Yesterday, I posted about how we try to trust Ellie and ourselves in our parenting.  That particular post has been viewed almost 100 times so I know lots of people have read it.  There’s a certain amount of pressure to actually do what you’ve said that you do when you know you’ve told 100 people that you do it.

Ellie is currently learning how to walk, teething, and fighting a cold.

Those are a major developmental change, sore gums, and sickness.

Those are also the top three reasons why babies want to increase their nursing frequency, particularly at night.

Can you see where this is going?

At about 5:30 this morning (after many wakings already), I finally had had enough.  Ellie was awake, Nik was awake, and I was done with nursing.  We tried for almost a half hour to get her to be happy with other things.  But in her increasingly desperate way, she told me that she wanted, even needed, to nurse, again.

And so I literally said to her, “Ellie, I told the world that I would trust you.  So I’m going to trust you and let you nurse.  But please, don’t hurt me [because her latch has been a bit lazy] and please go to sleep.”

Thankfully, she was gentle in her latch, she fell asleep, so did I, and we didn’t get up until 7:30.

I guess Ellie just needed to prove that I did indeed mean what I said when I promised to trust her.

And I suppose that yesterday I should have said, “We trust our baby but it’s a lot easier to trust her in the middle of the day than in the wee hours of the morning when we’re all exhausted.”

Please, if you have time, go read more of the Practices of Parenting that other people have been posting.  I’ve been so blessed by all the wisdom that is collecting there!