Colic
Colic is the general term that pediatricians and parents use to describe babies that cry more than the “usual” baby. Now what is the normal amount? I dunno. Nobody really knows. The usual criteria pediatricians use to “diagnose” a baby with colic are the following:
A baby that is crying for 3 or more hours a day, 3 or more days a week, and for 3 or more weeks.
The name colic comes from the idea that back in the day, docs thought that this excessive crying was due to stomach/gastrointestinal upset. Then it was in vogue to say that colic was due to baby migraines, but these hypotheses fell through. All in all, the more we learn about colicky babies, the less we are sure what is causing it. Most pediatricians now feel that some babies are born more pissed off than others. Some are perfectly cool with being thrust from the warmth of mom’s belly to this cold dark harsh world. Some, well…aren’t. And to be honest, I thought that the basis of colic was just some parents are better at handling crying from babies. That was until my baby boy was born.
From the moment he came out until 16 weeks, he had big feelings about everything. This was such as stark difference from our firstborn who was the easiest baby, not easy because dad is a pediatrician, but easy in that they only cried when hungry, hurt, or scared and did not mind being put in any situation, or missing a nap, or going to bed early. I’m telling you: magic baby status. So when baby bro came and no matter what we did he was screaming in our faces, it was jarring. I still wake up in a cold sweat thinking about how hard that kiddo cried every time till he was red in the face. I didn’t have any gray hair until I had a colicky kiddo. I, a pediatrician, and my wife, a teacher with a master’s in human development, could not for the life of us figure out why this little dude was so mad at everything. We tried changing formulas. We tried colic drops, gas drops, teas, lotions, massages, and craniosacral therapy. We tried changing sleep routines. We tried every pacifier imaginable. We tried changing clothing material and sleep area accoutrements. We took him to the pediatrician to see if I was missing anything because something was obviously wrong—he was crying all the time. Time and time again, nothing worked and no abnormal findings at the doctor’s office. So then all it was a waiting game until Week 16 when these colicky babies magically flip a switch and don’t scream all day.
I am not going to lie, it wasn’t easy dealing with an upset baby for 16 weeks. It took a lot of parenting tag team breaks, lots of long walks, and joining a Woodinville winery wine club to get through those weeks. When we exhausted every possible soothing mechanism and nothing worked, we would resign ourselves to putting him down in a dim and quiet room and letting him cry for 15-20 minutes before starting all the soothing attempts again. Once we realized that we couldn’t calm him down every time and that even if he is crying, and I mean crying a lot, and we don’t do anything, he eventually will calm down and sleep. Over time, we saw the crying get shorter as he learned more and more that he could calm on his own to nap every now and then.
So for your sanity, once you start seeing the signs of colic, realize that you can do the best you can to soothe, but it’s not going to work every time. Making time for chilling out and regaining your own mental health is super important and also a priority.
Now the good news, colic always ends. And it did for us right around the 15-16 week mark, he figured stuff out and like flipping a light switch, he turned into a chill dude. Of note, if a baby is colicky, there is no evidence that those kids are more anxious, demanding, badly behaved, or do worse in school than their non-colicky buddies.
I am sorry, colic sucks, and if you have a baby with colic, it is going to suck for 12-16 weeks, but it always gets better.
As for my gray hair, that’s just getting worse.