HELP!! 8mo waking at night again

[robinh13]

Hi there...i'm hoping someone might have some good advice for getting my dd back on track for her night sleeping. i posted in the getting back on track thread, and they suggested that i might be able to get some good advice here as well, so here is my story.
 I have twin dd's both 8mo, and both have recently been sick with a cold and ear infections.  They are on antibiotics and seem to be on the mend, no more fevers or runny noses.  the problem is the night sleep.  One of my girls has been a great night sleeper, has slept thru for months despite her sister's crying at night.  Even when she was sick, as long as we got her nose sucked out really well, before bed she still slept thru.  My other dd has never been the best night sleeper.  she would sleep thru sporadically, but nothing consistent.  then she began sleeping thru, and on the occassion she would wake, she would wimper or talk for a few minutes and then go back to sleep on her own.  YAY!!  But then when she got sick she was miserable.  she couldn't eat cause she couldn't breathe out of her nose, and couldn't sleep even with the head of crib propped up cuz she was so stuffed up.  We ended up having 3-4 nights where she woke every 10-15 min and finally we would just let her sleep on our shoulder, cause then she was upright and could breathe better.  I knew when doing this that it would have an effect on her after she got better, but at the time i had to do what i could to get her to be comfortable and at least get some sleep.  Now that she is better things are still off.  She did go back to sleeping for longer stretches again pretty well on her own after being sick, so that was a relief, but now she is waking at night again and not being able to put herself back down.  some nights it is only once around 145am, other nights like last night, it was 1030, 1245, 200, 400 and then up for the day at 615.  she has been napping great during the day and is in good spirits.  I think she may be going thru a bit of separation anxiety, so i don't know if that is affecting her at night or not.  my dh is usually the one who goes to her at night.  i will post my routine so you can see how our days go, and if there is anything we need to tweak.  Any advice anyone has is greatly appreciated.

6-615  wake up
630 4oz bottle
800 breakfast
900 am nap (1.5-2hr)
1100 6oz bottle
1200 lunch
200 pm nap (1.5-2hr)
400 6oz bottle
515 dinner
630 bath, stories, 7-8oz bottle
700 asleep hopefully for the night

thanks again for all your help!!

Robin

[robinh13]

here's some more info from my other post, that might be helpful.  it includes info. on how she acts when she wakes, approx times, and what we have been doing so far.
Usually what happens is that she wakes and cries a bit...much like her mantra cry, so if that is the case, we wait and see if she will stop on her own and go back down( That used to happen before she got sick).  Most nights it starts like that, but then after 2-3 minutes escalates to a more upset cry, so DH goes into her, and sometimes he just picks her up on his shoulder for a minute until she calms and then puts her back down.  sometimes she will go back to sleep with just that.  other times he just puts a hand on her back, or strokes her hair/head until she is calm.  other times he has given her the nuk(pacifier) to calm her(we only use her nuk for naptime, not for bedtime, and that is how it has been since day one so it's not anything new)but the nuk is a last resort solution(dare i even use that word  Smiley
Her twin sister  Abby will sleep thru it all for the most part.  if Kayla's crying goes on for a while, as it does some nights when she won't settle for us easily, then it will sometimes rouse Abby, and then we have a real problem to deal with, but luckily that doesn't happen too often.
so what do you think is the best way to proceed??  we don't want to be going in too soon, so that we take away her ablilty to soothe herself, but we also don't want to leave her too long, and either have her sister wake up, or have it increase her fears in the separation anxiety.
so with the separation anxiety i know you need to kind of deal with that phase, as it will pass, but if it is part habit, then how should we deal with getting rid of this habit?  we are trying to remain as consistent as possible with everything we are doing.

[Layla]

Hey Robin. Sorry it took so long to reply...

It could just be the after effects of being sick & maybe to some degree she is used to being cuddled at night (or picked up & helped to go back to sleep). She is also at an age where SA develops & if she seems more clingy during the day then maybe SA is another reason she continues to wake up (again, her wanting to see you at night). I think maybe rather than picking her up you should try the pd method. I believe pu can be too stimulating at this age so its more just pd when re-teaching self soothing.

I think its great that you are waiting a bit before attending to her.... & when you see that she's not settling then go in & pd. You can also use your voice & say something like "its ok, mummy/daddy is here", etc....

This is from the pu/pd board...
8 MONTHS TO A YEAR - At this age you really don’t do any pick up as babies 8 months and up tend to soothe faster in the crib. 

