Newborns seem to sleep almost constantly for the first couple of weeks. Sure, they wake up sporadically to feed, scream, and shit themselves, but it’s mostly sleeping, up to 16 or 18 hours a day according to the NHS. Enjoy it while it lasts, because at some point (and this point was week 3 for us) your child will become a figurative bile-spewing ball of rage from the hours of 19.00 until midnight-ish.

Yes, as sure as long, sleepless night follows weary, endless day, your child will turn into a monster in the evening. Begun, the Witching Hour has. There’s neither rhyme nor reason to the child’s ire and distress. He can be clean, well-fed, tired, and making all the right noises about wanting to be put down for a sleep, yet as soon as his head touches the mattress, his back arches, his eyes scrunch, and out bellows a cry of ear-splitting proportions that the only conclusion you can reach as to the reason for this feral howling is that someone must have just stabbed him directly in the eye with at least a couple of rusty bodkins.

He mustn’t have fed properly, you say. Let’s give him another ten minutes on the ol’ boob. He settles happily into a bonus ten minutes feeding, before flopping off quite contendedly for at least 15 seconds, before suddenly and inexplicably realising JUST HOW TERRIBLE EVERYTHING STILL IS AND HOW MUCH THIS NEEDS SCREAMING ABOUT.

Ah, must be a soiled nappy after the last, bonus feed, you naively think. A quick change later, and he seemingly happily relaxes on your lap, eyes closed, for at most twenty seconds before the grim realisation of THE HORROR OH THE HORROR OF EVERYTHING OVERWHELMS ME AND I MUST SHOUT THIS TO THE WORLD.

You work through your mental my-baby-is-crying-what-could-it-be checklist at this point. Hungry? Nope, fed and bonus fed. Dirty? Nope, changed just now. Tired? Quite obviously. Over-tired? Possibly, but there’s sod all we can do about that. Hmm, maybe it’s colic. Yes! Colic! That one-size-fits-all label that explains this terrible, terrible, occurrence. You search the medicine cabinet for something suitable. Calpol? Shit, he needs to be two months before he can take this panacea. Gripe water? Nope, needs to be a month old, and we’re only in week 3. Infacol? Yes, Infacol! Oh, medicine, how I love thee, with your combining-small-bubbles-into-bigger-bubbles-to-make-them-easier-to-burp mutant power! Swiftly, you administer the medicine, and it seems to work, temporarily. Mr. Hyde recedes, and Dr. Jekyll reappears. Things seem to be going in the right direction. His eyelids are getting heavy. His breathing settles. You decide to put him down in his crib/moses basket and utter a silent prayer to $DEITY to please let this be the day where the kid falls asleep at a time that allows you to get your tea before midnight.

You gingerly place him in his bed, tuck a blanket round him, slowly back away from the crib, leaving a lingering hand on his chest for a few moments, and whispering an ever-quieter shush, all to calmly let him know he’s not alone, he’s safe, and he should embrace the welcoming arms of sleep. You’re almost there. Your hand moves away from his chest. The shushing stops. You stand up, partner next to you, and breathe a (quiet) sigh of relief, smiling at the imminent prospect of sating your hunger with whatever reheated remnants of last night’s dinner makes up tonights feast.

But no. Life has a different plan for you, sir (or madam). Because right about now, he realises that hey, that lovely warm body I was pressed against only a few minutes ago has gone, and that scent of Mum or Dad has been replaced by the scent of the washing powder-du-jour impregnated in the crib sheets (or the smell of milk sick, cos that’s just how it happens some days when you’re just too tired to change the sheets). AND THIS IS A THING THAT MUST BE SHOUTED ABOUT, INCREASINGLY LOUDLY, AND POSSIBLY FOR A GOOD FEW HOURS.

Y’see, the Witching Hour is a problem you can’t really win. It’s Kobayashi Maru. The only thing you can do is try to limit the damage the whole escapade inflicts on you before the feral beast in front of you finally exhausts himself from five straight hours of screaming and falls asleep, legs akimbo, in some particularly inconvenient place, like in the middle of the lounge carpet, or under the dining table. You only notionally win; the victory is Pyrrhic. You scoop them up delicately, under fear of partner-inflicted death should you wake them up now they’ve finally dropped off, place them in the crib, and try (and often fail) to refrain from commenting upon how cute they are when they’re asleep. Because you know exactly how cute they didn’t look, only half an hour prior, whilst spitting and howling at you like a cornered alley cat.

And you know that, in approximately 18 hours, you’ll have it all to go through again. Reassuring yourself that it’s only a phase – it is only a phase, trust me – helps you cope to a certain extent, but the only real way to deal with the Witching Hour is grit your teeth and suffer it.

Or gin. Bottles of the stuff. Morning, noon, and night.