SLEEP - Page 3 « Back to Group Discussions

[Abraisme]

Coralie also goes down easily, which is nice because many nights I'm trying to put all 3 kids to bed on my own.   Right before bed is the only time that she'll nurse to sleep, once she's out I can generally move her easily into her bed and lay her down.  Sometimes she'll wake up about 20 minutes later, I'll nurse her again and lay her back down.  However, she still wakes up 3-4 times a night to nurse.  She also is a crappy napper.  She takes four 45 minute naps a day, all in a carrier.  I don't mind carrying her though because she spends a decent amount of awake time on the floor or in a bouncy seat.  I like the snuggles. 

[Paigekitten]

Éowyn is a pretty good sleeper now, but she keeps trying to sleep 6-6 (NOT straight through, with maybe 3 wakings), which does not work in our house.  All three of the kids have different natural sleep patterns and I have a hard time keeping them aligned to get enough sleep myself.

[KayPea]

Originally Posted by birdhappy85 

Has the actual act of getting your babies to bed at night gotten any easier?

Oren has always gone down at night pretty easy (thank goodness for that, getting DD to bed was awful) but now he nurses to sleep in the rocker and I put him down in his crib, changed from before when I used to nurse him and put him down semi-awake. I actually spend more time in the room with than I need to, because I like the snuggly "alone" time (I do things on my phone - read blogs, Facebook, play Draw Something). Putting O to bed means DH is on DD duty, and by the end of the day her spiritedness has worn me out. Tonight DD had a meltdown before dinner, and while I was dealing with that, DH put Oren to bed by bouncing him. Oren never even cried!  

However, O is one of those kids that will randomly wake in the night and be all bright eyed and looking at me like "Oh, hello! I like you! Let's play!" And take much time and effort to put back to sleep. And his wake-up time is somewhere in the unholy vicinity of 5am. Some mornings we get lucky and he makes it past 6am, and sometimes we get this morning when he gets up at 4am. I usually can't put him back in the crib (which is pushed right up next to our bed) once I come to bed, so he's in bed with us after 11pm or so. Sometimes he wakes 3-4 times between 11pm and 5am, and sometimes just once. (I think the multiple times were teething-related). Some nights he's up and down between bedtime and 11pm, and some nights he sleeps through that period. He has no real pattern, this kid. Oh, and his naps are crap. Like 10 minutes sometimes. The only time I can get him to nap for any length is in the Ergo, but I can't be inside. He won't even doze on me inside. I have to be outside, walking to get him to sleep, then at least standing the rest of the nap. No matter how deep asleep he is, he wakes up the minute I sit down or go inside somewhere. Thank goodness park season is upon us. 

DD was a nightmare to get to bed (still is, actually, though it's better now that she gave up naps.) When she was a baby someone always had to be in the bed with her, or she was awake and screaming. So from 7pm to 11pm DH and I would trade off watching TV on the netbook while snuggling her in bed (with earphones on, her white noise totally blaring and the room otherwise had to be totally dark and no other noises) then the TV was keeping her up, but luckily DH got an iPhone by then, so I read books on it. The iPhone is still how I stay sane putting her to bed, it has been my best tool (having tried EVERYTHING (gentle) to change her sleep habits, I finally had to just accept it, and make the best of what I had.) When she was a toddler, and finally able to be in bed alone, it still took over 2 hours to get her settled. Oh, and she always nursed to sleep. She also slept horribly at night - waking every hour until she was over 2. 

Four things I did that I could tell made the most difference: 1) NEVER gave her a bath within 2 hours of bedtime. It just revved her WAY up. 2) Stopped drinking coffee. Sob. 3) Worked on my state in bed with her - she would have the hardest time falling asleep when I was all annoyed with the process and anxious to get out of bed. I had to be really meditative and mellow, and flirt with falling asleep myself before she would drop of too. She was REALLY in tune with my emotional state. (It was once she was sleeping that I could use my phone - this helped keep me from being too antsy while I waited for her to get into deep sleep so I could slip away. If I didn't do this, my antsiness would prevent her from getting into deep sleep.)  4) Got LOTS of fresh air during the day. We still go out rain or shine, for hours a day. 

