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Fri 9 Nov, 2007 03:02 pm
I thought after 3 months, babies started sleeping better? Ha!
She was doing so well....and now this.
She sleeps great for the first half of the night. She sleeps a solid 7-8 hours. Then at around 2-3am she wakes to eat. After that, she's up every hour on the hour.
For the first half of the night, she doesn't need her binky to sleep. In fact, we don't even give it to her to fall asleep with 99% of the time. But if she wakes after her 2-3am feeding, she cries if binky is out. Well, not really cries, more like fusses and then it escalates to crying if I don't go in there. So...
Binky falls out, she cries, I go in, put it back, she sleeps for an hour. Again, Binky falls out, she cries, I go in, put it back, she sleeps for an hour. Again, Binky falls out, she cries, I go in, put it back, she sleeps for an hour. And on until I finally get up for good in the morning. You can see why this is making me loony. I am really getting tired here.
It's been suggested we co-sleep but I am not for that at all. I do put her in her swing some times beause I need to get some sleep and she will sleep solidly from 3a til I wake her around 7a if she's in her swing.
But this is a bad habit I don't want to get into.
As you all know, you cannot keep a baby awake if they are tired. I tried keeping her up longer last night but she was still up at 3, 4, 5 and 6am.
Parents, HELP. How can I get her to sleep through that second half of the night? Is this just a phase? Am I doing something wrong?
I am going insane with exhaustion here.
You are not doing anything wrong - she's just a babe. Both my granddaughter and grandniece went through that until they were 6 months +. My daughter bought a book called The Baby Whisperer - it has really helped her get her daughter on a routine. Helped with her son, too.
I would advise you to give little one a little runny pablum at her last feed but I know that is not advised today, so...
I strongly suggest you get the book from the library and have a quick read.
Could be a growth spurt...
It sounds like you're doing the right things, especially not being too entertaining when she wakes up. (Just doing what she needs and leaving it at that.)
One thing I remember thinking during these phases (and there were a lot of phases) was that the key was to wait it out without letting the behavior become entrenched. As in, it's a phase if you just get through it and don't offer any kind of positive reinforcement (and remember, "positive" doesn't necessarily mean "good," just something that makes the behavior more likely to recur).
I've said this before, but part of why I do "Sozlet Stories" is because I got a bit panicky about how much I'd forgotten about sozlet's earliest days/ months/ years, and how quickly. So for a lot of this stuff I've plumb forgotten (as in, when sozlet was 4 months old I may have had more useful advice...)
Man oh man oh man.
Been up since 4. I am so tired today. I finally put her in her swing at 6a so I could get one hour of sleep and still she fussed. She did not want to be asleep.
*oy*
How many naps does she take?
Maybe you can eliminate the last one before bed?
(I know, I know, easier said than done...)
Well, she doesn't sleep during the day much. Normally, 1-2 hours total. So when she gets home from daycare, she crashes at around 5,6 and then sleeps until 8, eats and then is ready for bed. I keep telling hubby to wake her up but he won't. He thinks it's mean or wrong or something.
How do you keep a baby awake when they don't want to be awake? She still falls asleep sitting up.
Do interesting things -- going for a walk, that sort of thing. Keep talking to her. It does sound like the 5-8 nap is skewing things -- that she's basically sleeping from 5 PM to 4 AM, a respectable 11 hours, with occasional breaks.
It sounds like napping earlier would help, too (so she's not so tired at 5), but I know that's not really under your control.
Yeah, unfortunatly I can't be there during the day with her.
But I will talk to hubby and tell him that we should at least try one day to wake her up before 8p and see how she does.
The binky thing may be a bad habit developing as well. Baby is relying on you to help her sleep by going in and replacing the binky.
Most likely it is a phase, but the replacing the binky may develop a bad habit. Also, like sozobe said it could have something to do with napping schedule.
Just for humors sake, we had an issue where the only thing that helped the baby was the baby swing. The baby swing was kept in the living room. So when baby was fussy, we would put baby in baby swing in the living room and then open up the couch and sleep on the sofa bed - remind you not nearly as comfortable as our bed. When I told some one else about it, they said simply - why don't you move the swing into your bedroom. Duh - see what sleep deprivation does to your common sense.
I'm clueless about the whole daycare experience and what you can reasonably request, but is it possible to ask them to put some effort into helping her nap when she's there?
If she hasn't napped all day I can see that it would take a Herculean effort to keep her awake when she's back at 5.
I wonder if the swing may be a positive reinforcement thing, too -- that she knows that if she fusses long enough she'll get the swing, and that's what she wants.
