How old is your child?
Twins: Siena & Iris: 10 months and 3 weeks
What’s his/her daily routine?
Recently transitioned to 2 to 1 nap per day...here is their schedule
7:45am wake
8am: milk
9am: breakfast
11:30 lunch
12noon Nap (only lasts one hour....sometimes less!!)
2 or 2:30 pm Milk
4:30pm Dinner
6pm bath/pajamas
7pm milk and bedtime (usually they are asleep around 7:30-7:45pm)
I just transitioned to this schedule about 2 weeks ago (although sometimes i still give a morning nap if they are really tired due to the night wakings). The reason i transitioned was because their morning nap would take longer and longer for them to fall asleep...sometimes they would play in their crib until drifting off to sleep at 11:15am. And they would refuse their afternoon nap altogether.....or if they did sleep in the pm it was almost 4 - 4:30pm (once it was even 4:45pm) before they fell asleep in the pm. I know it was early to transition them, but they were refusing the pm nap. They have never been long nappers.....an hour is usually what i can get out of them. With this new schedule they get very tired by lunch time and have on occasion fallen asleep on their high chair while eating. ON days when i tried to give them a morning nap at around 10:15-10:30, they will take it, but then won't sleep at all in the pm. Since the 2 to 1 switch i have moved up their bedtime (they now are asleep around 7:30-7:45pm whereas before they slept at around 8:00=8:15pm). I find that now since moving bedtime earlier, they wake up at 6am crying...(they used to sleep til about 7:45am and wake up happy).
What’s nap routine? See above
How long are naps? Lately naps (especially for Siena) have been less than an hour ...once she slept on 30min all day....i feel lucky if they sleep an hour (iris will usually go for an hour). I try to do pu/pd to extend the nap, but i can spend another 30min just doing pu/pd with them crying like crazy and they still don't fall back asleep. I have used pu/pd successfully in the past (at around 7.5months) to break them of the prop of being walked to sleep and that worked, but i have never been successful with pu/pd for extending naps. ONce i bring them to their playroom or family room after naps they are okay (ie not too bad crankiness...they play happily)
What's bedtime routine? Time? 6pm Give both bath and pajamas one at a time. Play with them (try to play with books so its not too stimulating play) and then bottle and then into the crib
Do you bottle or breastfed?? Bottle
How much? or how long? 3 bottles a day...8 oz each bottle....Feeding can take up to one hour (ie they drink then play then drink etc)
If breastfed.. one side or both?? (at each feed)
How many wakes per night? Last night Iris woke at 12:30 am...i did pd until 1am then left the room when she was quiet (not quite asleep yet though). Siena slept through the night. Both awoke at 6am and did not fall back asleep til 6:30pm. They sort of take turns giving me problems with night wakings.... Last week Siena was up often throughout the night (9:30pm 11pm 1pm 4pm) and Iris slept right through and now Siena is sleeping through but Iris is waking. They are both having early morning wakings now though...around 6am (sometimes 5am).
What’s your LO like when waking at night? How long is he/she up? I come into the room and they are standing up in their cribs (watching the door) and crying.
When you go to him/her is she fussing or crying? Or is it a mantra cry? Crying
What have you tried to settle?? I pick up until they stop crying then i put them down and rub their back. Sometimes they will get back up again (I wait til they are standing) and then just put them back down on their back. If they don't stand back up but remain crying lying down, i rub their back. Sometimes i think the back rubbing has become a prop because they quiet down when i rub their back and close their eyes, but then the minute i stop rubbing their back they jump up and stand up crying again.
What do you do for A time and how long is it? They either play in the downstairs family room that is full of toys and when they need a change of scenery i take them to their upstairs playroom.
Are there developmental issues such as teething or milestones? They went through a growth spurt shortly after 9 months. They took their first steps at 9.5 months and have been walking ever since. They are now walking fully (rarely crawl anymore).
Have you introduced cereal? Why, how much, and how many times a day? (for LO’s under 6 months)
Do they have a prop? If so what is it? I think the back rubbing i do when i do pd has become a prop??
Do they have a lovie? Iris has a little bear that she holds at night, but Siena has never taken much to her bear.
I know i have several problems here: not a long enough nap in the day, night wakings, early morning wakings. etc. Not sure if this is all do to the 2 to 1 transition. Before the 2 to 1 transition, problems were starting at night (night wakings) and they seemed to improve a bit when i went 2 to 1 (i think they were just more tired at night so they slept), but now things seem to be getting worse.
I really love Tracy's books and philosophy, but the more people i talk to i am beginning to wonder whether CIO might be the way to go. There is a local Parenting Phone in show i watch on TV and the expert their is totally for going cold turkey and letting them cry it out. The girls doctor also told me to let them cry it out. A good friend of mine who has two wonderful kids (already 3 and 4 yrs old) did CIO on both and they are super duper sleepers (and they don't seem like they have a broken bond of trust with their parents). I wonder if the parents in tracy's book did CIO wrong (you are supposed to not go into the room at all...if you let them cry and then break down and go to them after a while you are just teaching them it takes more crying for you to respond). I don't really want to do CIO, but sometimes i wonder how different it would be to pd (since the girls cry while i am in the room anyway...i don't do pd until they are standing up so sometimes i am in the room with them while they are lying down and crying - not much diff from CIO is it? I think the back rubbing has become a prop so i am trying to stop doing that).
Thanks in advance for your help!
HJL