Baby: 165, Mom: 0

The baby is winning. The score is Baby: 165, Mom: 0. The 165 represents the approximate number of nights since Riley was born. The 0 is how many of those I’ve gotten a full night’s sleep. Just to reiterate, that’s ZERO, people.

Now, the “sleeping through the night” concept is about as clear as mud. The baby books consider 5 consecutive hours to be sleeping through the night. My neighbor’s baby sleeps from 8 p.m. to 8 a.m. I’d even take 12:30 to 5:30 a.m. at this point. But however you define it, MY BABY ISN’T DOING IT.

It shouldn’t be that big of a shock, since my first baby didn’t sleep through the night until I had completely stopped breastfeeding him around 10 mos. But while Miles woke up, it was generally only once, around 2 a.m. or so, and he’d nurse and go right back to sleep. Whereas Riley is ready to rock at 11 p.m., 2, 4, and 5:30 a.m. Sometimes he throws in a 1 a.m. show just for the heck of it. He’ll be wide awake, yelling and hollering, like, “Will someone get in here and entertain me already?” And don’t even THINK about letting him cry it out because everyone in our zip code would pay dearly for that mistake.

Miles was no piece of cake as a baby, but I knew even back then he was a good sleeper. He decided on his own bedtime around 3 mos. Then we just fed him, rolled him into the crib, and left the room. We could watch entire movies in one evening after we put him down. We had it made.

So this whole “sleep training” concept was foreign to me. I read all the books (OK, skimmed them), but all the tricks and tips for getting your baby to sleep like moving the chair closer and closer to the door each night struck me as pure insanity.

Of course now, I’d try all those things in a heartbeat -- except for the fact that we have a 3-year-old asleep in the next room. Can someone tell me why none of the sleep books mention siblings? Does Dr. Weissbluth honestly expect me to let my baby scream for A FULL HOUR at 3 a.m. when his brother’s trying to catch some Z’s next door? And did I mention JUST HOW LOUD my baby’s scream is? It makes Mariah Carey sound like she’s whispering when she hits those high notes.

We’ve tried instituting a solid bedtime routine, with a bath and lavender-scented lotion and soft music. We’ve tried letting him fuss for short periods to see if he falls back to sleep. We’ve tried sending Dad into the room to settle him back down with the pacifier. This just pisses him off. (Riley, not Dad. Well, maybe him, too.) We’ve started him on solids already and even given him formula at night. We’ve put him on reflux meds. None of this makes any difference whatsoever.

I suspect it’s because there’s nothing really wrong with this baby. He’s just a huge mama’s boy. He can’t stand to be separated from me for more than 3 hrs. at a time. Sometimes, even an hour is too much. Like at the gym the other day, when they pulled me out of a yoga class to tell me they couldn’t calm him down. (Really? An entire staff of childcare professionals can’t calm a crying baby? Even for an hour? Might want to rethink your line of work then.)

Anyway, I walked into the kids’ area and picked up my red-faced, screaming baby. He shut off the waterworks like a faucet. With tears still glistening on his cheeks, he looked at me with an enormous gummy grin that said, “Mama! You’ve come back to me at last! Let us never be separated again, my love.”

OK, but does that have to include the hours between 11 p.m. and 6 a.m.?

VIDEO O’ THE WEEK: Riley can’t get enough of his rice cereal.