Rant - Feeling so hopeless about sleep!

[Noelle610]

Bananz, I'm thrilled to hear that!

My DH insists on leaving Charlotte's light on (albeit on the lowest setting) when he puts her down in case she still wants to "play". Then he proceeds to throw toys and books in her crib. It's so strange to me, because I am all business - dark room and no toys - she's supposed to be sleep gosh darnit! BUT, she always goes right to sleep for him... He compares it to my winding down and surfing the net on my phone or reading before bed. Maybe he's onto something....

 

[bananaz]

Haha, I don't put books or hard toys in there or leave the light on, but I have increased the number of stuffed animals and I definitely think it helps. It seems like they distract her long enough for sleep to sneak up on her. How does Charlotte go down when you put her in with no toys or light?

 

[Noelle610]

That's really interesting! She usually does pretty well for nights, but naps can be a struggle sometimes. Maybe I'll try that approach.

 

[MiniKiwi]

Bananaz, that sounds awesome. I have tried quite a lot just putting Mia in her cot but it doesn't work She doesn't have any toys at all, maybe I'll give that a go.

Things are actually getting worse here. Last night she was up hourly or less I just don't get it

 

[bananaz]

Bananaz, that sounds awesome. I have tried quite a lot just putting Mia in her cot but it doesn't work She doesn't have any toys at all, maybe I'll give that a go.

Things are actually getting worse here. Last night she was up hourly or less I just don't get it

Yeah it never worked for Elsie either until suddenly... it did! I don't think it would work without the loveys though, she likes having something to tackle and toss around while she's going to sleep.

Poor Mia and poor you Could it be teething-related? Or maybe even an ear infection?

 

[MiniKiwi]

Hmm I don't think it could be an ear infection, she's happy, no temperature, not crying in the night and fine lying down. Her teeth are definitely more likely to blame but I thought we were through with the worst of that, her four teeth are through the gum now..so I don't know

 

[Noelle610]

Ugh MiniKiwi, my heart breaks for you! That type of sleep deprivation is just crushing. I wish I had some good advice, but I really only have

 

[Boo44]

Shadowy - jack developed a poop habit of 6am (when previously sleeping til 7.30) when he was 7 months old. He's still doing it at almost 9 months! Totally out of the blue. I know 4am is worse. We've tried all we can think of to stop it (even vetoed weetabix for a few days poor baby!) but nothing has changed it. The best thing we've done is switch nappies. He doesn't leak now and sometimes still hardly stirs and gives us until 7am despite the pooping

Just wanted you to know you're not alone lol!

Bananaz that's fantastic!! Nothing like happy naps

Mini kiwi - you out of everyone deserve Mia's brief sttn habit to come back. I really have everything crossed for you, you're so nice! (Hope that makes you feel better)

 

[NotNic]

For close to a month, around 7/8 mths Finlay woke with a disgusting nappy every morning. It was annoying then it stopped and we got the early wake ups instead. At a guess, I reckon its just a change in their bowels, where they are maturing coupled with extra fibre in their diets and larger portions.

I posted elsewhere about naps and this week the nap times have got less and less. Without me cutting them down he is sleeping for roughly an hour in the morning and on the days when he does have two they've lasted just 30mins. Before he was having close to two hours in the morning and 45mins - 1hr pm on average a day. Having a shorter morning nap doesn't really give us a good pm sleep anymore. Bring back d nap times please!

 

[Shadowy Lady]

Minikiwi - OMG I'm so sorry Mia had a worse night. Do you get help with the night wakings? Does she feed at every wakeup call?

Bananaz - yey for awesome naps!

Boo - noooo don't tell me that!!! I really hope this stops soon. Or at least if she could poop a bit later, I even take 6 am over this stupid 4 am! What diapers do you guys use? We use Pampers Cruisers and she never leaks...but I guess she's just uncomfortable.

NotNic - you're probably right...just hoping it goes away We go through shitty nap days but usually it doesn't last. Does he sleep and nap in the same place?

So naps have been great for us for the past 2 weeks. She naps in average 4.5 hours a day. I also never have any problems putting her to sleep or nap. So if this stupid poop issue was resolved I wouldn't be complaining. I could not get a hold of her doc and they said they'll be calling back tomorrow....maybe by some miracle we'll have no poop tonight? One can sure hope....

