Post by applegrape on Feb 1, 2015 10:10:01 GMT -5
I've been MIA. Grocery day and I made lactation cookies. But my sister is babysitting tonight for her husbands niece-it's the nieces 21st birthday and she drops the baby off with my sister. My sister asked of she had any sort of crib and the girl says " no he sleeps in his car seat all night" I'm so judgey right now. They smoke in the house too, my sister had to wash everything and give the baby a bath. I feel so bad for this baby...
He started coming to the daycare at 9 months and had basically spent those first months of his life in his carseat. The back of his head was so flat and he hadn't reached any of his developmental milestones. He was basically a newborn in a 9mo body. He couldn't roll or sit and had no voice. He was so quiet and sad looking. Probably because of all the times he screamed and screamed in his car seat and nobody ever came to help him. (This could be the basic stem of my stance on CIO but, that's another topic, entirely).
I'm tearing up remembering that sad boy. By the time he moved into the 1's room, he could roll and had started to babble and find his voice. By a year and a half, he was almost walking and by the time he moved into the 2's, he was running and talking and getting into all sorts of mischief with HUGE personality. It was an amazing transformation and it was so awesome to see.
This was a long story but, it's an important one. I'm hoping so hard that that is the only time that poor babe spends in the car seat other than in the car. That's such a long time to be restrained. All the sads now.
This is essentially the story of how we got DD. Her mom had ODd and her dad was in prison for selling drugs. She lived in a playpen until she was 9 months. She sat in dirty diapers all day, and no one held her. She didn't smile, laugh, sit, crawl- nothing. DH was visiting one day (bio mom is DH's ex gf), and the family was letting DD CIO in another room by herself on the other side of the house. DH picked her up and she stopped crying, so he pretty much said, "Where's her car seat?" And took her home. We only just got legal custody two years ago, but we've had her ever since.
Physically she started developing as soon as someone paid attention to her. Mentally she has some attention issues, and we worry it is from drug use in utero. She also had long-standing abandonment issues that didn't resolve until she was 9 or so, and she couldn't be left in a room by herself. She was afraid no one would come back for her. Her bio-parents permanently messed with my baby girl's future because they were too selfish to stop taking drugs.