Parenting Between the Lines: What Helped Me Learn to Parent My Way

I kissed his forehead goodnight.

I lay across his feet.

One arm resting on his chest, the other patting on his bum.

He’s kicking, tossing, making sounds.

I feel the usual desperation to calm him down so that I can do something else.

That was me a month ago, putting my 4-month-old baby to sleep and struggling as usual. I had decided to stop picking him up unless absolutely necessary. He’d gotten so heavy that rocking him to sleep in my arms became so painful that I almost dropped him a few times.

So I was determined to teach him to fall asleep without being picked up.

I put him in his sleep sack. White noise on. Blackout curtains shut.

Pitch black room, and here we are - an upset baby on a floor bed, kicking and flailing his arms, and me - lying across his bed below his feet, so that he can’t see me.

I already sang his short lullaby, which didn't help very much but was worth trying as part of his sleep routine.

I’ve been doing the shush pat for a while now.

He's still kicking and trying to grab at my hand, but I keep my arm heavy.

I’m following advice from the sleep course I had just taken: be invisible and boring.

My mind is impatiently racing: But why doesn't he calm down?! Will it be possible at all if he's so used to being rocked to sleep in my arms?

And then I realized that I was very tired. All this anxious strategizing suddenly felt like too much work.

I felt like I had no choice but to cozy up and begin relaxing my body and mind.

So I gave in: I decided it was okay to take a short nap with him, if he doesn't start crying up. What if relaxing was the answer?

Things I wanted to do can wait, I told myself.

And as I was letting go of my desperate attempts to control him, I stopped patting, let my arm go heavy. Maybe that’s what slowed down his kicking.

My breath became deeper and more even.

Then something shifted to my surprise: his frantic breath started to slow, deepen, and match mine. Could it be just because I relaxed and let go of control? Is it really that simple?

As I was thinking about something else, I drifted away into a half-dreamy state. Not sure how long I was there, maybe 10 minutes or 15… but when I came back to reality, I discovered that my baby boy was sleeping.

He voluntarily turned on his side, sucked his fingers for a bit, and fell asleep.

I was amazed: this easy, hands-off approach worked. Maybe control was the problem, not the solution.

I didn't think it would be a repeated success, but this started a completely new sleep routine that we practiced for about a month until just recently he learned to fall asleep with no help at all.

Now it’s even simpler.

Sleep sack on, kiss on his forehead, white noise on, blackout curtain shut... and I leave the room.

I check my baby camera 5 minutes later, and usually he is sound asleep by then.

Letting go of control wasn’t just a meditation mantra anymore. It became the secret to our new, easeful sleep routine.

This is how I discovered the beauty of Mom-baby co-regulation: my relaxation helped him relax; my letting go helped him let go.

Intuition Isn’t Always Instant

Before becoming a mom, I liked to think of myself as intuitive. I had done a lot of inner work. I trusted my body. I knew how to tune in.

And yet, during the first couple of months of my son’s life, I cried regularly from the sheer weight of not knowing what to do. I was overwhelmed, exhausted, and in pain. And when my body is in pain, my intuition tends to shut down. Instead of hearing my inner voice, I got stuck in anxious loops, constantly second-guessing myself.

I walked into motherhood expecting to feel equipped by instinct. Instead, I felt lost. And I realized that intuition isn’t a fixed state — it’s something we grow into over time, with practice, rest, and courage. It comes online not when we demand it, but when we create space for it.

Knowledge as a Foundation, Not a Rulebook

There was a moment when my husband Erik, watching me try to implement a sleep routine from a course I took, said:

*"Every baby is different! You and I have different learning styles. I figure things out as I go — you read books and take courses. That’s okay, but maybe we can’t follow rigid schedules and rules for our baby. It’s not how we’re wired."

He was right.

I never dismissed intuition, but I also didn’t believe it was enough by itself. I wanted a bit of structure. I needed a foundation to build from — something to help me feel less helpless. The courses I took didn’t give me all the answers, but they gave me language, concepts, and options. They helped me narrow down what to try. That, in turn, gave me confidence to experiment and find our own rhythm.

The Chaos of Contradictions

One of the hardest things for me in the early months was the sheer volume of conflicting advice. Social media. My care team. Friends. Relatives. Everyone had a different take. Should I follow attachment parenting? Strict schedules? Sleep training? SIDS guidelines? Traditional wisdom?

I wanted to be responsible. I wanted to do it right. But trying to follow everything only left me confused, disconnected, and close to burnout. It took me a while to realize: trying to do it all "right" isn’t responsible — it’s impossible.

Our modern parenting landscape is noisy. Over-commercialized. Often polarized. And a lot of what we see online or get sold in stores isn’t even designed to support us — it’s designed to make money off our insecurity. No wonder it’s so hard to hear our own inner voice.

Intuition + Information + Discernment = Aligned Parenting

What has helped me most is learning to use external knowledge as input, not instruction. To collect ideas, strategies, and tools — and then pause to ask:

Does this feel right for me?

Does it feel right for my baby?

Does it serve our family’s needs and rhythms?

When something doesn’t feel quite right, I try not to push through. I pause. I pay attention to the tension. And over time, that has become a natural critical thinking process — one that lets me integrate the best of both worlds: useful knowledge and inner knowing.

It’s not about picking one over the other. It’s about cultivating the discernment to know what to apply, what to adapt, and what to let go.

Tips for Parents Learning to Combine Instinct and Info

Pause before applying: Ask yourself: Is this advice helpful right now, or just noise?

Start with your baby, not the book: Let observation lead your decisions.

Notice resistance: If something feels off, explore why. Your reaction, reaction of your baby, and reaction of your partner — they all matter.

Let intuition be earned: It gets stronger with sleep, space, and support.

Allow flexibility: With babies (and humans in general), what worked yesterday may not work tomorrow. That’s normal, so it's important to stay open to change.

Reflection Questions for You

What parenting advice have I tried that didn’t feel like a fit for me?

When on my (self-)parenting journey have I ignored my gut? What did I learn from that?

What small wins have made me feel more confident and connected?

Where do I need more solid info? Where do I need less?

A Final Thought

You’re not broken if you don’t "just know" what to do with your baby (or your inner child, if you're reflecting on re-parenting yourself). None of us do at first. You’re learning. You’re showing up. And every step you take toward trusting your own knowing is a powerful act of parenting.

We find our way not by being perfect, but by being present.

And that is more than enough.