Emily has colic. For those of you who haven't lived with a colicky baby, let me educate you:



That video is 20 seconds long. Pretty horrible, right? She does that for 3 hours straight every night. She's done that for 3 hours every night for the last 6 weeks. Every. Single. Night.

You're probably thinking, "Well, pick her up you dork!" I did. And right before I set her down, I had been walking and bouncing her to try and calm her. I'd been shushing her. I'd swaddled her. I'd given her the pacifier. After I took that video, I put her in the front baby carrier and walked around with her. She screamed the whole time. I had put her in the bouncer to see if she just wanted to be left alone. She DID NOT want to be left alone. Per the advice of the doctor, I swaddled her and put her in her crib. I get a break; she gets a break and could possibly fall asleep. No. She screamed non stop. She screams until it's time to eat again. And then, she refuses most of the bottle and becomes even more infuriated because she's starving, but it really pisses her off if I try to coax her into eating. (No, she's not hungry early either. I had considered that and thought maybe by meal time she's so over-the-top miserable, she can't even eat. I tried feeding her early. FAIL.)

The latest theory is that babies with colic lack the mechanism to shut down. By the time evening rolls around, they are overstimulated and exhausted but don't know how to turn themselves off. They are like this until the part of the brain that controls this "soothing" function matures - usually about 3 months. This is by far the most frustrating baby hurdle I've dealt with. Maybe a feeding aversion ties this for suckiness and mostly because those last longer. It's way worse than reflux. At least with reflux, there is a solution. There is no remedy for colic. (Yes, we've tried gripe water and ColicCalm.) Bottom line: colic sucks. When someone tells you they have or had a colicky baby, cry for them. I cry for me all the time.