BabyWhispererForums.com
SLEEP => Night Wakings => Topic started by: tea_gurl12 on October 26, 2011, 02:00:24 am
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Hope this is in the right section... :)
DS is almost 6mo and we are currently on a 4hr EASY. Naps have been good but BT is another story. DS will wake up an hr after BT no matter what time we put him down to sleep, crying and will refuse to settle, even with PUPD.
I thought maybe he was OT so we tried a 6/630 BT. No change. We tried a later BT @ 8 thinking he was UT, no change. When he wakes, we PUPD but he gets more worked up. I know he can self soothe bc he does so for naps but when I PU, he will cont. to wail away. After an hour of PUPD, I APOP by feeding him to sleep.
Below was our EASY for yesterday (typical of most days but we switch up BT hoping something will work)
WU/E 7
A 730
S 930
E 11, bf+solids
A 1130
S 2
E 3
A 330
S 515 CN
E 6, bf+solids, bath
BT 7
Wakes up crying @
8 put hand on chest and he fell back asleep
850 same as above
910 PUPD for an hr then APOP (bf or just hold him) to sleep
1030 finally asleep!
1130 DF
4 NW feed
630/7 WU
Is there something in my routine I need to change to help with the wakings after BT? They happen every day so my evenings are spent just waiting for DS to wake up bc he is like clock work! I spend every evening trying to put him back to sleep after BT and it is starting to get tiring :-\.
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Tea Gurl...we are going through a similar situation...my LO is almost 6 months and his daytime routine is to a tee! He eats every four hours and has two 1.5 hour naps (he actually wants to nap and soothes himself completely to sleep). He has started rejecting his catnaps...and I don't find that it makes a difference in his night sleeping patterns.
Night time is tough for him. Not horrible....but completely different from his easy going day routine.
He goes to bed fairly easily between 6:30 and 7. Sometimes he needs a hand on the chest for 5 minutes but he mostly soothes himself. Then, the struggle begins....he wakes up at 9:30ish crying everynight. I go in and comfort with 1 PU/PD and hand on chest. He falls asleep. Then he wakes up at 10:30ish for Dream Feed. Either falls asleep eating or goes back to sleep quite easily after the DF. He wakes up at 2am for Night Feed (and this is something that I would like to eliminate but have been putting it off until I start him on solids....ok...and maybe I'm a bit anxious to try it...I know it's going to cause him distress because he is used to the NF and I really do think that 8 hours is a long time for him to go in between feedings!!!) It usually takes him some time to fall back asleep after his NF. I also usually have to do a diaper change before his NF because his diaper leaks (I think you gave me advice on this on one of my posts...we are trying different options still...with not much luck). Then he is usually up at 5am...I go comfort....he falls back asleep. Then he is up at 6am with no chance of falling back asleep.
What I would love to figure out...is why he keeps waking up at 9:30pm and how I can get him to sleep in longer.
Anyways...sorry to put the focus on my little guy...I actually wanted to encourage you the only way I really could...by letting you know that you are not alone and that other mothers are also struggling...and I'm sure we will get through it!! We are strong!!!! :) Good luck, and keep us posted! I will do the same
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Jay3, I will try to start DS on a longer A time this week. I find DS struggles with a 2.5 A time and is pretty cranky by the 2.5 mark, but I'll slowly extend it. I am also going to try to drop the CN. Just a question, is the below EASY what I should be aiming for...
E 7
A
S 930 (first A times of the day I find are shorter than the rest)
E 11
A
S 2
E 330/4
A
S 7
Lincolns Mom, thanks for sharing :).
Yesterday DS woke up 30 minutes after we put him to bed at 7pm and I did PUPD a couple of times and he went down, but about 20 minutes later, he started crying in his sleep. He's sleeping (eyes are shut) but he keeps crying out. He's did this all last week and if I don't PUPD, he'll wake himself up completely as his cries get louder. Usually he hates PUPD but when we did it with him starting mid-last week, he didn't get upset. So I PUPD once and he'll sleep for another 5 minutes, but this will continue for hours, his waking up every 5 minutes and crying, as if he's making sure I'm still there. I have tried getting him to settle with a hand on his chest, rubbing his tummy, etc. but he won't stop crying unless I PU.
