'Ask Anne'

Chapter 5
The Reluctant Father - Part 2

Dear Anne,

I am a single mother with a 6 month old baby boy. He has been behaving really strangely recently, and I was wondering if you have any pearls of wisdom to share.

First, he’s been crying almost incessantly for weeks. I’ve taken him to the doctor and confirmed that he’s perfectly healthy, so I don’t know what’s causing him all this distress. I thought maybe it was my milk, so I tried changing him over to a hypo allergic formula, but that didn’t seem to help. In any case, the only time when he does seem to calm down a bit is during breast feeding, though I find it odd that he turns a bright red whenever we start.

Next, he seems grouchy and unhappy all the time, and often has this frightened and desperate look in his eyes like he’s trying to escape. I always thought babies are supposed to be filled with laughter and giggles, but not my little Bobby. I’ve tried singing, cuddling, dangling all kinds of squeaky toys and black-and-white cutouts, but not even the tiniest of smiles. He does wiggle his arms and legs around an awful lot, like he’s struggling to move around by himself, then he gets frustrated & upset and starts bawling again. Maybe he’ll get better after he figures out how to crawl?

Finally, when he’s not crying, he babbles a lot. Obviously he can’t form any words so I’ve no clue about what he’s trying to express. I read in a book that he’s learning how to vocalize at a really young age, so he’ll be an early talker and supposedly more intelligent. I don’t know about that, but he definitely babbles much more than any baby I’ve ever seen, and I wonder whether there’s anything I need to be concerned about, or if it’s just a passing phase.

Anyway, all this stress from my little boy’s odd behavior has really been putting me on edge. I hadn’t meant to share this, but I’ve recently been getting a really weird dream. In it, I’m a baby girl lying in my crib again, and then this man comes over and hands me a pretty rattle. When I grab hold of it, it starts to glow and then BOOM! Suddenly I’m all grown up and back in my room again. Isn’t that really strange? I’m too embarrassed to tell any of my friends about it, I mean, it sounds like one of those cliché age change stories you find posted on the internet. Eeek! Anyway, sorry about my rambling, if you can think of any advice for me for me and my little Bobby, I would greatly appreciate it. Thank you so much!

Yours,

Maria