[2boyzmama]

: Okay, I know that you guys are all the last ones I should be complaining to, but I need help with sleep issues!!!

Here's a run down of last night:

8pm, Connor went to bed.
10pm, Connor awake for the first time, I bring him to my bed and nurse him while I watch a movie, then put him back in his bed at 10:30.
11pm, I go to bed.
12 midnight, Connor awake again, I bring him to my bed, nurse him, put him back to his bed around 12:30am.
2am, you get the picture...2:30am he's back in his bed again.:yawning:
4am...no surprise, same thing, but this time he won't stay asleep when I put him in his bed around 4:30. I patted his back and turned his toy on that he listens to when he goes to sleep at night, it doesn't work. At 4:40am I walk out of his room, close his door, close my door, and turn off the baby monitor

I don't know how long he cried for, I just couldn't take it anymore.

I got up at 6am, 30 minutes late, to head in to work.

This was slightly worse than typical...I can handle one or even two wake ups in a night and still function normally. But more than that, and it starts to effect me. I've been skipping going to the gym because he's just completely draining me!!! Work is stressful right now, so that isn't helping any.

I do nurse him at bedtime, but I put him to bed awake. I turn on his music toy and he sometimes fusses a little, but he usually puts himself to sleep. So he's capable of doing it.

We co-slept from about 6 months old (once his airway was stable enough and his reflux was under control to make it safe to cosleep) until about 12 months old when I couldn't stand the all-night nursing (literally, he NEVER let go of my boob, I was losing more sleep by cosleeping because I couldn't even roll over)

He tummy sleeps because of his airway, PRS, reflux, etc. He's tummy slept since birth.

I don't think he's cold or hot.

I don't think he's refluxing or silent refluxing, he's still off all dairy, and I'm still limiting mine. I haven't noticed any pattern with my food intake.

He is not sick with anything that I can detect...

???

:

HELP! Someone please! What am I missing??? He's 21 months old now, he should be sleeping better!

I'm sure that we've contributed to some of this...at first he was sleeping through the night, but he was also not gaining any weight, so I was forced to wake him up to feed him. Weight gain has been a continued issue, so I've never hesitated to feed him, no matter what time of the day/night it is. Also, since I work, I've always been accomodating to my children at night, they don't get to see me during the day, and I miss them! I don't mind missing a little bit of sleep if it means they're happy, you know? And with all the tests, appointments, procedures, surgeries, etc, I feel like I need to make sure he knows that I"m there when he needs me. But this is getting to be too much...

 

[christinelin]

I don't have anything brilliant to offer except that none of mine (ASD and typical) slept solidly at night until they were around 2 1/2 years. I think nursing at night contributes (mine all nursed long-term), but the payoffs are obviously worth it.

What I ended up doing was adjusting my schedule -- going to bed very early to get enough total sleep. I also did nightwean between 2 and 3 years and found the sleep improved somewhat with that. A final thing that helped us was not nursing to sleep. Once they could fall asleep on their own, it really did seem to help (sleep associations and all that cr*p).

My guy who has Aspergers is now taking melatonin at bedtime which helps with falling asleep and sleep in the early evening. I wonder if the doc would okay that for Connor?

 

[sbgrace]

Hubby doesn't take any of the night stuff?

So do you think he's waking out of "learned" hunger at night?

The two hours thing doesn't fit quite in terms of typical sleep cycle length at that age. In other words, he's not waking at the end of every sleep cycle I don't think.

What makes you certain he's not having reflux at night?

 

[bdavis337]

Reflux perhaps, like Rachelle suggested? Or.........2 year old molars?

 

[mykdsmomy]

Can you give him some calms forte before bed? Have you tried melatonin?

This may not be an option but have you thought of bringing his bed into your room? (We did this for Boo and it has helped keep him out of our bed...he's 4 and weighs nearly 60 lbs. He kicks and screams in his sleep....it was bad).

I'm sending Connor sleepy vibes

:yawning::yawning:

 

[mamajody]

I am not sure what kind of advice you are looking for? Do you want examples of our night time routines, and how they change? I can't remember if Connor had specific feeding issues that might require night feeds, so I will share my routine, even though I night wean my kids by 18 months for my sanity.

So, what about your DH? Will he help? Mine has been a dream with all 3 kids. Aspie singleton, and NT twins alike. Since I like to have my kids night weaned by around 18 months, I could not do this without him. Nursing cannot be on the table as an option, and that means no mama during nursing black out periods. My twins are not solid through the night sleepers yet, at 26 months, but DH began taking over the night time routine a year ago. Since I am sure mine are not waking for hunger before we start this routine, you should ignore it if you suspect Connor is still hungry at night.