I love that story, Linkat, yeah, we had lots of "duh" moments as new parents...
From the time they were born, my BIL used to play Enya when they wanted their children to go to sleep... maybe some soothing music will help.
She has a Baby Einstein Mozart cd that I play and the swing plays music too so I am sure there is some association with sleep and music. I will try and put music on every time I lay her down in her crib.
My daycare provider (licensed in-home) had a paper for me every day when I picked Weasel Girl up, from the time we started there until her language developed to a point where she could tell me about her day. It told me what the kids did, where they went, how much she ate (formula/milk and later packed lunches) what they did with small muscles, large muscles, what was art that day, did anybody fight or skin their knee, and most importantly, when and how long she slept.
She stayed with this daycare person from the time she was ten months old, through before- and after-school care, until she left daycare -- even then, as we were neighbors and friends, she would go over and help with the little kids.
My provider filled out a form she designed for each pre-talking kid, while they were down for naps or playing quietly. I still have them all!
It seems to me your baby is quite needy for sleep by 5 or 6 in the evening, and has had near enough rest by mid early morning, that is, 3 a.m., and can be sometimes cajoled into getting a bit more with the swing thing.
Strikes me, viewing from afar, that that could be distributed better somehow.
More sleep at daycare, up longer in the evening, more sleeping through, until such time as other stuff happens, like, say, teeth.
Yeah, she does need to sleep more at daycare. Her sheets have her naps at only 15-20 minutes each and usually only 2-3. I guess there is just too much excitement going on for her to sleep. I was apparently the same way when I was a baby.
Last night, she conked out at 6p and slept til 8 when I told my darling husband that we had to wake her up and at the very least, feed her before putting her down for the night. She hadn't eaten since 4 and I knew if she didn't eat then, she'd be up at 11, right after I'd shut my eyes to sleep. She woke, not easily, ate and then stayed up til 10ish. And then she slept from 10-3a and 3a til 4:15 when she woke briefly and then until 6:15a. So the problem definitly is that she is just sleeping too early.
We will have to start waking her up a little sooner every night and putting her down again a little sooner so that she isn't going to bed at 10p. Routine might be nap from 5-6, bedtime at 8-8:30. I think that's reasonable and it will let her have a little catnap in case she's exhausted (which is obviously is) so that she's not so cranky while she's up in the evening.
This sort of thing was always a struggle with SonofEva.
I was old...40 at the time...and simply couldn't make it through the next day on 4-5 hrs. of sleep. So I gave up and followed the old advice: Sleep when the baby sleeps. If that meant I had to sleep from 7 p.m. to 3 a.m., I did it. It was weird doing all my typical evening stuff in the early morning hours, but at least I got my rest.
As I remember, that worked pretty well for a few weeks until he decided to change his sleep schedule once more. (sigh)
This is why women in their 50s have no business having babies. It isn't the childbirth that's the problem, it's the physical demands of taking care of young children.
I have a question...Why is it bad for the baby to sleep in the swing?
Eva just beat me to the punch. While reading the first posts I was thinking "Maybe Bella should just go to bed at 8pm when the baby does.
I'm always in bed by 9pm or so myself, and get up at 5am. I don't leave the house until 7:30am. I ususally read or come on A2K, but you could get a lot of stuff done in those couple of quiet hours. Mosting spending quality time with your precious daughter.
My sister in law has gone to bed by 8pm for more than 20 years, and is an early riser.
It might seem stange to you, but I think that's because society has socialized us to stay up later. Do your own thing.
As far as the sleeping in shifts, your husband would be coming to be only an hour or 2 later, so it's not like all night. He can take care of any little wake-ups before his bed time, and when he comes to bed you'll be in a nice heavy restful sleep, and won't be disturbed.
It's not bad for her to sleep in the swing, but I don't want her to get used to falling asleep in it. We had a tough time getting her to sleep in her crib as it was.
As for going to bed early...I guess I could do that. I would just miss a lot of time with hubby and he'd miss a lot of time with the baby.
I think the best solution is to let her nap when she gets home and then wake her up for a few hours before bed.
Chai wrote:I have a question...Why is it bad for the baby to sleep in the swing?
Because you run out of batteries!
I agree with the swing works - use it - we did, but always keep extra batteries!
Bella Dea wrote:...As for going to bed early...I guess I could do that. I would just miss a lot of time with hubby and he'd miss a lot of time with the baby....
Yeah, we did. But it was a matter of my survival.
It didn't last long, though. As you are learning, parenthood is a state of constant adjustments.
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