[TalkToMeNow]

Kirsten, yes to the phone! If I just lie there in the dark, I will fall asleep. Once I fall asleep, the night is over for me. If I try to get back up, I will be in such a bad mood.

Jasper is being tough with his sleeping. When dh wasn't here, I could get J to bed between 8-8:30 every night. That would mean me staying in the bed until 9:30-10, and then he'd be out for good. But I could usually read during that time. Now, I can't seen to keep dh out of the room until Jasper is asleep. He wants to be in there with me, but then J won't sleep. Sigh. He gets on his laptop or iPad, which totally lights up the room.

I understand that he wants to be in the room with me, but it's so frustrating. Is it really so tough for him to watch tv (which he loves and I hate) or play video games (ditto)? I guess I just need to adjust to a new sleep normal for J...

[Jaimee]

Argh, that's frustrating Amanda!  Now that your dh is no longer traveling during the week, would it be easier to say something like, "honey, I need it dark and quiet in here, why don't you go watch TV in another room?"

Avery is making a sleep change, I think.   Seems like 4 months is about the right time!  He has started falling asleep and wanting to stay asleep around 8:30 or 9.  I have tried putting him down in the bed at this time before, but he would just wake right back up.  But last night when he did it again, I tried laying him down again and he stayed asleep until 2:30 when he was woken up by ds1 coming in to our room whimpering and dh not getting up in any sort of quick fashion to quiet him in time.    But that's still 5.5 hours of solid sleep and after nursing, peeing, and nursing again he went back to sleep until 5:30 and woke up at 7 for the day.

I actually feel more tired with this arrangement b/c of the 2 night wakings.  If he went to bed at 11pm he wouldn't wake until morning.  But it's probably better this way so that I can get a bit of free time at night.  Maybe if ds1 doesn't wake us up he will sleep longer.  We'll see, I guess!

[wellforth]

Luca stopped sleeping at the breast.  That has not been fun.  I used to really enjoy that, plus it was nice putting him to sleep while sitting on my butt.  Now, he has to be walked in the ergo, outside, for usually a long time, then quickly transferred to bed and nursed.  If my fingers are crossed in exactly the right way, he'll stay asleep.  If not, he'll start grabbing his feet and wake up, which means another hour or more of carrying him around trying to keep him from being overstimulated until he can be popped back into the ergo and round the blocks again. 

He used to go down between 4 and 6 p.m. for the night.  I mean, 4 p.m. is way too early, but he'd drop off to sleep.  Now, it's more like 7-9 p.m.  We finally figured that out!  I sorely miss that down time at night, but it's nice not having him wake up at 4 a.m.  Usually.

Naps here are in the ergo.  Walking is what puts him to sleep, and usually, the napper has to stand the whole time.  That gets really old, with 3-4 naps each day.

It gets easier.  I keep repeating this to myself over and over and over and over....

carey

[birdhappy85]

As I type this at 11pm, my baby is sitting wide awake in her swing blowing bubbles with her drool and cooing. 

She has been going to bed around 8pm for months now (albeit resisting it almost every night), but I could not get her down tonight.at.all. It was two hours of pure hell before I gave up.  If this is the sleep regression, then it's nothing like I expected. I thought we'd be dealing with frequent wake-ups. This is something entirely different. She just isn't even acting tired! She has never stayed up this late before. It's SO WEIRD. Hopefully it's an isolated situation. Time will tell...

[jbk21]

Oh man, Joanie!  I always say- there is nothing in the world more frustrating than a baby that won't sleep.

I remember when my son was 9 months old he just stopped sleeping for about a week.  He wouldn't nap, he wouldn't go to bed at night.  Nothing we did worked- not even having him in a carrier. 

It was AWFUL.

I really hope to avoid that this time, but now that I said it out loud I just jinxed myself.