Our routine looks like this from about 14 months to 18 months:
After nursing down around 9pm, it is up to DH to comfort for any wake up calls before 2am. Exceptions are known or suspected illness, teething that cannot be comforted with daddy and remedy, or growth spurt that might bring on hunger suddenly. Daddy accepts that he will be tired after potentially being up until 2am each night, but I take everything before 8pm, and after 2am. This guarantees that I get at least 4 hours of uninterrupted sleep at night. This is my bare minimum.

Our routine changes to 5am by around 18 months. At this point all of my kids have been eating for months. They take regular meals and snacks by mouth, and nurse during the day as well as last thing before bed. Daddy is basically responding to any night time need before dawn. This has been intense for us with the twins, especially since I got pregnant this time right at the 18 month mark and was too tired to help at all. Both boys were totally night weaned by 18 months anyway, but they would still ask for cuddles at night. If they say they are hungry, DH will offer them water, and a few crackers. No nursing. Most nights we will end up with at lest 2 calls that DH responds to. K is very brief to deal with if/when he wakes, but O needs lots of cuddles, and will often just be brought into our bed so DH can go back to sleep. If A wakes, she is often too fuddled to self sooth, even at 5 1/2, so she always ends up in our bed for at least a little while. This is now rare for her anyway.

In case anybody was wondering, we do not allow our children to cry it out, but I do not consider crying in arms the same thing. They are not put in their beds crying alone, nor are their requests for a parent ignored. They may be told, "no" to a specific request to get up, play, have nursing, ect... but if they want to they can come into our bed for a time, and we will put them back in their beds when they are soundly sleeping again on most nights. My kids also don't go down to bed awake until like 2 years old. Maybe number 4 will take to it sooner, who knows?

Good luck finding a solution to your night time issues. I hope this was helpful.

 

[queencarr]

Not sure what I've tried that you haven't but you have my full sympathy! As I mentioned on my other post, my youngest is a very poor sleeper, and 2 hours is a great stretch for him

Typically, I get about an hour at a time if I am lucky, and usually one 3 hour or so stretch on a very good night. So if misery loves company

My oldest only slept 1 1/2 hours at a time until he was 3yo. Putting him on reflex meds made a huge improvement, and nightweaning helped further still. Although when we nightweaned, he then often needed a snack in the middle of the night, so we left a few crackers or baby carrots out--his favorite midnight meal--and a cup of water by the bed

Another trick was to give him a high protein bedtime snack--cheese, peanut butter sandwich and milk, etc.--right before brushing his teeth. We also simply asked him to stay asleep, which helped, surprisingly enough. I think he had become so used to being up frequently, that he didn't know there was another way. One other thing to check is that his reflex meds don't need to be adjusted. We found that we needed to tweak the dose about every 3-5 lbs of weight gain. We also found after a couple of years that we had been undertreating his reflux--it was controlling the symptoms but was not enough to allow the existing damage to heal completely. He had to go on super high doses of prevacid and reglan for a couple of years to fully heal and we are only now able to work on weaning him down for the past year on the prevacid, and 6m for the reglan. Sending good sleep your way!

 

[sbgrace]

To elaborate a little.
We had been feeding Andrew through the night for extra calories. I had to actually slowly "wean" out those feeds (he was bottlefed) when no longer needed the night calories. His body was so used to eating at night it woke him.

But your description of the frequency and wanting to nurse but being variable sounds more to me like he's waking from reflux pain. Andrew's only reflux sign as he got older was sleep issues like that. Well, if we let it go on he would change drinking patterns too but night was the main thing.

 

[momtoalexsarah]

I agree with the others, I think you need to get the reflux checked - if may not have shown up in the swallow study that you did because it may be periodic or positional.
Megan was on Zantac for a long time and we droped it when she was about 26 months and we had night weaned and she was sleeping well. All was good for about 2 months and then she started waking about every 2 hours, she would want a drink of milk and go back down. This carried on untill Sept when we where in at her peads and he said to put her back in the Zantac and see if the sleep improved - within a week she was sleeping 8-10 hours steight.
When I was talking to the ENT at cleft clinic they said that kids with clefts/palatial issues get reflux because the open airway(that causes the VPI) creates a vacume affect when they lay down, drawing that acid up so it may not be obviose (Megans can be subtle to full blown dribbling out the nose) Megans is somewhat allergie related but not completely. She will reflux durring the day - if given the right conditions, I demontrated this to the ENT by giving her a glass of chocolate milk - she was dribbling it out the nose within 10 minutes

 

[kittynurse]

My vote is for 2 year molars. DS1 was around that age when he got them (all 4 at the same time - ugh!) and we would be up and down all night until we figured out what was going on.

