Rant - Feeling so hopeless about sleep!

[kettle28]

I need to share!

may have found out why lo wouldn't go down in the evenings!! may.....don't want to invoke the curse!

he was getting tired signs about 50m after being awake in the morning so I was getting him down about 1.5hrs after waking.

then he'd be showing tired signs again an hour after a 45-60m nap so I was trying for 1.5hrs again. this would go on until 10/11pm when he'd meltdown from overtiredness, he was having 30-45m naps rest of the day.

was visiting a friend yesterday after his first nap which was 60mins, it was 2hrs when he started grizzling so I stood and swayed with him and his eyes closed on my shoulder!!!! he slept on my lap for 30mins. next awake time I kept him up for 2 hrs and he had to be rocked for 10mins but went down for an hour.

next awake time was only 1.5hrs but, he woke, fed went back to sleep, woke and had teething gel, slept again and until from 6.30-3am only woke 3 times, twice to feed and once for teething!!!!!!

after that it was 2hrs, 1hr, 1 hr, etc, etc, until bottle 7.30am and then awake time 9am!

but hey, can't complain!!!!

today have done the same thing,

nap 1: 1.5hrs after wake up
nap 2: 2hrs after wake up
nap 3: 2hrs 20 after wake up
bedtime: 1 hr 15 after wake up

he just woke for rest of his feed he started before bedtime and went back off to sleep!

cross everything for me ladies - maybe the secret was he was undertired!!!!

x

 

[Noelle610]

Great news Kettle!

 

[kettle28]

Great news Kettle!

I can't believe the difference it's making!! Think he was locked in that undertired/overtired loop!

Now if I can just keep his head away from those cot bars . . . . !!!!

 

[Noelle610]

Great news Kettle!

I can't believe the difference it's making!! Think he was locked in that undertired/overtired loop!

Now if I can just keep his head away from those cot bars . . . . !!!!

That happens!

Could you try breathable bumpers? We got some when having similar problems and it worked like a charm!

 

[polaris]

Hi everyone.
Wow this thread is moving fast at the moment, I've just read through the last few pages. Good to hear that some of our LOs are doing well in regard to sleep!

Aimee - brilliant news that she's starting to self-settle! Even if she doesn't do it again for a while it shows that she's moving in that direction.

Kettle - that's great news that tweaking the schedule has made such a positive difference.

Mellyboo - yay for sleeping through!

Thanks to everyone for the advice about my older boy's horrible nap transition. I know it's totally OT for baby club! We do do quiet time if he's not having a nap which does help to get him through the day but it doesn't seem to stop him from getting progressively more over-tired over the course of a few days. I also limit his nap length if he is napping, which is hard to do in practice because it's very difficult to wake him once he's asleep and he's usually grumpy for an hour after I wake him which is no fun! I also try to get him to nap early in the day if he's napping. We're currently trying alternate days of napping and not napping. Honestly, I thought I would be devastated when he dropped his final nap but at this stage I just want it gone!!

More positively, Clara is sleeping great! The last two nights she has only woken twice and resettled quickly each time after a feed. This evening hasn't been so good as she woke at 9.30 and didn't want to go back to sleep but I think maybe she was too hot as the weather here is really warm at the moment. Oh, and do you remember how I had decided to wake her at 7 a.m.? Well I woke her for two mornings and since then, she has woken spontaneously at exactly 6.45 a.m. each morning! How strange is that??

 

[NotNic]

Brilliant news about Clara. Sounds like you've reset her internal body clock. How are the days and naps going now? Sorry to hear that Thomas' transition is a bit tricky. Think this one is done no more nap transitions for him. Hope things sort themselves out soon. Also I was thinking the other day how grateful I am that back in our NTNP days you didn't put me off babies with challenging newborn and sleep deprivation stories!

 

[polaris]

Brilliant news about Clara. Sounds like you've reset her internal body clock. How are the days and naps going now? Sorry to hear that Thomas' transition is a bit tricky. Think this one is done no more nap transitions for him. Hope things sort themselves out soon. Also I was thinking the other day how grateful I am that back in our NTNP days you didn't put me off babies with challenging newborn and sleep deprivation stories!

The days are very good now, she's napping at 9.30 for about 1 to 1.5 hours, and at about 2 p.m. again for 1 to 1.5 hours. The only slight concern I have during the day is that I quite often have to wake her from naps to preserve the next nap/bedtime. But she's always in good form when she wakes up so I guess it's not a big issue waking her.

LOL at not putting you off babies! I have a good friend in real life who is currently pregnant with her first and I have to admit that I try not to mention Clara's sleeping patterns to her!