·   You wait for them to stand up or pull up and then you place them back down so they are looking away from you and not at your face.
·   If you feel they are truly frantic and need more you can pick them up for a moment but you put them straight back down. 
·   At this age it’s important to use your voice even more.  Your baby will start to recognize what you are saying, eg. “I’m not  leaving you, you’re not alone, it’s nap time” etc. 
·   At this age you may need to pair pu/pd with gradual leaving of the room.  First you stay in the room until asleep, then move a few feet from the crib, in a few days you move to the door, then out the door. 

You might also want to consider white noise so that her twin does not wake up during all this (if her cries really escalate).... something like a fan???

Another thing I was thinking about was the duration of naps.... it could be that she is sleeping too much during the day... which is something that also causes night wakings. If her naps are 1.5hrs long then thats about the av but if she's having 2-2hr naps then maybe thats too much for her (unlike her twin) & its another reason she is waking at night???

Let me know what you think
Layla

[robinh13]

Hi Layla!
thanks so much for replying.  my thoughts on everything are so jumbled right now.  i really do think her waking at night is habit...i remember reading in one of tracy's books, that if you can set the clock by when the wake up it's a habit...and that is definately kayla right now.  after thinking of everything, i think when she was sick, we may have done a little too far in helping her to go back to sleep, as we wanted her to just get some sleep, and be comfortable, while she was miserable, but now she is relying on all of that help to go back to sleep. 
so last night was pretty bad...we expected it to be, as her night sleep has been getting worse, and now she has been going down for naps harder too, where before it was a breeze, wind down, cuddle, put her in bed and off she went to sleep.  DH and i were out of town at a wedding for the weekend, so the kids stayed with my sister here at the house, so we figured when we came back she might make us pay a bit for leaving    she woke up at her regular 1:30am time frame, and DH went to her put her hand on her back and calmed her.  then 20 min later she woke again.  i went this time, thinking that if separation anxiety was the case, maybe it would help her if mommy went in.  well, that seemed to make it worse, and she wouldn't calm in the bed for me at all.  i left her in the bed and did the hand on the back until her crying was really intense, then i picked her up, and she calmed right down so i put her right back down, but then the cycle started all over again.  finally after an hour and 10 min. she was back to sleep, and then slept until 6am, but we ended up having to use the nuk to calm her, and then take it away when she was asleep.  i was so mad at myself for caving and giving it to her, but i had tried everything else, and nothing else worked.  For a little background...kayla has a very intense personality...so she gets overtired/overstimulated very easily, and when she gets to a point of being really upset it gets very hard to calm her...but that hasn't stopped me from trying 
As for the length of the naps...both her and her sister take an average of 3-3.5hrs of sleep for naps, usually they have one nap that is 1.5hrs and the other that is 2hrs(sometimes less), so i'm not sure the naps are too much of an issue, as i think if we shortened them even more, they, especially kayla would be so overtired by bedtime that she would have a harder time going to sleep, and usually when she gets to that point she will refuse to eat her bottle, so then we would have that issue. 
on that note though, i do have a question for you, if their afternoon nap does get shortened and they get up around 3:30pm is going to bed at 7pm still ok, or is that too long for them to be awake in between?  Would we then  need to move their bedtime up?  i know i have read that sometimes to get them to sleep better at night, they need to go to bed earlier...but logically to me that would mean they would sleep less or wake up earlier, or both...but my logic could be flawed...sleep deprivation can do that to you.
anyways, sorry this has gotten so long, but i wanted to fill you in on how things have been going, and give you my thoughts as well.  i'm willing to do anything to get her back to the point of being able to self-soothe and sleep independantly as i know that is what is best for her i just want to go about it the right way, and not fall into the accidental parenting trap.  please let me know what your thoughts are on all of this, and what is the best way to proceed.  And thank you so much for all your help so far, and for just listening, i really appreciate it!!!

-Robin-

[Layla]

Robin, I was in this thread for about 5 hrs straight & kept of meaning to reply but something always came up so I am really sorry it took me all day to post back .

So to answer some of your q's

if their afternoon nap does get shortened and they get up around 3:30pm is going to bed at 7pm still ok, or is that too long for them to be awake in between?  Would we then  need to move their bedtime up?  i know i have read that sometimes to get them to sleep better at night, they need to go to bed earlier...but logically to me that would mean they would sleep less or wake up earlier, or both...but my logic could be flawed...sleep deprivation can do that to you.

