Are difficult babies destined to become difficult children?
Updated below! (at age almost 3)
We have a real complainer of a baby. She’s only 8w old, so I’m talking about her instinctive response to stuff. She starts screaming within seconds of waking up, even if she’s in my arms. Seeing me, having me talk to her, none of that calms her, she just loses it when waking up no matter the scenario. She screams thru all diaper changes. She screams when she wants to nurse even if she just finished nursing 5 mins ago. She screams at baths. Tummy time? Lol, mayhem. She goes from 0-60 in 2 seconds with everything.
We use all the soothing techniques, follow wake windows, are mellow and quickly responsive but not over stimulating, have discussed with the pediatrician, etc. and I’m not asking for tips. I’m actually really burned out on tips. Just asking for a crystal ball…
She has been colicky and dealing with bad gas (which seems to finally be getting better thanks to a 20-pronged approach), but that doesn’t explain the fact that she does just flip out the second she develops any need. Her grandmother was a NICU nurse and ran a daycare center and can’t handle this baby. Well, if push came to shove she could, but she can’t quiet this baby without superhuman effort and she just passes the baby right back to us bc she is so difficult.
So my question is— does this say anything about her personality? She’s a difficult baby, is she going to be a difficult toddler and difficult child? My husband and I are both exceptionally laid back people and have been told we were easy babies, so I sort of assumed we would have a pretty chill baby ourselves. Surprise!
FWIW hormones/genetics/evolution are a crazy thing and I am crazy about this little monster and want another baby despite how hard she is to handle 😅
Update: Don't feel bad if this is your reality now! I was exactly there, but we are out of the woods and you will be too! Mine is a great kid now. I read some interesting academic papers on the topic, while panicking with a young baby at 3am, and it isn't uncommon for very difficult babies to become exceptionally empathetic humans (measured at age 5 or 6 if I recall correctly).
She's got strong feelings about things still, but we have been extremely patient, accomodating when she was a baby, very conscious about working on emotional education and gently building the vocabulary for her to express herself/her needs starting pretty young, and she has learned to really happily channel her strong feelings into polite requests the vast majority of the time. At almost 3 years old, she is honestly a delight. She gets into everything and is extremely curious and has A BAJILLION questions, but she's just a really NICE kid who is smart and funny and so thoughtful. She has more empathy and patience than I ever would have thought was possible back in those early days of worrying about her. She has more than many adults I know...
She has an intense personality type, but she is not difficult anymore. She gets really into the things she's into and has strong feelings, but I don't mean those things as euphemisms. She is pro-socially engaged with the people in her world.
Don't get me wrong. The first 2 years were very hard. But I gave up on trying to check boxes with her (we didn't go on cute trips to the cafe with our baby in the stroller, the idea of putting her in a carseat and driving to a baby swim class would make my blood cold). I napped when she napped, I didn't get out very much outside of daycare hours, I lived a quiet life being home evenings and weekends just doing quiet things at home. It was hard not having the cute baby/new mom phase that I see many other folks with. My friends with kids the same ages had very different experiences. We also would not have been able to raise her the way she needed to be raised if we had another baby sooner, this kid really needed a LOT of attention and support and HARD work.
But here we are at almost 3 and anything is possible now. She has just blossomed, and my understanding is that can be typical with intense personalities, especially if you put in effort. And that's so so hard. I go to therapy for myself, which helps create the space to actually enjoy parenting with so much focus. Things have just gotten progressively easier since she turned 2 and I can answer my original post question: a truly difficult baby does not grow into a monster toddler/kid/adult!