[KayPea]

I feel lucky because Oren goes to bed so easily (DD was always so difficult to get to sleep). But the trade off is the random "Hi! Let's play!" times in the middle of the night, lots of night-waking, and stupid early mornings. Like 4am 3 or 4 times a week. Never later than 6:30am. And, like I said in the Chit Chat thread, I consider 6:30am to be sleeping in! We've tried getting him to go to bed later - he WANTS to go to bed at 5:30pm or 6:pm and I push it to 6:30 or sometimes 7 depending on his erratic naps. But it's usually when he goes down earlier that he wakes up later.

And oh, the naps. This kid. In the bed he seems only to be able to sleep for 15 minutes. 30 tops. 30 is good. Oh man, I wish he'd do 30 lately. And it takes me 10 minutes after he's asleep to ease away, so really that means he wakes up 5 minutes after I leave the bed. In the Ergo, he might sleep for a bit longer if we're inside, and he'll sometimes have a good long nap in the Ergo if I'm outside, walking and as long as I don't stop moving or sit down or go inside. Which is so hard, especially with a toddler who might need to, oh, pee, or eat, or look at a bug or get stuck at the top of a climbing apparatus.

Luckily, he remains pretty cheerful, even on next to no sleep, especially if I can hold him/wear him most of the time. When he actually does get decent sleep, though, he is a laser beam of uber-happy guaranteed to cheer up the most determined scrooge. I want him to sleep so that we can go out and fight sadness with his gummy smile.

[Jaimee]

About two weeks ago Avery transitioned to taking awesome solo naps, but then his nighttime sleep started to decline.  I was thinking maybe the good daytime sleep was detracting from nighttime sleep.  But his bedtime started to creep earlier and earlier, so I thought maybe he wasn't getting as much milk in the evening, which is when he tended to cluster nurse.  I also considered that he was waking to pee in the night since he wasn't getting it all out in the evening like he used to.  So a few days ago, I tried waking him up after a brief evening nap and getting him to nurse and pee again before putting him down for the night.  This didn't result in any better nighttime sleep.  Then, yesterday Avery had two good, solo naps and then one nap in the carrier.  He hadn't had a long nap in the carrier in almost 2 weeks.  And last night he slept great!  Thinking back to when he was first born, he would nap in his swing for long stretches during the day and then be up all night- like every 10 minutes.  Around the 2 month mark he stopped sleeping in the swing and I started wearing him all day long and then he started sleeping like a dream at night.  Is there a connection?  It seems logical- when he gets less mama-snuggle time during the day he wants to wake up for more nursing/snuggles at night...?  Has anyone else noticed this connection?  And if so, when did your baby transition to not needing the carrier time in order to sleep well at night?

[birdhappy85]

Sora went to bed at 8:15pm last night and didn't wake up until 6:40am this morning.  We've got a record over here! Almost 10-1/2 hours straight, holy crap! *does a little dance*

[jbk21]

Anyone else have a baby that won't sleep?  Dylan is a champion napper.  Three solid naps a day, very regular, for a total of about 4.5 hours of daytime sleep- sometimes more.  He has a regular bedtime (close to 9, sometimes 8, depending on when his last nap ended) and a good routine.  

He sleeps in my room, but not in my bed (well, sometimes he is in the bed, but mostly not.)  I have tried both a crib mattress and a pack and play.  

He sleeps with a pacifier, but doesn't mind when he loses it.  

He nurses about 2-4 times a night, usually 3.  He doesn't sleep for longer than 2 hours and 15 minutes.  His wakings are usually like this: (approximately)

bedtime 8:30

wake 10:45 to nurse

{{sometimes restless, waking a couple more times but not to nurse}}

Wake 12:30- nurse

wake 2:00- adjust and give paci

{often restless}

wake 4:00

Wake 4:45 nurse, hope he stays asleep until big brother wakes up (but he never stays asleep)

restless until waking at 5:45.  Some days he is restless but "sleeps in" until 6:45, but big brother wakes at 5:45 anyway.  *eyeroll*

He isn't just stirring.  He is waking up screaming 9 times out of 10.

Sometimes he is just in need of a readjustment, new position, paci, etc.  Still, I am having to get up to do this.  When he is in the bed he squirms, squirms, squirms.  Then I can't sleep.

