She won't sleep in my arms... Lessons from the day my accumulated skills became useless

Not long after my daughter was born,
I naturally gained confidence in putting her to sleep by holding her.
“This might be my area of expertise,” I thought.

Until she was about a month old, she would fall asleep immediately just by being held, rocked slowly, or gently patted.

There was a period when my wife was unwell, so I took over putting our daughter to sleep, aside from breastfeeding. As the opportunities to put her to sleep by holding her increased, my skills leveled up day by day.

As my daughter grew, she began to cry for various reasons.
She started reacting to things she saw, crying from hunger, or crying because she couldn't sleep—.

No matter the situation, I would use my ingenuity to calm her down and put her to sleep.

I devised my own theme for putting her to sleep.
Every day, I continued to learn through trial and error on my own.

・I increased the variations of rocking, combining vertical and horizontal movements.

・In addition to rocking my body, I tried rocking and twisting my arms.

・I created irregular rocking by offsetting the timing of my head and body movements. I tried to replicate the comfort of irregular motions like those of a car or a stroller.

・I applied a little pressure to her stomach or lifted her head slightly to help her close her eyes.

・When she wouldn't stop crying, I would whisper “shhh, shhh...” near her ear. I was conscious of making a sound like rubbing a plastic bag.

・I realized that if she saw my face, she would wake up thinking “I'm being watched...!”, so I would look away.

・I would hold her while holding her hand, sensing when she was falling asleep by the weakening of her grip, and adjusting my rocking accordingly.

Try, fail, and try again. Through that repetition, my repertoire gradually increased.
I relied on breastfeeding when she was hungry, but she began to sleep peacefully even when she was crying loudly.

Having gained experience and skills,
when she wouldn't stop crying or looked sleepy,
I was in an invincible state, thinking “Leave it to Daddy.”

...Then, around the time she turned three months old, something strange happened—.

When I tried to put her to sleep in a cradle hold,
my daughter would arch her back, kick her legs,
and shake her head, resisting in every way.
She would resist, start crying, and scream.

The skills I had accumulated until now were rendered useless.

Since her neck wasn't steady yet, I hadn't practiced holding her upright much.
Because of that, even when I held her upright, the pressure on her chest seemed uncomfortable, and she would start crying.
If she didn't want to be held, I would put her back in bed, but she would just keep crying.

What should I do—.

While continuing to hold her horizontally, I tried trial and error, thinking,
“There must be a comfortable way to hold her,”
but she kept fussing.

Just as I was about to give up, I sat her on my lap while keeping her sideways, and supported her head so it was tilted slightly upward.

Then, my daughter began to doze off and fell asleep as if she felt secure.

“She really does have a cute sleeping face,”
I thought, and at that moment, I felt like I had acquired a new way to put her to sleep.

Reflecting on this experience, I thought about what I learned from it and how I could put it into words.

My realization from this experience was that I had become narrow-minded by clinging to past successful experiences,
and that I had lost sight of my purpose, wondering why I was so fixated on that specific method.

In this case, I was trying to make adjustments within the scope of holding her horizontally.
I had arbitrarily decided that she wouldn't sleep if held vertically,
and hadn't tried any new methods.

If I translate this into three lessons that also apply to work,

I will try thinking by replacing it with this.

Even if a skill (a means) becomes useless,
I realized that by returning to the purpose and exploring new methods,
I can grow.

Children change every day.
That is precisely why I want to be prepared for parents to keep changing too.
Not relying too much on past experiences, and returning to the purpose.
I believe that is important for both future parenting and work.
Let's update ourselves flexibly in line with change.