That is what we seem to be doing here! We make progress, and then all of a sudden we are back to square one. more on that in a moment!
NCSS Day 8 Update: implementing white noise in Staci's room was part of my original plan. I finally took the humidifier we received as a baby shower gift out of the box, promptly neglected to read the instructions (as per my usual), set it up, filled it with water, and turned it on. It is not loud, but I was happy with the quiet hum it created and hoped it would do the trick for Staci. After 6 nights, and at the recommendation of a friend, I turned on the radio in between stations just to listen to the fuzz. It didn't seem to change anything last night, as she was up quite frequently. Today, however, she took her very first multi-sleep cycle nap all on her own! One hour and 40 minutes. YAY!
That success was oh-so-short-lived! Nap number 2 was a measely 28 minutes. This seems to be what we do. Two nights ago, we got a 3.5 hour stretch and a 4 hour stretch. Last night, nothing longer than 2 hours and quite a few stretches that fell far short of 2 hours. Then, today, with the morning nap success and the afternoon nap giant failure I just don't know what to think! Two more days and I will do the 10 day evaluation of NCSS.
I have to be honest though. I have been so tired I have not been able to implement the Pantley Removal Technique, so I fear there will still be frequent night nursings. The thing is, I simply do not have the energy in the middle of the night to try to go to remove my breast from her mouth when she's not asleep, because I don't want to be up with her all the rest of the night. I just want to do what is easy and get her to go to sleep, so I can go back to sleep! It does seem as if daytime naps are truly headed in the right direction, so I'm hopeful that once those are under control, the nighttime wakings will lighten a tad on their own, and I will be able to focus more on getting the night time wakings down. There is just so much to fix I can't seem to focus on multiple avenues of 'treatment' all at once. Maybe if more caffeine was an option I would be able to do that, but since Staci is nursing that is not really an option. I have a favorite drink that I have cut way down on, and in fact haven't had any at all in 2 days. I will be so pleased when I can have as much caffeine as I want! I miss Starbucks...
Megs-Sending you sleepy girl vibes! We tried a variety of different things to get Gracie to sleep and finally found some that worked. First we co-slept with her from 6 months until about a year. (She was able to nurse during the night without my really waking up and would go right back to sleep)I know that isn't for everyone, but we all loved it and all got sleep. At around 12 months we moved her into a toddler bed, right next to our bed, and she stayed there until she was around 15 months and then we put her into her own double bed in her own room and dh slept in there with her for about a week or so until she got used to it. She is now sleeping in her own room & in her own bed all night most nights. Just wanted to let you know what worked for us. I really think what works depends on the child and the family. I hope you find something that works because I know how not fun it is to be so tired and have a screaming child on top of that. Oh and for naps (when it was only Gracie) I would lie down on our (or her double) bed and nurse her down then either nap with her or sneak off after she had fallen asleep. I know our ways are different than most (we practice a lot of attached parenting things), but hope that some of this helps!
ReplyDelete(We did things pretty fast after she turned 1 because we didn't want any changes to be attributed to Mary Faith)
Good Luck on your journey to sleep!
Thanks Mama P! We're mostly on the AP side of things here as well. It's so weird--she won't fall asleep nursing during the day, ever, but at night she HAS to nurse to go back to sleep! it's so weird! I do bring her to bed with me on occasion, and she never slept in her crib till about 8 weeks old. It seems like I get longer stretches if she's not in bed with us, of course that was not shown the past couple of nights. I'm not opposed to co-sleeping BUT Staci's bedtime is 7ish, and I like to have a few hours of grown up time after that, so how does that work? KWIM?
ReplyDelete