Isn't it amazing how different each of our children can be?

I've spent the last 6 weeks MARVELLING at both my children. Earth shatering things like the first time I looked at Tyren after the birth and was stunned by just how big he is - his hands are almost the same size as mine, the long legs, big puppy dog feet. The comfortable weight of Arrow in my arms the way she fits in my lap, her little perfect skull, the stork bite in the same place as Tyren's on the back of her head.

Tyren was always an intense baby - needing lots of comfort nursing to go to sleep, a single kind of urgent cry for pain and hunger felt the same to him, waking up anywhere but at the breast meant abandonment...but he hardly ever cried - just lived in the sling. From day one he was all eye contact and mouth and the need to be moving. He was a total charmer wih others but because his sense of welbeing was dependant entirely on my breasts i could never be more than a few feet away. Still people always described him as an easy baby. Now he has the same quick emotional temperment and people find him exhausting.

Arrow is equally intense but in a different way. She has a real range of cries - complains about life more in general but not in the heartbreaking way Tyren did. She grumps awake, then drops off asleep again immeadiately without needing or wanting anything from me. She has a hard time burping so declines comfort nursing most of the time, much preferring to be patted to sleep or through her difficulties. She has been smiling constantly since two weeks and wakes in the best moods I've ever seen in a newborn. She gets that same toe curling eyes roll back in the head look most babies get nursing if you simply rub her head. She never cries when hungry, just "heffalumps" to indicate she wants to nurse. At the same time she's a colicky litle thing and NEEDS to cry out her tensions each evening - if I distract her from it by walking, taking a bath, vacuuming with her in the sling she still needs to release the tension and the crying simply starts later. I have to go into a quiet space ground and centre myself and just BE with her through it. She won't comfort nurse well during this - it just makes her more fretful and then she projectile vomits everything up. Instead we preceed the crying with some time nursing lying down then wait til the crying has ended and lay down to nurse again. She needs to be in physical contact to sleep but doesn't care if it's me or Wes or my mum, let her lie on anyone's chest head over heart and she's in heaven, or nestled between my breasts or even with an arm draped over her, or in the sling. I don't know if it's that she's my second baby or if it's the difference in temperment but I find her so easy to mother, but everyonme else sees her as a hard baby between the colic and the need for contact. I'm so excited about seeing her personalty unfold!

THE RESPONSES

• Oh Dirt, in so many ways you could be describing my children!

  One thing(amoungst the many!!)that parenting has taught me is to never assume that what works for one child,will work for another.Your post(so beautful)was almost like reading about Isaac & Finlay...

  Isaac was such a "booby-baby",it was his be all & end all.No matter what,aslong as the boob was close,he was happy.He rarely cried/s,was an easily handled baby,very socialable,but when it came to boob & bed,he had very fixed ideas of how & where.Isaac would ONLY sleep in my arms or very close to me in bed(as he still does!).He would find nothing as soothing & settling as the boob & the more tired he got the more he needed the breast to be there. Whereas Finlay is so different to this.She is a good nurser & suckles well for nourishment,but when it comes to comfort nursing her needs are very clear.She will comfort nurse after a nourishment-nurse for a short time,enjoying the warmth & close-ness & having her head stroked.But after a time she starts to get frustrated & upset.This is SO,SO different to Isaac.At first i was clue-less & would go on offering the boob,increasing her dismay & leaving me wondering what on earth i was doing wrong.I soon realized that what she wanted was to be swaddled & put on her sheepskin in her bassinet & like Maeve be patted & rubbed....she LOVES this.She reaches a point of tiredness that the boob has the opposite effect & unsettles her,where with Isaac it was the ONLY thing that would settle him. Finlay loves to be massaged.At last a child that i can massage!!*L*.She will lie quite contentedly & let me rub & massage her for up to half an hour before her bath.....Isaac would never let me do this,he would scream in protest!.Such differences!.

  Infact it never ceases to amaze me how different all of my children are & how they've shown me that there is no place for just the-one-way-is-the-right-way-approach to parenting.Infact Finlay has suprised me by being so different to my boys that i've had to ask myself is this because she is a girl?.It has certainly challenged my ideas on nature vs nurture!. I am ever adapting & moulding myself to be the best possible mother for my children.In any one day my motherhood is constantly evolving & my children are showing me that as different people they have very different needs & desires.This may sound like i am stating the obvious,but it has been such a lesson to me & quite frankly it humbles me.I am very,everpassionate about my parenting beliefs but a long the road i have learnt(from my children!)that flexibilty is the key.

  This is my experience anyway.