 

[pompeyvix]

Hey, can I join in on the baby sleep thread?!

Our main issue is day time naps. Max around an hour a day. On the rare occasional good day, she sleeps 90 mins.

Normally 2 naps, sometimes 1.

Any ideas?

xx

 

[Larkspur]

Bananaz, that's great! My LO started randomly self-settling for naps of his own accord just before the sleep regression hit. At the time it felt like cheating too!

Shadowy, I'm sorry but I keep giggling at the 4am poop*. I'm fascinated to know what the doctor says and if there is a trick to fix it. Hope it stops soon!

MiniKiwi, hugs... maybe the change when daylight saving ends next week will create a little jolt and fix things? I dunno, I'm pretty much just hoping for miracles here!

BUT! Speaking of miracles, or at least surprising things, I am happy to report that we are showing promising signs as we gear up to Fix The Bad Sleep. I've been unlatching progressively earlier, and he's been taking to it okay. Then, last night and today, he has twice VOLUNTARILY spat out the nipple while still eyes-open, tipped his head back, closed his eyes, and started to drift off!

He's also done a couple of three-hour shifts in the last couple of days, which is a lot better than I've seen for a while. I proceed with hope.

*Rafe will probably start now that I've giggled at it.

 

[bananaz]

pompeyvix - How are you getting her to sleep? And when are the naps usually?

Larkspur - That's awesome progress. I'm excited to see how things go once you officially Take Action!

 

[MiniKiwi]

Wow you know it's bad when even Noelle doesn't have advice! Lol! But I did read your advice earlier in another thread and tonight I'm getting serious on Mia's ass! I'm so friggen tired, I've had a constant headache the last week or so. Tonight we're going to try and put a stop to the walking to sleep and I'll sit with her by her cot and shhh her until she sleeps and if she cries about it then so be it. I should say when, not if!

Aww thank you, Boo! That's lovely and I have everything crossed for us every night too so hopefully there's some kind of improvement soon. Also lol at you taking away his weetbix! Hope you and shadowy find a solution to the early morning poo!

Shadowy, thankfully my OH is awesome so yeah I have heaps of help. I definitely needed that last night, after 3.5 hours sleep the night before I felt ready to die by 8pm and went to bed..for Mia to wake up 10 minutes later then OH did the wakings until 2am. I feed her once in the night, the rest of the time she needs a cuddle, walking etc. The bottle doesn't send her back to sleep though

Larkspur - god I'm so nervous about the time change, at this point if things got any worse I might just die. What day is the change? How sad is this - Today I've actually been fantasising about her sttn for my birthday next week lmao..as if! So happy that things are looking up for you though, it definitely sounds like progress to me

Pompeyvix - sorry you're joining in I actually don't feel qualified to give advice seeing as my baby is a total menace! But I hope you get some advice in here, it's soooo frustrating having a non-napping baby

 

[mellyboo]

Jords has started self settling yaye all week success she still has night wakings .. Depends lately its been every 2 hours but I don't mind better than 30 mins huge improvement ...we do the toy thing actually works wonders and then we remove it ! And she's in her crib some times for the whole night and other times she spends early mornings in mine depends!

 

[NotNic]

MiniKiwi - I might have a suggestion. The Bedtime live program I was talking about had a baby on it they referred to as a 'motion addict'. She would only fall asleep if her dad rocked and jigged here. If he put her down too soon she'd cry hysterically and often theyd end up co-sleeping. They suggested something I think they called gradual withdrawal. They got her dad to kiss her, say goodnight, put her in her cot. He then laid down next to the crib with his hand firmly on her stomach. He was advised not to pat or rub, and to try not to speak to her. She whimpered for a bit then miraculously chilled out. He stayed there with his hand on her until she was in a deep sleep. Then for the first night he slept next to her on a mattress on the floor, so that if she woke he could do the same straightaway. They were advised to limit motion and not to pick her up out of the cot unless she needed changing. Then the next night they were to do the hand thing and lie next to her while she fell asleep, then hopefully they wouldn't need to sleep next to her. This would continue easing back until they could stand with their hand on her tummy and the length of time would reduce until she was able to fall asleep on their own. They anticipated the process taking a maximum of a week to work. Certainly they got their baby to fall in a deep sleep in 40 mins that first night. As it was live I won't know how they get on until the update that next week, but maybe something like this would be worth a go.