Can PUPD become a prop ??? If so, what do I do? I PU and only hold him until he stops crying but when I PD, he's already asleep again. By the time 10pm rolled around, I gave in and did the DF then (couldn't wait until 11/1130 which is when I normally do it - back was hurting) and he woke up at 230 for a feed, then 630 WU.
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Lincolns Mom, we also had a leaky diaper last night :-\. I think I might have put it on too loose - oops! I might give pampers cruisers a try, even though I know he won't be cruising in his sleep :P. I find his diapers only leak when I unswaddle him (I do that some nights after a lot of PUPD - like yesterday, b/c he's already partially sleeping and won't smack himself in the face or rub his eyes) so maybe it's all his moving and rolling at night that's causing the diaper to leak? If you find a solution, please let me know ;)!
We started solids at 5.5 months and I think it might have helped with eliminating some of our NWs (we were getting about 4-6 a night) but then again, it could totally be a coincidence :P. As for the 2am feed, I think we will try to eliminiate it when we figure out his NWs after BT. Those are causing me more problems than his 2am NW so I'm not too worried about that right now.
And yes, pls keep me updated! :)
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Jay3 - I will work on the 3 hour A time first then attempt to eliminate the CN. Do you know the pages in Tracy's book that talk about the 3-2 transition for naps?
The weird thing is I 'know' he can sleep independently so I don't know if I'm the prop (but maybe?). For naps I do his WD, walk into his room and put him in the crib, say my sleep phrase and then leave him to put himself to sleep. Maybe I'm holding him too long? I'll try to be more careful tonight and see what happens.
So far DS is doing 2.45 A time today but he's having a harder time getting to sleep. He is usually out in a couple of minutes but it's taking him about 10 minutes for this pm nap (same thing for his am nap). Maybe he's OT from the extra 15 minutes?
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Hi,
Stretching A times is always so difficult (or at least I find it difficult...) The fear of OT and short napping vs. UT and more short napping...?!?! Nightmare.
Sounds like working towards dropping the catnap may help then. With my son, I found that he started fighting bedtime at about 6 months rather than waking after bedtime, but dropping the catnap solved the problem. Good luck with working towards the new routine, hope it works out for you.
Rach. xx
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You're so right Londondixy :-\ we're definitely in an OT/UT loop.
Last night we took DS out for a walk in the stroller and he fell asleep for about 30 minutes. When we got home (about 8pm), I was hoping he'd continue to sleep but he was up, ready to play. I did PUPD for 45min but realized that he was UT. PUPD has been better lately (he doesn't scream non stop anymore :)) but yesterday he wasn't even trying to put himself back to sleep because he was wide awake and frustrated that I was trying to get him to sleep.
He fell asleep at about 10pm :( and woke up twice to feed bc I didn't do a DF @ 11pm. I had him up at 7am this morning (is that ok, or should I have pushed back his WU?) His first A time lasted 2 hours bc he was OT -- not enough sleep at night I figure. It just seems like the more UT he is at night, the more OT he is in the morning. I'm guessing this is normal until we can drop the CN and up his A time to 3hrs? I'm trying to keep his A time at 2.45 for the next couple days and push him to 3 hrs but I find he gets OT super easy.
Also, what is the "average" S time for babies @ 6mo during the day and at night? And for the S time during the day, does it matter how many naps he takes so long as he gets that amt of sleep (ie. doesn't matter if we take 3 or 2 naps, I should just aim for ___ hrs of sleep).
Sorry for asking so many questions, and THANKS! :)
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This was our EASY yesterday...
WU/E 7
S 9-1050 (first A time was only 2 hrs because he was OT from only 9 hours of sleep)
E11 bf+solids
S 130-3
E 3
BT 535 (bf + fed solids @ 5pm b/c he skipped the CN so we made BT early - or should this have been a CN ???)
NW 615-7 pupd until we gave up bc he was UT. Tried to APOP so he would get some sleep and not wake up OT the next morning, but he wasn't tired at all. Rubbed his eyes and looked tired @ 915, 945 sleep for the night.
DF 1130, NW 430 (bf) and WU @ 730.
So far this morning I kept him up for 2.45 for his first A time so we'll see how his first nap goes.