He doesn't seem to have a strong preference for side/belly/back.  He will sleep best mostly on side or belly but I have to go through all the positions to figure out which one will stick at any given time.  It changes moment to moment.  It's really frustrating.

Help.  Please.  Help me.  I am so tired I can't function.  I can't parent my 3 year old and my baby all day on no sleep.  I really can't.

[LunaLady]

Does he sleep better in bed with you? Rhyko has to be pretty much glued to my side to sleep.... 

Sorry, not much help, here. 

[jbk21]

Nope, same number of wakings (though it varies each night) but he is super squirmy so then I really can't sleep.

[Jaimee]

I strongly empathize with your J!  I've had three babies that have done this now.  Avery is my best out of the three, though, managing to sleep 3-4 blocks most nights (though sometimes waking for 1-2 hours in between said blocks).

It sounds like he's being woken up during the period of light sleep at the end of his sleep cycles.  The screaming awake could be b/c something is bothering him, but he doesn't want to be awake.  What is bothering him could be a variety of things and they could change from cycle to cycle, but my first thought is his need to eliminate.  It's possible that he must fully rouse in order to pee, but is able to resettle fairly quickly with a paci, positional change or nursing without peeing.  Then the next cycle of light sleep reminds him that he still needs to pee.  With my last two kids, I resorted to night time ECing to stop the squirming.   It is entirely possible that if you roused him enough to put him on a potty that he would pee and immediately go back to sleep and not wake in his next light sleep cycle (until he needs to nurse).  The waking cycle may take a bit to break, however so if you try this, I would suggest sticking with it for a week to a week and a half until deciding if it seems to be helping.  While waking yourself up enough to potty him is not ideal, it would be preferable to waking several more times! 

Good luck!

[jbk21]

I have thought a lot about ECing at night.  I haven't tried EC at all, so would he know to go if I put him on the potty at night?  I mean, I am awake anyway.  When I am up, I'm up.  So that part isn't hard, I am just nervous about waking him more, or him not knowing to go.  I'm sure these are silly concerns.  I'm willing to try!

[LunaLady]

R goes pee when he wakes at night, pretty much every time. He usually only has one sometimes two wakes, but he always goes pee when he does. Sometimes he even has a dry diaper!

Good idea, Jaimee.

[Jaimee]

When I started ECing Austin, I started at night and he had never used a potty before.  He was about 4 months old and doing his typical hours of night time squirming.  I got out my little Ikea potty, put it on a waterproof mat on my bed next to him. I took his diaper off, supported him fully while lifting him onto the potty and let him rest his sleepy head on my shoulder while he sat on the potty.  He peed immediately and slumped over even more.  I quickly got his diaper back on and he was asleep before I could snap his onesie shut.  Avery isn't quite like this.  He'll need some resettling after I potty him like sucking on my finger or nursing a little in order to get back to sleep.  But either way, I don't think he'll need to  "learn" anything.  If you wake a baby, they will usually pee within a few minutes, usually immediately.  Removing the diaper is sometimes enough to cue the pee, so you might want to throw a prefold or cloth wipe over his penis the first few times, just in case.  Most babies do not pee in their sleep- they have to wake a bit to pee.  Avery is always dry if I potty him quickly when he wakes.

A little night time EC tip: have everything you need ready by your bed (or wherever he's sleeping), including a prefold or receiving blanket.  Put the prefold (or blanket) into the potty of pee while you're getting him back to sleep.  That way if you accidentally knock the potty over you're not dealing with a bunch of pee in the bed or on the floor in the middle of the night.

[jbk21]

Thank you so much Jaimee!  I'm going to IKEA later- I'll pick up an extra potty!  Yay!  I hope this works.  He sleeps through middle of the night diaper changes, so I think he should do fairly well with not waking too much.  Hopefully.  I'll check back in after we give it a try!

[Jaimee]

Awesome!  I recommend getting two potties!  They're only $4 and if this works for him you may find yourself an EC convert and wishing you had more than one potty around the house!