What can I say about colic.. well in not so many words here it goes..it SUCKS!
Colic is a living, breathing, frustrating, exhausting, maddening thing. It turns your beautiful, bouncing, pink cheeked, fresh from the womb baby into a primal animal. It makes you question everything you ever knew as a parent, as a woman, and as a person.
It is a god awful, madness inducing, no explanation for, "there is nothing we can do for you" and "don't worry it will get better" thing.
I call it a thing because it is not an illness, an illness would indicate that there is a cure, and there is none...well none except for time. Time that turns days into weeks and weeks into months and before you know it, sleep deprivation, and constant screaming is "Normal".
Colic is something I prayed we would never deal with, Abby slept through the night at 10 weeks, and to this day still sleeps 10 to 12 hours with no issue and takes a "good" nap, by good I mean more than 45 minutes and is not speckled with Screaming.
Jax on the other hand, has screamed from day 4, he was perfect in the hospital and we got him home and POOF! sweet little boy turned into screaming wildabeast, at first we thought, ok well maybe it is his jaundice, he must be hungry because his levels are high, soI fed him round the clock ...it didn't help. Then it was "oh he has a milk sensitivity" (which turned out to be true and changing his formula which he was on by then helped some) then his doctor said "switch him to soy" and that didn't help...none of us wanted to admit that he had colic.
We tried Gripe water, colic tablets, I walked the living room for HOURS with him in the Moby, the colic hold, mylicon, car rides, and bouncing, you name it we tried it and nothing helped.
It was at this point that I begun to question myself as a mother, "Maybe I am not doing it just right, maybe if I try it this way it will help". I cannot tell you how many times Donnie got home from work at 5:30 in the morning and found me on the couch sobbing with Jax Screaming in his bassinet in the bathroom with the door locked because all I could do at the point was walk away and put him in a safe spot. I began to question everything I had ever learned about raising a baby, and my competence to do it with number 2. I was already having mommy guilt about what bringing baby home was going to do to Abby and couple that with the Colic and it was a recipe for disaster.
I looked at my son and wanted to love him, to have the feelings I had for Abby when she was first in my arms and her subsequent days when she was FINALLY home and they just weren't there, and I hated myself for it, I felt like a failure, a bad mother, because I looked at my baby and all I felt was sadness, sadness that Icouldn't fix him, sadness that I couldn't stop him from writhing in pain 20 hours a day. I mean come on I am his mother... I SHOULD KNOW WHAT TO DO!?! right...WRONG.
There is nothing to be done, but survive, and that is what we did, it took a toll on my marriage, my other child, My Husband and me, but we survived, and we have been rewarded with a beautiful, bouncing, amazing boy! Who we love more than words can describe, Who we thank god every day for, and who we know has an amazing future!
So while this post may not have any "tips" for surviving colic, or any advice so to speak, know that if it is something you are dealing with, have dealt with, or ever have to go through, you are not alone, and there is a light at the end of the VERY long tunnel, and the reaward is more amazing than you could ever imagine.
You will get that perfect ending, you will get a happy baby, and you will appreciate it so much more because of the trials you went through to get there!