Also, a quick question about 4hr EASY. If I extend his A time to 3 hrs and drop the CN, do I still want him to sleep 1.5-2hrs for his 2 naps? Won't that mean he's ona 4.5/5hr EASY? What should his new schedule look like or am I missing something :-\
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Nope, you're not missing something. You'll get more into a 4.5 EASY as he gets older and those A times continue to stretch. The solids help them to stretch their times between nursing a bit -- I think with the girls, we did 1.5 hour naps. Your second A time might be shorter too. It gets kind of tricky, but it is workable. In your EASY above, if you didn't have a shorter first A time, your day would have stretched out a bit more and you could do an earlier BT. If I need to do a CN late in the day, I'll cap it after about 20 minutes or so, just enough to get him to BT without having a major meltdown. Has he always done a longer A time before bed? Sometimes you have to take that into account as well as you plan your day. He also sounds like he's getting to the point where even a short CN will leave him recharged enough that he won't go to sleep. We're getting there ourselves, it's a difficult thing to plan around b/c if they fall asleep even for 20 minutes or so, they won't be ready to nap again until after a decent A time. I'd probably keep trying to push those A times slowly. Usually it's hard to push them the first few days, might be a bit more fussing before he falls asleep, but he'll get used to it.
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Thanks for the tips Erin :) I am slowly trying to push out his A time and I think he's coming around. 2 days ago I APOP by holding him to sleep once he woke up after BT. I figured I would try to get his sleep schedule back on track (to avoid his always waking up OT the next morning) and it worked. He slept from 8pm all the way to 7am (with 2 NW - DF & 430am NF) and woke up babbling and talking to himself. The past week I had to wake him up at 7/730 and he would be soooo tired from being OT causing his A times to be shorter. I want to do that for a couple more days (APOP at night) and then hopefully his internal sleep schedule will keep him sleeping after BT instead of having him up and ready to play, and his A times during the day will be 3 hours!
We had a dr visit today and he wants me to stop swaddling DS to sleep. That's another story entirely (and I'll have to make a new thread on the props board) because he depends sooo much on his swaddle. I tried unswaddling him for his morning nap (only gave him a sleep sac & a lovey) but after 30 minutes of waving his arms around, rubbing his eyes and playing with the lovey, he got upset and frustrated because he couldn't suck on the lovey properly to get himself tired. I ended up swaddling one arm and he fell asleep in about 3 minutes, but woke up 45 minutes later (he can usually transition into the next sleep cycle no problem when completely swaddled). I did 1 pupd and he continued to sleep.
Anyway... thanks for all the advice! Hopefully we can get both his BT back and get him used to sleeping unswaddled soon!
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The APOP after BT to avoid the ot sounds like a good plan. We weaned the swaddle one arm at a time here -- and if it got to be too much during the night I'd just swaddle him again. I'm sure you'll get some great advice on props!
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Tea gurl...any leaky diapers lately? I'm still trying to find a solution!!! Starting him on solids this week...wish me luck!!! :)
What part of Ontario are you from? We are in London.
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Erin, we're going to attempt to wean the swaddle during BT since they're still lousy. DS continues to wake up after 45 minutes and wants to play. Yesterday I tried to APOP and even then, he went to bed at 10pm! So we're going to go cold turkey (as per the husbands advice - why prolong the inevitable he says) for BT but keep naps in the swaddle (I'll try one arm out) just so we don't get a completely OT boy.
Lincolns Mom - our leaky diapers are very random. I use both pampers and huggies and we get leaky diapers randomly so it's rather hit and miss for us. Your little one sure has a lot of pee! But I guess it's good that it's not poops that are leaking because that would surely be awful. Any luck with putting the diaper on side-ways :P. And we live in Toronto. Somewhat close to London!
Hopefully next week, we'll have more success with BT and the swaddle weaning!! :D
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Oh, and we had Noah's 6mo shots on Friday and he's never been fussier/crankier before ??? Every time I put him down, he'd cry and scream like he was in pain :'( I'm debating if I should push the swaddle weaning a couple days until he's back to normal and just APOP his BT (since it's still MIA)??
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Might not be a bad idea. Did he get the flu shot? That one seemed to annoy James the most. Also, 6 month growth spurt might be happening too.
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Don't think we've hit the 6 month growth spurt yet (would he get cranky during the growth spurt, or just want to feed all the time?) but he did fuss a LOT the two days following his flu shot. He's better now, and I just put him down for BT (no APOP tonight) just to see what will happen. If he wakes up 30-45 minutes later, I'm going to APOP but I'm hoping he'll sleep a longer! :)