Jacob- the 'High Needs' Child?

Tonight my husband and I were attempting to put our baby down for bed. We have this nightime family ritual of hanging out on our bed and playing blocks with him and singing songs until Daddy has to go night-night (He commutes). Then I take the baby through his bedtime rituals that are designed to signal to him that sleep is soon expected! Of course, this is all in theory and in a perfect world, the evening goes off without a hitch. In a perfect world... Our son can be considered a sensitive, or fussy baby. Some people like to use the term “high needs” to describe their fussy babies. Some babies just come out of the womb complaining! After Benjamin was born, I thought I was reaping what I had sown. I thought God was punishing me for all the complaining I had done, especially to Him. Now, don’t get me wrong, I absolutely LOVE my baby! But the high needs child does take an extreme amount of energy and creative parenting, especially in the first year of life. They require more cuddling (on their terms and how THEY like it, not how you think they want to be held!), they require more and longer nursing sessions, and as if things weren’t challenging enough already, they require LESS sleep!

Because demanding babies are so because of their personalities and temperaments, many moms report knowing they would soon have their hands full while the baby was yet in the womb. This was the case with ours. At about 5 months into the pregnancy, he decided to turn the wrong way (breech) and constantly poked his head into my ribcage. He always woke between 3am and 5am to kick me. He would wake up and move around if I had to get up and go to the restroom (which was frequently). At 24 weeks along, I started having contractions and had to be admitted to the hospital so they could give me medication to try and stop the delivery. I had to do this twice. Then 6 weeks before my due date, I rolled over in bed and Benjamin kicked me and instantly my water broke. Being that he was still breech (I was scheduled to have him turned 3 weeks later), my husband rushed me to the hospital to have a C-section. Once they pulled him out, there was a commotion in the delivery room. When I asked the nurse what was going on, she said the baby peed on the doctors!! It was as if he was saying, “I’ll take life on my own terms!”

Tonight I asked my husband if he would like to have a mini-midrash session. A midrash is a Jewish concept and it involves discussion of Torah (the Bible) and sometimes there is debating and you may even try to “win over your brother” to your point of view, which can make for some lively discussion. The term midrash means "investigation". As believers, it is a good exercise because it causes us to engage ourselves with what the Bible has to say as we wrestle with how it applies to our daily lives. Tonight, the topic I suggested was a personal theory I have: Jacob (who was later named Israel by God and became one of the patriarchs of the Jewish people) was a high need child! I only had the beginnings of a case and it went something like this:
The Bible says that while Rebeccah was pregnant with the twins Jacob and Esau, they jostled around inside of her. So much so, the Genesis account says, that she “despaired of living”! Ahh, the beginnings of Jewish mother-guilt! It also says that when they were born, Esau was born first and that Jacob grabbed the heel of Esau his brother. (Thus he was named Yaakov-Hebrew for Jacob, meaning supplanter). Now that is one determined little baby! (BTW, my husband also said he heard a theory that Esau was actually trying to crush the head of Jacob, in an attempt to nullify the promise of Abraham passed down to his children’s children, for the promise of the Holy Land was given ultimately through Isaac, then Jacob, although Jacob was not the firstborn of Isaac. I thought this was interesting and deserves further investigation).

The second reason why I think Jacob was a sensitive, high needs child is because the Bible says he stayed close to the tents while his brother Esau was a sportsman always out hunting game. Staying close to home-close to Mommy and Daddy. That sounds like my Ben! So attached to us is he that he fusses if I leave his sight to use the restroom! Some child experts believe that these babies so need a high level of touch and bonding and that is why they seem overdependant on their parents, but in fact, they end up later being more secure and independent than their peers. The idea is that in order for one to learn to become independent, one must first learn to be dependant.

And the final reason I think Jacob was a high needs child is because high needs children are often strong willed in their personalities….the hallmark of a leader. They don’t give up easily (it is a good thing God answered my prayer for my baby in the womb that he would have an overcoming spirit! He would need it to overcome the challenges presented to him by living in a hard hospital incubator for the first 2 weeks of his life). This is the defining characteristic of Jacob. He was always overcoming something. He overcame the fact that his father was about to give the blessing of the firstborn and thus the promised land to his older brother (O.k., some scholars have been hard on Jacob and especially in his mother for helping to deceive his father into thinking he was his brother in order to receive the blessing). He also overcame having to work for Uncle Laban for so many years so he could win Rachel. But the Bible says that Jacob wrestled the angel of the Lord. Thus God named him Israel (Hebrew for ‘one who wrestles with God’.) To wrestle with God- the maker of Heaven and earth? Now that takes chutzpah!
I know I can often tend to get tired out from my active high need child. But when I think about the big picture and how my investment in my child will one day pay off, I can only be thankful for if my midrash theory holds true, I know he is in good company!