Would he let you peek in his mouth to look for tell-tale signs?

Martha

 

[2boyzmama]

Quote:

Originally Posted by christinelin What I ended up doing was adjusting my schedule -- going to bed very early to get enough total sleep. I also did nightwean between 2 and 3 years and found the sleep improved somewhat with that. A final thing that helped us was not nursing to sleep. Once they could fall asleep on their own, it really did seem to help (sleep associations and all that cr*p). My guy who has Aspergers is now taking melatonin at bedtime which helps with falling asleep and sleep in the early evening. I wonder if the doc would okay that for Connor?

Unfortunately I can't adjust my go to bed time...I WOH, I get home just as hubby is leaving (he's full time night student) and have to take care of dinner, dishes, cleaning, get kids to bed, get my bags packed for the next day, etc at night. It's the only time I have to do it. I often leave a lot of the cleaning/dishes for hubby to handle the next morning, but it doesn't always get done that way. And trust me, we do NOT have a spotless house, I"m talking about the bare minimum cleaning here

Connor does put himself to sleep at nap time and at bed time. I do nurse him first when I'm home, but he is awake when he is put in his bed.

I've never researched much about melatonin, but with his history of airway issues, I wonder if it would be safe...

Quote:

Originally Posted by sbgrace Hubby doesn't take any of the night stuff? So do you think he's waking out of "learned" hunger at night? The two hours thing doesn't fit quite in terms of typical sleep cycle length at that age. In other words, he's not waking at the end of every sleep cycle I don't think. What makes you certain he's not having reflux at night?

No, hubby does not do much at night...I did finally insist that he be the one to get Connor from his bed and bring him to me, but that doesn't save me any sleep, it just spreads out the misery a little

My hubby is a wonderful man, husband, and father, but sleep is a big thing for him. He has real issues with functioning when his sleep is interrupted. I used to think he was just being lazy or that he just had to suck it up like mothers have to, but he thinks a bad night of sleep is waking up once to notice the time!!! I resolved long ago that night time will have to be my time, because otherwise our children would be forced to CIO if left up to hubby...

Quote:

Originally Posted by bdavis337 Reflux perhaps, like Rachelle suggested? Or.........2 year old molars?

Yes, I've been suspecting molars, because he has his hand in his mouth when he wakes up at night. But I've tried Motrin and it doesn't help.

Reflux...Sigh...he just doesn't have the signs he used to have of reflux...he used to obviously reflux, or at least burp, or cough, or SOMETHING!! How else would I know??? We aren't currently seeing GI because I had a...we'll call it a "difference of opinion" with the GI we were seeing when Connor was an infant, and I managed to control his reflux on my own without their help, and any other GI issue I've handled through genetics or dev peds.

Quote:

Originally Posted by mykdsmomy Can you give him some calms forte before bed? Have you tried melatonin? This may not be an option but have you thought of bringing his bed into your room? (We did this for Boo and it has helped keep him out of our bed...he's 4 and weighs nearly 60 lbs. He kicks and screams in his sleep....it was bad). I'm sending Connor sleepy vibes :yawning::yawning:

Have not tried melatonin, not sure if his medical issues would allow for it, but I'll research it. Have not tried calms forte. I'll research both.

The reason we moved him to his own bed in his own room is because it got to the point where we were keeping each other up at night...neither of us got into a deep enough sleep if we were in the same bed (me always on edge about me or hubby rolling over on him, or the blankets coming up too high, or him tummy sleeping on a soft mattress, etc etc; and him because he could sense my boob all night) We did him in his own bed, but still in our room, and he could see us if he woke up at night and was much less likely to put himself back to sleep on his own.

Quote:

Originally Posted by sbgrace To elaborate a little. We had been feeding Andrew through the night for extra calories. I had to actually slowly "wean" out those feeds (he was bottlefed) when no longer needed the night calories. His body was so used to eating at night it woke him. But your description of the frequency and wanting to nurse but being variable sounds more to me like he's waking from reflux pain. Andrew's only reflux sign as he got older was sleep issues like that. Well, if we let it go on he would change drinking patterns too but night was the main thing.