Pompeyvix - our naps have gone poo, but when we tried to convince F to have naps we did the pick up, put down technique as soon as he started to look tired. The HV who advised us suggested that we tried to put him in the same place for naps and ideally at roughly the same time every day. She also advised us to try to do the naps in a cot / crib rather than prams and rockers as its easier for them to sleep longer in the place they are used to sleeping properly. Gradually his sleeps got much longer and it was around 6months that we started to get ones lasting 2hrs+ total.

Us - the naps are in his cot, though yesterday his pm one was in his pram. I'm trying not to make too big a deal of it as 4 top teeth are coming through simultaneously. Two are visible now and the other two have just broken the gum so I think that'll be soon. If however the bad naps continue then I think I might have to get tough. I am wearing him out with activities so maybe the Duracell baby will wear out soon. The one thing that did concern me on my other thread was how many babies had dropped to one nap by 10.5months. Also my mum told me I dropped my second nap early. It seems that Finlay has inherited all my bad baby habits so far.

 

[Noelle610]

Pompey, hi! What's your LO's night sleep like? If I'm remembering correctly, she is sleeping in quite late? I'm wondering if she's combining her night sleep and first nap.

Larkspur, that is wonderful! So glad to hear your plan is working out.

Melly, also great for you! It's a wonder how amazing a 2 hour stretch can feel when you've been getting up twice an hour!

MiniKiwi, I think your idea is great! I was going to recommend some gentle sleep training, but I wasn't sure how comfortable you were with that and I respect that. Let us know how it goes!

NotNic, it does sound like your LO may be an early transitioner to 1 nap. I'm afraid of that transition! Hope it goes smoothly for you.

Things are good here! The night started off weird. I put Charlotte in her crib and she was quiet. Went to check on her 20 minutes later assuming she was alseep, but she was laying on her back with her eyes open just totally relaxed! And she's usually a tummy sleeper. So I left her to it and she eventually fell asleep and STTN. How's that for self-settling?

 

[Shadowy Lady]

ughhh I still haven't heard from my doctor and last night we had a pooping episode at 1:30 am!!! And for the past two nights she actually cries when she wakes up pooping...she hadn't cried in the middle of the night for quite sometime....oh ya and she was up for the day at 6 am. Very unusual for her also. Wondering what this is; teething, her cold,...

I started changing some stuff in her diet today. Gave her grains this morning (barley cereal and pureed pear), will give her meat and veggies for lunch and then fruit for dinner. I was giving her grains as dinner before so we'll see if it makes a difference.

 

[Noelle610]

ughhh I still haven't heard from my doctor and last night we had a pooping episode at 1:30 am!!! And for the past two nights she actually cries when she wakes up pooping...she hadn't cried in the middle of the night for quite sometime....oh ya and she was up for the day at 6 am. Very unusual for her also. Wondering what this is; teething, her cold,...

I started changing some stuff in her diet today. Gave her grains this morning (barley cereal and pureed pear), will give her meat and veggies for lunch and then fruit for dinner. I was giving her grains as dinner before so we'll see if it makes a difference.

You know, I was thinking about your early morning wakings recently... I can't help with the poop, but I'm thinking Sofia might be ready to transition from 3 naps to 2. I think you mentioned she naps about 4 hours during the day? That's quite a bit (and a good problem to have!), but at some point as she gets older it may start to affect her night sleep. Often the signs of being ready to transition include an early morning waking. You might have to move bedtime earlier a bit until she gets used to being awake for longer in the evening.

If you can do 3 hours between naps and bedtime, it might work well. Something like this:

7am wake

10am-11:30am nap

2:30pm-4pm nap

7pm bedtime

 

[gaiagirl]

Well, we tried moving lo to his room last night. I was worried that it was our shifting and noises keeping him up/waking him at night.

He's usually in there in the evenings before we go to bed, but still tends to wake every few sleep cycles and need resettled all evening. That was the same. In bed at 7:45, resettled at 8:30, 9:30, 10:30. Then slept until 12:15. At which point he had a VERY hard time going back into his crib and was waking 10 min after I got back in bed, lol. So I gave in and brought him back to bed.

Might have scared him straight though, from 12:30-7 I think we only woke once very briefly!

I'll try again for his room but not sure we are ready!