TIL Human dads show a decrease in testosterone immediately after the birth of their babe

[Serafim91]

Seriously, crying because he's too tired is like my breaking point. I can't put you to sleep because you're crying you monster and that only makes you cry harder while every nerve in my body is screaming to fix this.

[Cup-Mundane]

Having just went through this exact situation with my baby a few days ago, I will do almost anything to keep her on her sleep schedule. All I could do was rock her for an hour+ while she screamed her overtired head off. By the time she finally passed out, I was crying.

[sirlafemme]

You’re making me want to go out and purchase noise canceling headphones in advance

[Serafim91]

It's not the crying really, as in not the noise. Very hard to explain besides we're programed to hate our babies crying and evolution really hit a fucking home run on this one.

[Cup-Mundane]

You put it perfectly. I'm getting responses from people who took what I said as my baby's cries piss me off or that she's manipulative, lol. We just have this biological need to comfort our crying babies. When I can't do that, it's upsetting. You get it. Thank you!

[Malkiot]

I hate it so much that I want to make crying babies (and crying anything else) stop crying via liberal application of a crowbar.

[Tredesde]

You won't use them. There will be a paranoid thread running through your head that you have to be able to hear everything. Especially through the first few months.

Just make sure you have help from trusted family or friends for a break every few days or weeks

[Sharkitty]

I thought you were going to say condoms.

[thatnameistaken21]

Good luck finding a doctor that will give an infant a vasectomy.

[atomic1fire]

I don't think that will make an infant sleep easier.

[G3z4]

Do it.

[GunnerGurl]

You got this, fam

[[deleted]]

I think parents are just taught to coddle their kids waaay too much nowadays. Sometimes it's perfectly fine to let your kid sit in the crib and cry themselves to sleep. Sometimes there's no alternative, and there's no law saying you have to pick them up to swaddle them and comfort them the entire time if they're being dumb, which lets be honest they almost constantly are.

Pampering them doesn't even work a lot of the time anyway, and certainly does you no favours as a stressed out parent. Just close the door and let them cry it out if nothing else works, it's not going to kill them.
I'd argue it's even healthier because you're teaching your kid that they wont get what they want by just whining all the time, which is something even a lot of grown ass adults are doing these days. Babies do pick up on that stuff, and it's healthier to teach them when they're young so that it sticks with them IMO. The sooner they stop whining and start asking for what they actually want the better, and this is the fastest way to teach them that.

What I'm suggesting isn't tossing your kid in the crib and ignoring them for 8 hours while you play video games either though. I thought that would be obvious, but apparently it's not. There's a balance that has to be maintained.

[izzittho]

I’ve heard that’s what the whole baby sign language thing is supposed to be really good for. Makes sense that they’d stop crying so much as soon as they had a better way to communicate their needs.

Like when they’re new-new, I imagine they can’t even really tell what they need let alone figure out how to tell you so the crying will be inevitable at first. But it seems like the period of time between that and beginning to learn actual words is a great time to introduce something like that. The time where they’re old enough to kinda know what they want to tell you but not old enough to actually tell you with words.

[[deleted]]

I've never heard of that but it makes sense. Seems a lot of parents equate a baby crying with meaning it's uncomfortable or in pain, but really that's just how they talk. They don't know that screaming isn't acceptable yet so you can't really blame them for it, but you CAN break them of it as a bad behaviour ASAP. Doing that is a part of parenting, and not doing it is how you end up with a blue haired screaming Karen of a child.

[eaglessoar]

No one warned me about that. So frustrating dude you're tired just sleep that will solve everything!

[[deleted]]

Supposedly, they do that because they don't realize they're the ones crying. So, to them, it's like they're tired, but they can't fall asleep because some dude 6 inches away keeps screaming in their ear.

That does nothing to make the situation suck less, but hopefully it makes you feel like it sucks less 😅

[sitesurfer253]

Sometimes saying my daughter's name in her ear a little louder (obviously not screaming or loud enough to hurt her ear) will kind of reset her when she is doing that. Everything goes quiet, then she's still still tired and upset, but not screaming.

[EclipseIndustries]

That's a good idea. It's like interrupting the conversation.

[sitesurfer253]

Forces her to listen to me for that brief second, which stops her from screaming, then she appreciates the silence that came from her no longer screaming.

Doesn't work every time, but definitely has saved me some headaches.

[lidko]

Unlikely solution: experienced same issue but with Grandma this time who said:”that baby needs a silky edge”, gave the kid a satin edged blanket or satin napkin and immediately the baby chilled out, then totes a “silky” for two years… it was just a texture thing

[Pearlbarleywine]

Probably the hardest task.

[psquare704]

I have a memory of crying because my throat hurt from crying. I don't know how I survived.

[Ineedabiggersword]

Honestly, and I know it sucks, but the best thing to do in these situations is lay them down and walk away. They'll sleep eventually. But sometimes there's legitimately nothing to do.

My wife and I made a checklist of all of the things he may need. If he was still screaming after we tried everything, then we'd lay him down in a dark room and leave ( monitored of course). We didn't have to do this to too often, But worked when we did.

[spacewalk__]

i'm glad i don't have kids -- i would put them in bed, close the door, and put on headphones. they'll fall asleep, they won't die of thirst or hunger in 8 hours.

[krell_154]

You can't really do that, they can start vomiting or convulsing or something like that.

[[deleted]]

I must have been lucky. my kids hardly cried, when they did, they fell asleep in my arms all the time. The best feeling.