At 8 months, Jasmine could only really handle 3-3.25hrs before bedtime. She wasn't too good on any more & we would basically have night wakings if it was more than that.... so if the pm nap ends at 3.30pm, I would try for an earlier bedtime. Doens't have to be MUCH earlier.. maybe try 15mins earlier. When Jasmine gets overtired, I do an earlier bedtime for a couple of days to let her catch up on sleep & its never caused us earlier wake ups

Dont feel bad about using the nuk... we've all been there.... I would continue with the same process as you have last night (other than giving the nuk ). So pick up only when things are heating up & quickly down once she is settled & do pd instead.

How did last night go?

[robinh13]

Layla,
Last night went better....but it was kinda an all around hellish day.  I've noticed with kayla, that when her night wakings got worse around wed/thurs last week she has also now started to be more difficult to get down for naps...whereas earlier that week and in the weeks before, she was going down like a dream.  i'm sticking to our normal nap time routine though in hopes that consistency will win out.  So yesterday,she went down great for her am nap...took a little more cuddling before putting her in bed than before, but not much (to be expected i guess since we were gone for 2 days).  But her pm nap going down was a disaster and it took over an hour to get both her and abby down...so that was frustrating beyond belief, coupled only by the fact that i had slept for 2-3 hrs the night before so that didn't help, and my patience level was not what it normally is.  But i digress, so they only got about an hour nap in the pm, and had a 2hr am nap...so i had planned on putting them down earlier than normal for bedtime.  so we started their bedtime routine earlier, had their bath, and shockingly, Kayla actually ate all 8oz of her bottle at bed(she has been a bad eater,so usually we fight to get 6-7oz into her).  we read our 2 stories had a small cuddle, and i put her into her bed.  she rolled over and went to sleep.  usuall when i put her down as i'm leaving the room she pops her head up and watches me, and then may cry 2-3 min later as she realizes i'm not coming back in. but then will go off to sleep...sometimes after having us reassure her, other times not needing it.  so she was asleep by 6:45pm last night and Abby at 6:50. 
Kayla woke only one time last night at 12:30am (DH went to her, as he felt bad i was already so sleep deprived) he tried calming her in the bed, and that didn't work, she got more upset, so he said he gave her the nuk(we are gonna have to get on the same page with the nuk use...i don't like to use it, and he's ok with it...grrr)and put his hand on her back, he said she calmed down and after 2 min he left and then she was quiet until 5am...where she woke for 15 min, babbled a bit, then went back down(by herself  ) until 6am when he got them up.
so all in all it was a better night, i thought maybe the going to bed earlier would make her sleep thru totally, but maybe that is too much to expect overnight...   So i think i will try that again tonight, along with making a plan with DH on how to deal with the nuk issue, and i'm also gonna try playing with their nap times a bit and see if shortening them a little will also make a difference.
Now how much A time did your girls have before their naps during the day?  i'm wondering if part of my problem with her going down for naps is that i'm giving her too much A time before the nap, and then she is overtired when going down and that is why it is taking more to get her calm(she doesn't get upset...just really spazzy)
a few weeks back i extended their A time from 2hr 30-2hr 45min to 3 hrs cause they started having shorter naps, and waking after 30-45 min, and it worked like a charm and they were back to napping well.  so i have been making sure that we start wind down early enough that they are asleep by the 3 hr mark.  however the last couple of days we have gone past that, and for abby it doesn't seem to make much difference, but for kay it does...so i was curious how much A time your girls had at this age? 
Anyways, sorry this is so long....i do tend to babble on sometimes.  but let me know what your thoughts are on what we've been doing and such.  Thanks again for all your help!!

Robin

ps..i forgot to mention, that Kayla just started crawling 2 weeks ago, and we think she might be teething to, as she is chewing on her nuk more than sucking it....could all of this be related???

[Layla]

Wow Robin... you have an amazing DH

At that age Jasmine was doing 3hrs in the morning, about 3hrs in the pm & no more than 3.25hrs before bedtime. Abby might not be as sensitive to overtiredness as Kayla is so if more than 3hrs is causing her to be aggitated & hard to settle for that nap then I would take it down a little so that she's in the cot by the end of that A time. I agree with you 100% on the earlier bedtime.... I think with all the night wakings she's had she might need an earlier bedtime until she can catch up.

Agree with the nuk use (I also used to use the nuk dummy & bottle teats... NUK was the best!!!). Have a chat & really I would just throw it out if I were you (but thats just me.... going cold turkey )

If she's teething then maybe she is finding relief by chewing on it..... have you had any luck with meds in the past (when they are teething?).

