I really wanted to wait until Lacey was closer to 6 months old. I wanted to wait until her cold was over. I wanted to wait until I was sure her reflux meds were working. But, I didn't, I couldn't.
When Lacey was born until she was 3 months old, I thought out loud (big mistake)--I have a great sleeper--YAY! Then over the course of the last two months I have slowly watched her sleep patterns get worse and worse. The 4 hour stretch that disappeared. The every 2h at night go to every single freakin hour. Every night. For weeks. The final straw came early this week after another horrendous night of night wakings when all of her wakeful time during the day she spent fussing. She wanted to be held and walked. She could barely stay awake for an hour and when she napped it was only for 30 minutes. On Monday she took probably five 30 minute naps and was miserable in between. I just couldn't do this anymore. I missed my happy baby, I was utterly exhausted and I decided that on Tuesday we would start sleep training. So I pulled out my books. We were putting Lacey to bed WAY too late. She never had a consistent nap schedule. Her naps were too short. And of course the night wakings that were making me crazy have to be reduced. I recognize that at barely 5 months she still probably needs to eat overnight, but not every hour or even every 2 hours. So first I wanted to teach her to self-soothe to fall asleep and then see if the naps could be extended and the night waking frequency to be decreased. The other issue we have is she is still swaddled, arms in, b/c of the eczema. When she gets an arm out, she scratches and wakes herself up. So here we go--I braced myself.
Night One: 7:30 bedtime. We tried arms out on the swaddle. She cried hard at first for about 10 minutes, then fell asleep. Not bad. 45 minutes later, she woke up and cried for a few minutes, then fell asleep for a few minutes, then up and down many times until about 10pm. I fed her at 10pm, swaddled her arms in and she slept for FOUR HOURS!! I fed her again and she slept another 3 hours. It was wonderful.
The next day, we took Lana to preschool, Lacey fell asleep for about 30 min on the ride home and was fussy after that. I put her down for a nap drowsy but awake about 30 min after we came home. She went to sleep with no crying and slept for 30 min. When she fussed, I let her be. She cried for 5 min and went to sleep again for an hour!! WOW! She had another 2 naps like this that day and she was in bed at 7:15 for the night. The second night she woke up every 2-3h and I fed her most of them. The third night she slept from 7-12:30!! That's 5h!! This is going very well.
Today was day 3 and Lacey took 3 great naps--all 1.5-2h in duration. For each nap and at bedtime, she goes down awake, fully swaddled (arms in) and there is little to no crying. I can't believe it. I feel like I have my life back and my happy baby back. She and I are still catching up on so much lost sleep and severe overtiredness, but I am optimistic, things are better for all of us.
The first night was rough on me. I was wound tight. I didn't like to listen to her cry. I hated her hoarse voice. My husband was not sympathetic to my pain, but he is not a mom. We moms are wired differently. But today, just 3 days later--I am happy, I am laughing, I have more patience. I feel so proud of Lacey for getting it and doing so great with it. When we sleep trained Lana, she cried for a long time. Many nights, for many minutes for many weeks. Her cry was intense and persistent. Lacey yells a lot, but does not have the same intensity in her cry, which makes it a lot easier to deal with. Things are not perfect. She still is night waking way more than she should. The swaddle is a problem too--I want her to sleep in a sleep sack without scratching or startling herself awake. Plus we have to take Lana to school and then pick her up a few hours later and Lacey always falls asleep in the car which messes up the rhythm of her nap schedule for the entire day. There is nothing we can do about that. So we are going to stay close to home for a few weeks to see if we can come up with some sort of consistent sleep pattern for her. Some kids can just roll with the punches and sleep wherever, whenever. Neither of my girls are like that. I am just so happy we have made progress and I have slept for more than 2h straight. Wish me luck that the good habits continue!
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8 comments:
This is awesome news Julie!!
The 6 month rule is not a hard and fast rule. From my understanding, once babies understand cause and effect is when CIO is most effective. We had the same experience where the boys got sick then they got used to waking up every 45-60 minutes ALL NIGHT. It didn't take us long to CIO after that. They were 5.5 months adjusted but we could not wait two more weeks.
Anyway that's when we used the opportunity to put together a solid schedule where they went to bed at 7, took a morning nap and afternoon nap, and got up around 6-7. That schedule stayed for almost a year, and after going through sleep hell we did whatever it took to maintain it.
Life is so much better when you get sleep!!
Yay! Sleep is definitely worth the fussing, even though it is so hard to listen to. So glad you are getting some rest and having happier days!
I am so glad your sleep training is going well. That is the one thing I HATED going through and dread having to do it again. We did the extra early bedtime (6:30) because Mags was such a horrible napper until she was one. Her bedtime is still super early (7:00) but she rarely gets up at night.
That's awesome! I soooo wish I had done sleep training when Seth and William were younger. I've paid for it for 3.75 years! So good for you. I've never heard anyone who sleep trains say they regret it or say it wasn't worth it.
Hooray! That is so exciting. I'm envious of the 1.5-2hr naps. I need to try that! We're still 30 min napping over here.
One of the hardest things to do with sleep training is training the MOM. Really, you have to learn to just give them that chance to self soothe. At nearly 23 months, DS2 still wakes up during the night once in a while. I hear him over the monitor and it has to be more than 20 minutes of persistent crying for me to even think of getting up now. You are doing great! Lots of support your way!!
Thank you for posting this. You know we've had similar issues and have been "working" on them this week...but thanks to the horrible responses I got on a certain birth board a few years back, I've been REALLY nervous to ever post anything with the term "CIO" in a public forum. I think people who are REALLY against it probably have kids who always slept pretty well and have never experienced weeks of every hour wakeups. Sleep deprivation is no joke. I almost fell asleep driving a few weeks ago.
Anyhoo I'm glad to hear things are going better. We've been getting a little bit more sleep over here as well. Still up about 3 times a night but at least there's a 4 hour stretch in there somewhere, and the naps have been alot better, too. I've managed to put Jr. in his crib "sleepy but awake" for 4 days straight now with NO CRYING. Hallelujah.
YEAH!! Welcome back to life! Sleep is critical for all of our health! It is going to take some time but isn't it awesome to have the positive results so early in the game!? And going to bed by herself is a huge trick to learn! Wyeth is still working on that. This is HUGE! Lets hear it for more good news in the days to come!
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