Rant - Feeling so hopeless about sleep!

Forums New posts
Katrina - yay!!! So happy for you, you deserve the good sleep hun. Hope you see this pattern on a continuous basis :)

so last night wasn't as great. I know it may sound great for some of you but it was worse than usual for us. Sofia went to sleep at 8 pm (i put her down drowsy and she went to sleep on her own) but woke up at 1 am (about 2 hours or so before her usual wakeup time). I fed her and she went down but she was kinda noisy (though asleep) so I didn't get to sleep till 3:00 am. Then again she woke up at 4 am :/ she usually just does one feed per night so I don't know what that was about. I fed her and she proceeded to sleep till 9 am.

So I'm wondering if I shouldn't have fed her at 4 am. Do you guys think this may become an annoying new habit? Of course my DH alarm went off at 6:45 am so I only slept between 4:30 am to then. One of those days I need a lot of coffee...
 
I think it depends on why she woke up at 4 am. If she woke up because she was hungry, then you should feed her. If she woke up and just wanted help going back to sleep, that's something else entirely.

But honestly at 4 am its hard to judge those things, and hindsight is always 20/20. So I guess my point is that you did it once so it shouldn't be a habit yet! It should be ok.
 
Shadowy Lady said:
Katrina - yay!!! So happy for you, you deserve the good sleep hun. Hope you see this pattern on a continuous basis :)

so last night wasn't as great. I know it may sound great for some of you but it was worse than usual for us. Sofia went to sleep at 8 pm (i put her down drowsy and she went to sleep on her own) but woke up at 1 am (about 2 hours or so before her usual wakeup time). I fed her and she went down but she was kinda noisy (though asleep) so I didn't get to sleep till 3:00 am. Then again she woke up at 4 am :/ she usually just does one feed per night so I don't know what that was about. I fed her and she proceeded to sleep till 9 am.

So I'm wondering if I shouldn't have fed her at 4 am. Do you guys think this may become an annoying new habit? Of course my DH alarm went off at 6:45 am so I only slept between 4:30 am to then. One of those days I need a lot of coffee...
Click to expand...

I think you could try not feeding her and see what happens. Soothe her in other ways. If she goes back to sleep and sleeps for quite some time, you know she wasn't hungry. If she continues to be fussy or wakes shortly after she goes down, then you know she needs to eat. Feeding at night is confusing, because like sleep it's not always linear. It's not uncommon for a baby who has none or one night feed to suddenly need one or two as they get bigger and need more calories that maybe they aren't quite capable of getting yet during the day. I would say Charlotte went from needing one night feed to two around the 4 month mark. At some points she kept both of these out of habit (IMO), but its hard to know when that turning point was. I'd say probably just around 6 months.
 
jessica - Yay for a good night! I hope it keeps up :thumbup: Elsie has just started taking longer naps over the past few weeks and I'm loving it, but she actually wakes up much grumpier from them than she did from her normal 30-45 minute naps.

Last night wasn't great by recent standards. She didn't want to go to sleep so I wasn't able to get her down until 7:15pm, and then she woke at 8:30, 11:40, 3:40 and 4:30, and then was up for the day at 7am. The good news is that she self-settled for all of the wakings except for the 3:40 one when I went in to feed her, but it took 15-30 minutes of fussing each time.

I know I shouldn't be complaining since very recently she was up for 60-90 minutes in the middle of the night, but even these shorter wakings are really stressful for me when I'm so exhausted and I'm trying to decide when/if to go in to soothe her. Generally I give her 10 minutes and then if she's actively trying to go to sleep (which I can see on the video monitor) I leave her to it, but if she seems upset or is just flailing around I'll go in. Sometimes, like last night, it seems like it's really difficult for her to get back to sleep and I don't know what to do. She'll toss and turn trying to get comfortable, hold still for a bit, and then start crying again. She does this repeatedly, and I know if I go in I'm just going to distract her and prolong the process, but it still sucks hearing her fuss and not being able to do anything :(
 
bananaz said:
jessica - Yay for a good night! I hope it keeps up :thumbup: Elsie has just started taking longer naps over the past few weeks and I'm loving it, but she actually wakes up much grumpier from them than she did from her normal 30-45 minute naps.

Last night wasn't great by recent standards. She didn't want to go to sleep so I wasn't able to get her down until 7:15pm, and then she woke at 8:30, 11:40, 3:40 and 4:30, and then was up for the day at 7am. The good news is that she self-settled for all of the wakings except for the 3:40 one when I went in to feed her, but it took 15-30 minutes of fussing each time.

