I have been having major sleep issues since I've been back to work. I struggle falling asleep and staying asleep. Add to that a new dog that paces at night (getting use to our house) and a baby that wakes up at 4:30 and you're talking VERY little sleep.
I've been struggling with what to do with Lyla for a while. At two months she was sleeping 9 straight hours. After a good 3 weeks of this I stopped swaddling her. She would fight the swaddle being put on (whether I used a blanket of the swaddle me) and then would fight her way out of it at night. She is becoming a thumb sucker and wants her hands at night. So I figured she was ready to give it up. I was too because every morning I would wake to find her drenched in sweat and that just made me nervous. Didn't matter if I swaddled her in just her diaper. We took the swaddle away and slowly she digressed to 7 hours of sleep, but would take her bottle and go right back to sleep for another 3-4 hours. That is fine with me because during the school year I get up at 5:30, so if she wakes up at 5:30 for a feeding then I actually get to see her and get one last snuggle in before I leave for work. However, now she is waking up at 4:00ish. I even tried swaddling her at the coast, still woke up at 4:00. She still takes her bottle and then goes right back to sleep. It's just frustrating to go from 9 solid hours to only 6 or 7.
Last week we started adding formula to her night time bottle to help her sleep longer. It only was successful the first night. It doesn't matter if I give her a bottle at 9:30 or 10:30, she's going to wake up at 4ish. For a while I could put her binky back in her mouth and turn on her night time CD and she would go back to sleep until 5:30. Now that doesn't work. What makes matter worse is once I get up to feed her I can't go back to sleep for at least an hour. Not good when in two weeks I'll be getting up at 5:30.
So tonight I decided it's time to break the cycle. Obviously she is just use to getting up at this time and we need to stop it. She woke up, I gave her her binky, tucked her in and turned on her CD. She still cried. I turned down the monitor, but laid there watching the lights. I went back in after 10 minutes and repeated the binky and tucking in, rubbed her arm a little to calm her and walked out. Still not change. After 45 minutes of screaming (my house is small, I can here her without the monitor) I gave in. I went in picked her up, calmed her down and gave her a bottle. She went right to sleep. Unfortunately I did not (hence why I'm typing this at 5:50AM)!
The question is what do I do? Do I continue to just give her a bottle at 4 when she wakes up so I can at least attempt to get some more sleep or do I keep trying to let her cry herself back to sleep? I'm frustrated, tired and confused. I get mixed advice and am undecided myself. Some say let her cry, others say she is too young and still needs to know I'll be there for her. I hate listening to my child scream, but I hate waking up at 4. Any advice from you would be appreciated. I got to my pediatrician next week. Maybe she'll have some advice too.
Oh and where is my sweet husband as I'm laying awake listening to our daughter cry? Sound asleep and snoring next to me. Lovely!
3 comments:
Oh lady-I feel 'ya!
1) Stuart can sleep through ANYTHING. And that pisses me off soooo badly, especially when I can hear the moment eyelashes are batted. Yeah...
2) This waking up early could just be a stage. It was so frustrating to me that as soon as the boys were on a decent sleep routine, they would snap out of it and then I would have to start something new all over again. I would continue adding formula and if your ok with giving her another bottle at 4ish then go for it. Whatever gives you and Lyla sleep is good in my book.
3) Crying it out is one of the hardest yet best lessons. But you have to do what YOU feel comfortable with. It definitely not going to hurt Lyle to cry to a little bit but it always broke my heart to listen to it for more than a minute (either that or I was raving mad because I just wanted some sleep and I knew that I was going to have to get up soon and of course my dear husband got to sleep THRU THE NIGHT and was under the impression that so did our beloved son(s) and so he was also confused as to why I was ready to snap his head off when he walked in the door and expected dinner on the table and a clean house. Ahem). So yeah, you have to make the call on crying. Which is NOT easy but one thing I will add is that crying it out seemed to work a little better during the night than first thing in the morning. If I tried to let them cry in the morning, they would just get worked up and then be even more awake.
Alright, there's my advice. :)
Yes, it's hard, but please know that Layla (especially at this young age) KNOWS that you are there for her whether or not you go to pick her up.
Crying it out is ok (and maybe necessary), but do what you feel is best. Don't let anyone make you feel like a bad mom for letting her cry at this young age. There's nothing wrong with crying - I promise! She may need to break this cycle.
I remember the days, and yes, they are hard, and I feel for you.
Good luck!!!
It's so hard to struggle with the sleep issues! We did the cry it out method with both babies and it was REALLY hard. The good thing was it only lasted 1-2 nights max (off and on all night) for each baby. I stayed up a lot on those nights wondering if it was going to be worth it or even work but it did work.
Both babies are now really good sleepers and when they do wake up, I know that something is wrong and I don't feel bad about going in to try and soothe them because I know they have their routines down.
While the cry it out way was hard for those couple of nights, I felt so much better when both baby and I got to sleep through the night from then on. There's nothing like a good night's sleep!
Good luck!
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