That's how all this started with Connor, too, was that he needed the extra calories, and I didn't care when he got them as long as he got them. So if he didn't drink enough from his bottle (expressed BM) during the day, I'd wake him to nurse at night. And I never refused nursing at night.

What change in drinking patterns did you see? Connor drinks a LOT, and has been majorly increasing his drinking, particularly in the past couple weeks. I asked about it to the nutritionist at the cleft team a few weeks ago and she brushed it off saying that it wasn't a bad thing. But now you've got me thinking... ANd he's specifically asking for almond milk, not water (we don't do juice). Hmm...

Quote:

Originally Posted by momtoalexsarah I agree with the others, I think you need to get the reflux checked - if may not have shown up in the swallow study that you did because it may be periodic or positional. Megan was on Zantac for a long time and we droped it when she was about 26 months and we had night weaned and she was sleeping well. All was good for about 2 months and then she started waking about every 2 hours, she would want a drink of milk and go back down. This carried on untill Sept when we where in at her peads and he said to put her back in the Zantac and see if the sleep improved - within a week she was sleeping 8-10 hours steight. When I was talking to the ENT at cleft clinic they said that kids with clefts/palatial issues get reflux because the open airway(that causes the VPI) creates a vacume affect when they lay down, drawing that acid up so it may not be obviose (Megans can be subtle to full blown dribbling out the nose) Megans is somewhat allergie related but not completely. She will reflux durring the day - if given the right conditions, I demontrated this to the ENT by giving her a glass of chocolate milk - she was dribbling it out the nose within 10 minutes

I know that he's very prone to reflux because of his structural issues, particularly the laryngomalacia. But I really thought we had it largely under control once we identified the allergies!!! Aside from these continued sleep issues, there are no signs that he's refluxing...no bad breath, no red throat, no coughing, no choking, nothing is visibly coming out of his mouth or nose...

OKay...I'll be calling...somebody...tomorrow. Who? Dev Ped maybe? Actually, I've heard that there's a new GI at Children's, maybe I"ll give her a try and see if I get along with her. The GIs at this hospital are notorious for giving out bad information about breastfeeding, pushing formula, and not being willing to try (or even talk about) alternative methods of treating GI issues other than surgery and/or medication.

:

THanks for being a good sounding board, guys!!

 

[momtoalexsarah]

When he wakes up in the night, is he swallowing frequently - this was our only clue that with Megan the night reflux had returened - she would wake up and if I sat with her - without giving her a drink, she would keep swallowing. She would want to drink to sooth it.
If you want to try something natural - papaya extract really helps with reflux. I wish we could have used it, unfortunatly Megan broke out in hives from it, ugg.

 

[KimPM]

My DS didn't have the physical issues, but he was the same way, waking way too many times, until he decided to cut back on nursing at night, starting somewhere around 25 months. Sometimes it seemed he was just thirsty, not really wanting to nurse, so I helped it along by offering him a sippy cup of water first. This way he slowly backed off nursing at night (as he had gotten used to). By 28 months, he stopped nursing and had pretty much stopped waking during the night too.

My DS did need the nutrition/calories up until the point where he started night weaning himself. At that point he had already started feeding therapy and was grazing a bit on food. By 28 months when he was night weaned, he was eating enough volume during the day to not need the night nursing.

 

[queencarr]

Quote:

Originally Posted by 2boyzmama Reflux...Sigh...he just doesn't have the signs he used to have of reflux...he used to obviously reflux, or at least burp, or cough, or SOMETHING!! How else would I know??? We aren't currently seeing GI because I had a...we'll call it a "difference of opinion" with the GI we were seeing when Connor was an infant, and I managed to control his reflux on my own without their help, and any other GI issue I've handled through genetics or dev peds.

I was hesitant to do a scope to check for reflux because of the anesthesia, and so our ped had me give ds1 a couple of extra strength tums before bed (and if he woke) and watch his behavior. It doubled the length of time he slept between wakings from the first night, and we started rx reflex meds from there. BTW, our regular ped handled his reflux until he stopped responding to zantac and we had to go to stronger meds. Then we had to have a GI dr and do a scope.

As far as symptoms, the only symptom ds1 had was refluxing into his feeding tube when he was in the NICU, but we all thought that once he was on straight breastmilk, that he was no longer refluxing and his meds were discontinued once he was discharged. We moved a couple of times shortly after (military family) and we didn't start treatment for reflux again until he was 3. He never had any other signs except for frequent night waking, and was unable to tell me he hurt until shortly before his 3rd birthday

To this day, he has no other symptoms besides a stomach ache.