I know I shouldn't be complaining since very recently she was up for 60-90 minutes in the middle of the night, but even these shorter wakings are really stressful for me when I'm so exhausted and I'm trying to decide when/if to go in to soothe her. Generally I give her 10 minutes and then if she's actively trying to go to sleep (which I can see on the video monitor) I leave her to it, but if she seems upset or is just flailing around I'll go in. Sometimes, like last night, it seems like it's really difficult for her to get back to sleep and I don't know what to do. She'll toss and turn trying to get comfortable, hold still for a bit, and then start crying again. She does this repeatedly, and I know if I go in I'm just going to distract her and prolong the process, but it still sucks hearing her fuss and not being able to do anything :(
Click to expand...

I totally consider self-settling 3 times a WIN. All that aside, I know it's STILL really hard, because they wake you. Why oh why can't they just settle quietly?! Charlotte often acts in a similar way when she wakes, i.e. trying to get comfortable, etc. I know that they're making progress in terms of sleeping independently, but I wish I could sleep through it :) Sometimes giving them the opportunity to learn, even when you know it will benefit you both in the long run, is harder than just feeding and getting the whole damn thing over with so you can confidently go back to sleep.
 
Shadowy Lady said:
so last night wasn't as great. I know it may sound great for some of you but it was worse than usual for us. Sofia went to sleep at 8 pm (i put her down drowsy and she went to sleep on her own) but woke up at 1 am (about 2 hours or so before her usual wakeup time). I fed her and she went down but she was kinda noisy (though asleep) so I didn't get to sleep till 3:00 am. Then again she woke up at 4 am :/ she usually just does one feed per night so I don't know what that was about. I fed her and she proceeded to sleep till 9 am.

So I'm wondering if I shouldn't have fed her at 4 am. Do you guys think this may become an annoying new habit? Of course my DH alarm went off at 6:45 am so I only slept between 4:30 am to then. One of those days I need a lot of coffee...
Click to expand...

As others have said, you might try soothing her without food first and see if that works. I wouldn't worry about creating a habit from one off night, though. I hope tonight she's back to her old routine!
 
Thanks ladies, I will try that. I think because I had just barely gotten to sleep (like an hour earlier) I was too confused to try anything but boob, lol! She's napping now again at her usual time (10 am to 12 pm) so hoping tonight we'll be back on schedule. If not, DH is in charge Friday night so I'll catch up on my weekly loss of sleep :D

Her weight gain has been consistent but maybe she's needing more food now. She was born 8.5 lbs and is now 14.5 lbs at 3 months...is there a growth spurt at this time?

Hope you ladies all have a great night tonight. It's so nice to come here and talk about sleep/lack thereof. My friends think I'm weirdly obsessed with sleep. It's probably coz I'm not getting enough of it...
 
There's a huge 3 months growth spurt and then again at 4 months. The one at 4 months people often confuse with the baby needing solids.

BFing and growth spurts :wacko:
 
bananaz - Don't worry about wanting something better, you're not just wanting it for yourself you're wanting it for your LO. I know even last night Lily did "wake up" once I think between 10:30 and 5:00 but resettled herself within the time limit. Its so hard to let them do that, it literally tears me apart when I lay there. Actually I've taken to getting my pocket diapers out before hand, unstuffed and leaving the stuffing to do so I have something to do while my time limit expires. Her cry has changed too, its more of a screech now when she's in her crib and it just breaks my heart. I can't wait for the day that I can confidently put her in bed and know she's going to get up in the morning with no issues.
 
mrs bean - I had no idea there was a 4 month growth spurt as well...
 
I haven't read all the posts since I was last on, I will do it when Joni is asleep and I've got more time.

Once again I didn't post much this week because I was TOO FRUSTRATED. Joni was up every 20 minutes at worst, 1.5 hours at best...she got up 5 times one night and spent at least an hour sleeping on my chest, and OH declared it "a brilliant night" which shows what the other nights were like!

Anyway, long story short, we have really tried everything, so I said to OH, we need to put her in her own room. Ideally we wouldn't even have put her in her own room at 6 months because we have a really big bedroom and cot etc fits in there no problem, BUT I just wanted to see if she woke any less without us [read: OH] making a racket all night, and...

She only woke three times!! She got up at 6:30 which is early for her, but she is in a better mood than she has been for SO long, she has been up for over an hour and only just starting to look grizzly, normally it is 50 minutes max. I think she's up early because she's more rested than she has been for ages.

I know one night is way too early to celebrate, but I really hope this could help us. :happydance:

I will come back to read everyone else's news xx
 
MrsPear, that is GREAT news. Charlotte sleeps so much better in her own room, too. I think it's easy to misinterpret little sleep noises as awakenings and respond too quickly when our babies are close by. I would often think, "I better go to her now, before she wakes up fully!" and in actuality I think I was waking her up.
 