 

[Noelle610]

Polaris, that's wonderful!

 

[aliss]

P's doing a bit better but his lack of night feeds has now resulted in mastitis. Really, I can't win can I?

 

[seaweed eater]

Hooray! Glad for babies doing better!! Kettle wave, Polaris, Aliss...all great news!

Although so sorry about the mastitis, Aliss! Argh!!!

Kettle, does your LO wake up from being near the cot bars? Mine likes to stick his feet out and I was thinking of getting breathable bumpers, but so far it hasn't caused extra wakings or any kind of problem. Knock on wood. I see you there, BnB curse.

 

[Aimee4311]

Oh no, Aliss! I'm sorry, that really sucks!

 

[stephie_corin]

We had a truly terrible night, but I blame it on being sick. I've got a horrible sore throat and sore ears weirdly and I'm sure Culver has the same thing. He was crying and moaning all night. I gave paracetamol twice - at midnight and 4, as I was just too tired and run down myself. But I'm not counting this as a bad night as we have a reason.

Glad people are seeing good progress! Sorry about the mastitis Aliss. Ouch!

I'm going to keep working on naps today and try get him out of my arms.

X

 

[stephie_corin]

Stephie - can you reassure your lo with a firm hand on the tummy sitting in the chair? A few months ago there was a program on Channel 4 in the UK called Bedtime Live and one of the cases they treated was a baby that had to be rocked or jigged. They nicknamed the baby the motion addict! Their advice was to stop any type of motion stimulation, but to place a hand firmly (but not heavily) on your baby's tummy or back as reassurance. The parents were told not to rub or pat but just keep the hand constant until they were fully asleep. They then did gradual retreat until the baby had learnt to ss. The professionals opinion was that the movement stopped them learning to settle on their own. Might be worth a go.

Finlay had a brilliant sleeping day yesterday. A full 90mins in the morning and 40mins in the afternoon both at nursery!! I then had to wake him up at 6.30am this morning. I was nearly late for work!!

Thanks for this suggestion, I think it's a good one! Culver is certainly addicted to motion. I actually have an exercise ball and have bounced him for all of his naps for months now. Before that we would walk up and down with 'heavy steps' so he bounced in our arms! I've been rubbing his tummy but I will start trying to keep my hand still. I don't think this will work getting him to sleep (I'll still have to nurse him and hold him) but will work for his night wakings. Thanks so much! Glad you had some good naps xxx

Edit - I do sway with him on the bed when I'm trying to wind him down, or go in the rocker. Should I stop this all cold turkey or ease out of it? I'm not confident he will go to sleep with out some kind of wind down.

 

[seaweed eater]

SE, how does he respond if you try to parent him to sleep? C has zero ability to fall asleep on his own and will just get worked up and either cranky or want to keep playing if I don't step in and nurse him or help to wind him down. I'm firmly of the view that we need to teach our babies to sleep by themselves but as Noelle said, CC/CIO may not work for every baby. Perhaps you could work on first of all helping him get a good night sleep. Rock him, nurse him, whatever it takes. Once you have a few days of a better routine, you could start implementing some slow, patient techniques to help him to sleep independently. I'm so sorry if you have already tried this!

Thanks for this I did manage to get him to go down awake but relaxed by changing things gradually over several weeks, but then we hit a wall with that. Basically as things stand he needs to fall asleep and stop rooting and then I can wake him up as I put him in the crib. I haven't had success with taking him off while he's awake or even putting him down when he's fallen asleep for a moment but is still rooting. NCSS gentle removal doesn't seem to have helped much -- I think it has just trained him to unlatch sooner but he still roots when I pull out the nipple if he's not ready to stop comfort sucking. The pressure on the chin thing just makes him really mad and then I have to soothe him again, so I don't do that. He has a security blanket but he doesn't suck on it, and if I suggest it to him as something to suck on then he gets mad and throws it away. I would just love to use a gentle and slow approach, but I guess I'm not sure what else to try! But I am more than open to any suggestions!!

I don't know whether my bouncy chair suggestion will help at all. If the only issue is bouncing vs. not bouncing, then it may not. I suggested it because I was really surprised how difficult it was for Munchkin to move from his bassinet to his crib in the exact same location. I would never have guessed that he had any particular attachment to the way his bassinet looked or felt, but apparently he did. So this way you could just rule out that C has a similar thing with his bouncy chair (in addition to the bouncing).

