unclear, a washing basket on top morphs into a giant Doctor-Who-style robot; a floorboard creak suggests an intruder, or possibly an acrobatic fox that has launched itself through the bathroom window. And then I’ll spend what feels like hours in my son’s room – holding him, rocking him, breastfeeding him, soothing his pain, trying to make him feel safe, ready for sleep, trying to make him realise that 3am is not the ideal time for infant philosophising, despite his urgent babbles.
Very occasionally in these moments, I have what I consider my own Interesting Thoughts. I must write them down, I think to myself. But of course I don’t, because my hands are occupied and because all I’m really motivated to do is get back into bed as soon as possible so I can squeeze in two hours of sleep before the next wake-up. Sometimes, however, I think the same thought throughout the night as if a record on loop, so that when I wake up, it's stuck in my head. Last night, at 3am, I was thinking about the rod.
What is this rod? If you’re a parent, you’ll likely know. Because once the “Congratulations on your new baby!” wishes have quietened down, this ‘rod’ forms part of an expression that will creep into conversation with increasing stealth; one that is, in my opinion – though please prove me wrong in the comments – often uttered by the mothers and mothers-in-law of a new mother*. I am grateful for these honourable matriarchs who have done all this parenting business before, I am porous to their wisdom – but when the expression “you’re making a rod for your own back” rears up, it scrapes at my soul like nails on a chalkboard. It is said with love and concern – and is usually connected to things such as feeding a baby to sleep, or co-sleeping, or refusing to let them cry it out, or not having a strict routine, or giving in ‘too easily’, or not being disciplined enough, those sorts of things. Things that might bring an interrupted night, or could prevent the parent leaving their child for long periods, or will pacify a child now but could apparently bring future problems. Things that might be perceived as Bad Habits, which a baby should not have. Things that the speaker of the phrase knew better than to do themselves.
I have lost count of the times a parenting elder has warned me of this rod.
I try to ignore it. Because I do not believe I am doing anything wrong.
But this phrase is on my mind at 3am, as I rock gently back and forth with my ten-month-old son in my arms. There is a white-noise machine whirring womb sounds from under his cot into the darkness – it contributes to a strange dreamscape, my mind slipping between my subconscious realm and reality. I really am so very tired. The kind of tired that makes you feel sick and your eyeballs and teeth ache.
Did I do this to myself?
The thing is, I just can’t seem to get my son to stay asleep in the cot. Every time I put him down, he cries, his arms reaching out, a tiny human pleading in the dark. I cannot walk away. So I lift him up. He wants to breastfeed, or to seek sanctuary in the curve of my arm, he wants to fall asleep on me, he just wants me. Me. Me alone. No one else will do right now. The pressure of this can feel immense. It can feel almost painful to be needed so much. To be entirely responsible for someone else’s wellbeing.
I think about where the phrase comes from, this rod for your back. It’s surely about punishment, caning. The internet the next day confirms it. To do something that will create misfortune for yourself in the future. It dates back, in some form, to the 15th century, the “rod”, or cane, a form of punishment for errant children and disobedient grown-ups. A rod later beloved by the Victorians, who wielded it in schools, traumatising children for generations. A rod that, along with other forms of corporal punishment, wasn’t outlawed in British state schools until 1986.
It is hard to connect all that horror with comforting my crying child in the lonely small hours of the night. It is hard to believe they could be linked, even if it’s just a case of semantics.
I recently watched the film Everything Everywhere All At Once – I think about this too, at 3am. A marvel (but not Marvel) of a movie about connection and self in a multiverse (which is, if you’re my mum reading this and need explanation, a collection of multiple universes existing simultaneously). It is hopefully not a spoiler to say that in the film, our heroine, Evelyn Wang (played by Michelle Yeoh), must harness the multiverse for her own means. She must learn to bend reality and recognise infinite possibilities to save lives and love.
I liked this movie. It took us three nights to watch it, because the baby kept waking up and because my husband and I are so knackered by the end of the day and because it’s such a chaotic and brilliant film that it’s not the type you want to watch while also scrolling through your phone or nodding off. But still, even across three sittings, I enjoyed it immensely. And drifting into my dreamscape at 3am, I think about the things we will do for those we care about the most. And how we can hurt them too. I think about all the ways we can live, the choices we make every single second, the paths we take, the words we say, or don’t.
In another universe, I am happily asleep in bed next to my husband. In that universe, he can soothe the baby if he wakes, rather than being tearfully pushed away. Or perhaps I have children who just love sleeping through the night – and I didn’t have to force them, or do anything tough. Such children do exist. Just not in my tiny world of four. I dream of another universe where I wake up each day refreshed, knowing nothing about nocturnal wanderings. How nice to step into that life for a moment.
But that is not me, the real me, at least I don’t think it is. Because I am here, in this universe, awake at 3am. Is this the rod? This awakeness, this exhaustion? Is this the monstrous rod seeking out my back like a missile? In my head, in my half-sleep, I channel Michelle Yeoh – I imagine this rod, then magic it away, I vanish it with a blink of my eyes, I turn it into a feather. I will not submit to the rod on my back. I choose not to see it that way. That is my power at 3am. I am an ungodly level of tired, but there is no rod on my back punishing me. There is only a baby in my arms who needs me. He is not a problem. This is not a punishment. This is just a part of parenthood, for me anyway. Not exactly my favourite part, but parenthood nonetheless.
It will not always be like this, I remind myself. One day he will not need me in the same way. And so I think of this at 3am too. There is no single way to raise a baby. And I don’t believe my way is superior, but I do believe there is a multiverse of ‘rights’. What is right for you, what is right for them, what is right in your heart. I press my face into the soft – the softest – part of my son’s cheek. And I breathe him in. An elixir for the long night ahead.
* BTW, In terms of unsolicited advice, I once had a barista in a cafe see my order for a black Americano as a permission slip to lecture me on sleep, telling me that I was making a rod for my own back by breastfeeding. Unsolicited advice comes from all places when you’re a parent, but this one really took me by surprise.
PS Please accept my apologies for the delay in this week’s newsletter hitting your inbox. Consider it metaphorical teething problems of a Substack launch connected to the aforementioned literal teething problems. The likelihood is that if you’re a subscriber, you might have some understanding of Planet Tiny Chaos from which I broadcast my messages. So I hope you will bear with me. I have loads of things in store for you – I do hope you’ll stick around, and please do keep spreading the word.
I feel like you saw right into my mind and wrote it down more beautifully than I could have ever articulated myself. Currently navigating horrendous sleep with my 5 month old and can’t seem to escape the constant barrage of ‘you must sleep train, she isn’t sleeping because you haven’t taught her to’ etc etc. This made me feel seen and reassured that in the end I am just parenting a brand new human my way and it’s the right way for us. Thank you.
Beautifully written, Amy. And very reassuring -- my 3 month old is sprawled across me asleep this very second because she won't lie anywhere else! I too am well acquainted with 'the rod'...how anyone thinks a brand-new little human will miraculously learn to stop crying without being soothed is ridiculous! And these moments where we are the only source of comfort to them are so finite...I try to remind myself that as often as possible.