Our night wasn't terrible. Charlotte is still really sick. We went to the doctor and they told us it was just a virus, so really nothing we can do. They gave us suggestions to help her congestion, but Charlotte likes to be comfy and sleep on her belly, so there's no way I'm going to get her to sleep in a car seat. I never thought I'd type that, since she woke so frequently when learning to roll and getting upset!

Anyway, she was super fussy in the evening, so I put her to bed at 5:15pm. She woke around 7:00pm really cranky, so I tried to feed her and cuddle her. She then slept until 1am and was up for 45 minutes or so. She was just so uncomfortable. She then slept until 6:00am, so not bad at all for a little sick girl. She did fuss a lot and cough in her sleep, so at one point I had to pull out the earplugs! (I can still hear her when she cries with them on).
 
I agree, very good job Charlotte!

And I think Lily does better in her room, and I KNOW I do better without Lily in my bed. (I actually dream without her next to me)

Lily did a 3 hr, then 4 hour, then 2 1/2 hour stretch, and I am currently trying to let her resettle herself. She's turning herself over, which is part of the problem. She wakes up, tries to roll over, is successful, and then hates her new position (I let her sleep on her tummy. I can't keep going in there and rolling her back over though. So we will see I suppose... Maybe she will like it if she puts herself in that position.


The urge to practice those skills must be extremely strong.
 
Katrina, doesn't sound like a bad night overall!

The rolling thing is hard. I agree that you can't keep going in and rolling Lily over. I had the same issue with Charlotte and it did pass. She now happily sleeps on her tummy. These developmental milestones are hard. I've heard that sleep is disrupted when they begin learning to crawl and I'm not looking forward to that one!

I do wonder if our poor sleepers are extra sensitive to these things. I mentioned the rolling/sleep disruption to a coworker the other day and she has two kids. She said she never had that problem.
 
That's a really interesting theory, I'd never thought of that. I think Lily just has a huge drive to practice those skills, and if I don't give her enough tummy time then she has to practice them in her crib.

Tomorrow is my birthday! I just noticed :haha: Unfortunately, it doesn't mean LO will give me the night off. I kinda told my DH that my birthday was a "non-event" this year.
 
Mrs Pear - glad your night was improved. I do agree that babies seem to sleep better in their own room.

Noelle - I think Charlotte is doing brilliantly considering she's sick. Hope she feels better soon...

I feel that for us, we take a step forward and then two backward. Sofia took a nap that was kinda late for her (between 6:30 to 7 pm) but woke up on her own. We did her usual night time routine starting at 7:30 pm and I put her to bed at 8 pm even though she was awake and playful. Well, she did not want to sleep. She was fussy so I let her fuss and went in every few minutes to get her to sleep. Well, after an hour of that, she actually started crying so much that i got upset, picked her up and nursed her.

of course she didn't really eat as she was tanked up. She did fall asleep though so I put her down. Except as soon as I did she started crying hysterically again. I felt like she's gone back to being a newborn as she hadn't done that in months!! I picked her up again and calmed her, waited a good 20 mins and then put her down and she stayed asleep. She then woke up at 1 am crying again but not nursing. I had to repeat the same steps...last time she woke up was 5 am and this time she was hungry. Had her feed and went to sleep no problem.

Why do you guys think she suddenly needed to sleep on me? She's been sleeping in her crib no problem since she was 6 weeks old. She doesn't even nap on me, just in her swing or the couch. I really CANNOT cosleep again. I got no sleep at all those weeks :/

Any suggestions are welcome..oh and we tried last week to transition her from Woombie to a sleep bag so she can suck on her hand but she absolutely hated it. So she's sleeping in the Woombie still
 
You must log in or register to reply here.

Similar threads

Babybump87
Number of presents / money spent
2
Replies
20
Views
2K
motherofboys
motherofboys
josephine3
Birth story of baby Jasper
Replies
11
Views
4K
noranoler
noranoler
star25
Almost 6 week scan no yolk sac and bleeding
2
Replies
26
Views
4K
star25
star25
DobbyForever
What Would You Do: Bothersome Neighbor Playdates
Replies
2
Views
2K
DobbyForever
DobbyForever
star25
Expired test positive and getting darker
2 3
Replies
47
Views
7K
star25
star25

Users who are viewing this thread

Total: 2 (members: 0, guests: 2)

Members online

Total: 671 (members: 2, guests: 669)

Latest posts

Forum statistics

Threads
1,650,275
Messages
27,143,189
Members
255,742
Latest member
oneandonly

Share this page

Back
Top
monitoring_string = "c48fb0faa520c8dfff8c4deab485d3d2"
<-- Admiral -->