As for whether to stop cold turkey or gradually...I think it depends on how things go and how much complaining you are willing to endure! Personally I think I would try cold turkey first, with the firm hand on the belly, because sometimes those things surprise you and just work right away. But if he protests more than you're willing to put up with, you could retreat to a more gradual approach.

Hope everyone is having a good night

 

[stephie_corin]

SE if you put him down asleep, how does that affect the rest of his night sleep? I obviously don't want you to go backwards when you've made progress but I'm just curious. I'm not in any way related to Dr Sears (lol) but his baby book has a whole section on nighttime parenting that I was rereading last night. He's very pro parents helping their children to sleep and thinks the ability to fall asleep unaided develops later for some children. He stresses the importance of having different ways for your baby to fall asleep and that this will help night time sleep. This is a big one for me as I tend to respond the same way each time and daddy has not been that involved.

For me personally, I'm going to continue to help C to sleep for as long as he needs me but I need to work on reducing the aids that he needs and work on alternative ways to soothe him (like the hand on the belly). My goal is for him to learn to self settle but in his own time (and some encouragement from me). Just cutting down on rocking and bouncing has made an immediate improvement to his sleep.

I'm rambling, sorry. I know Munchkin and Culver are two completely different babies but I'm just trying to get an idea of how he would sleep if you put him down asleep in his cot?

I'm on nap 1 and left the chair downstairs accidentally. He's almost asleep in my arms so I will have to try transfer him to the bed again. I did no rocking or swaying and he got hysterical but calmed down pretty quickly! Yay!

Edit - I also appreciate that not working at the moment gives me a luxury that you don't have - you need sleep ASAP to function in the real, adult world! X

 

[VikkiD]

Well Daniel is now sleeping through properly no going into him to resettle him but he wakes so early 4:50 today earliest being 4:30 he did let me have a lie in yesterday till 5:50 I know I should be grateful for him now sleeping but can't he just sleep till 6 please??

 

[stephie_corin]

So for nap 1 it went like this: I held C while he cried hysterically. I shhhhed him and patted his back. He calmed down and latched on, fed and then I held him for a few moments. With trepidation I placed him on the bed. His eyes popped open - I placed my hand on his tummy and he blinked and then went to sleep! No rocking, no bouncing, no bouncy chair!

Vikki, I know that feeling so well. I'm so sorry he is getting up so early. Do you remember when a lie in used to be 10 or even (gasp) noon? I hope he starts sleeping later for you soon x

 

[VikkiD]

So for nap 1 it went like this: I held C while he cried hysterically. I shhhhed him and patted his back. He calmed down and latched on, fed and then I held him for a few moments. With trepidation I placed him on the bed. His eyes popped open - I placed my hand on his tummy and he blinked and then went to sleep! No rocking, no bouncing, no bouncy chair!

Vikki, I know that feeling so well. I'm so sorry he is getting up so early. Do you remember when a lie in used to be 10 or even (gasp) noon? I hope he starts sleeping later for you soon x

Oh I know I can't remember the last time I had a lie in 7am use to be a luxury now it's gone to 6am lol

 

[seaweed eater]

Well, when we stopped nursing to sleep, it actually improved his sleep dramatically. I haven't put him down asleep after nursing in months, so I don't know how that would be, but the way we do it now, it's really variable. Sometimes he's up twice (which I think is the best I can hope for) and sometimes it's 5+. Usually ~3 recently, and his nights are often only 9-10 hours, so that's not great. Also, the times he wakes up are not regular. After a couple nights of sleep training he was up 1(!)-2x almost every night at very regular times. So I think it does affect his sleep. But things could also be a lot worse. His naps have remained much much better than before (knock on wood), which of course helps his nights.

I haven't read Sears' book, but I do think it is important, because of object permanence, not to put them down asleep at this age. But I agree that it would probably help even if we had a larger set of techniques that worked to help him sleep. Now we have me nursing, DH walking (only sometimes), at daycare I think they rock him, and of course the car and the stroller. Personally, I haven't ever managed to get him to sleep without nursing. He gets really mad when I hold him and don't nurse him, or when I touch him in his crib unless he's already really close to being asleep. That rules out a lot. When I sit next to his crib and shh, sometimes it calms his crying but it doesn't really help him sleep.

I know from daycare that there are babies who just go to sleep when they're tired, and clearly he's not one of those, but I wish it were easier for him, especially since he's so distractible and interested in everything and finds it hard to wind down for that reason already.

 

[seaweed eater]

Ahh Stephie just saw your update! So pleased!! Sometimes those simple things just work shockingly well!

Vikki, glad to hear about the progress. I hope you get more 5:50 mornings and then gradually 6. It is hard to wake up so early