[robinh13]

Layla,

I agree, my DH is a rare find...it all comes down to sleep...if he gets up at night, he can come back to bed and fall asleep within 5 minutes.  for me, once i'm up, my body has a hard time letting me go back to sleep so it can take an hour or more.  so he is usually the one to get up, and if we get to the point where they are both awake, then i get up and we double team them.  we work well together, so i am very lucky, and thankful for him. 

last night was not what i would call a disaster, but it was definately a step back from the night before.  the girls am nap was good, and i adjusted for kayla for the pm nap, and she went down easily just like before, so i agree with you that that is key for her.  unfortunately, her nap didn't last.  Abby, bless her heart, has this thing, that when she poos, be it at night or during a nap, she gets up, no matter what.  so yesterday pm, she pooed during her nap, and when she wakes the first thing she does is pull up on the end of the crib, and start talking/yelling at kayla to wake her up too (they play really well together...it is sooo cute...EXCEPT when they are supposed to be sleeping... )  so kayla only got about a 50-55 min nap.  she was mad when she woke too!!!  so i knew bedtime was definately going to have to be early.  instead of 6:45 i moved her bedtime all the way back to 6:30.  she went down well again, and ate pretty well too, and was asleep by 6:35, and abby by 6:45.  Kayla however woke at 11:45pm...DH went to go to her, and as he opened the door she settled herself...so he never went in, just came back to bed.  at 1:30am then she woke again, and wouldn't settle herself, so he did the hand on back and she went back down.  but then woke again at 3:15am and was beside herself...so i had him give her some tylenol (in case it was teeth), and at that point the nuk was the only thing to settle her, so she got that and went back down until 5am, woke, talked a bit, back to sleep, and woke for day at 5:45 (she had pooed then, so she may have gone longer had she not done that).  So all in all it wasn't horrible, and she did put herself back 2 times, but she was still waking frequently, so that is a bit discouraging.

with the nuk, i know what you are saying makes total sense, but i'm not sure we are quite ready to give it up yet, as she does use it for naps, but it doesn't seem to be a prop, at least for naps, cause after she is asleep it will fall out, and she doesn't wake, nor care.  and for bedtime we have never used the nuk for sleep, and we have been consistent in that, so i think she knows that, as before when she was sleeping thru it didn't phase her at all...it is an emergency base only at night time.  so i talked with DH about that last night, and really told him i don't want to use it unless all other options have been tried and exhausted and NOTHING else will calm her down. (the sucking really seems to calm her...it does for abby too...but she found her thumb early on...so she sucks on that).  so we seem to be on the same page with that now.
Re: the teething, we have had some luck with meds for teething.  the gels don't seem to help at all, but tylenol or motrin(ibuprophen)seem to help a bit.
so, i'm gonna focus on getting her some good sleep for naps today, making sure we get down in that 3hr time frame, and i'll move bedtime up again too, and hopefully that will all help in some way.  i may play with re-arranging the furniture in their room, so maybe they won't wake each other so much...that's one of my biggest challenges with having twins....but i get twice the love, so it's worth it!   
thanks for your help, and let me know if you have any other thoughts on my plan...

Robin

[Layla]

Hey Robin... how have the last few nights been?

[robinh13]

the night before last(wed.) was ok.  that day both girls actually took 2- 1.5hr naps, all on their own, and woke happy and everything.  we put them to bed early that night again...645, and kay only woke 3 times (11pm, 315 am, 5am, then up for day at 545).  she put herself back down at 5am, but the other 2 times she woke and went straight to screaming.  DH got her down doing the usual...and without the nuk, so that was good.  But then yesterday during the day,  she seemed really tired, almost like she was constantly in the overtired state.  she went down rough for her first nap, but napped for 2 hrs( then i woke her), her sister did not fare so well, and only got an hour and 5 min nap, but she went down rough too, and seemed overly tired, so i think, even tho she is sleeping thru kayla's NWings it is still disrupting the quality of her sleep.  the pm nap, both went down well, but they both woke crying after 1 hour.  we put them down at 645pm again for bed, and again, abby did fine, but then Kayla was up every hour from 11pm until 6am, only putting herself back at her usual 5am.  the other wakings she would wake, go straight to screaming, we would go to her calm her(without nuk)she would go back down, only to wake an hour later.  So it was very frustrating and confusing, cuz i thought, that if she wasn't sleeping as much during the day, and we were putting her down early, that it would help her to sleep better, and/or catch up on her sleep...but i think it is starting to become a cycle of overtiredness, and so now, none of her sleep, naps or bedtime seems to be good sleep.   
I would love some advice on what you think is happening, and what you suggest is the best way to handle it.  we have consistently done the same things to get her back down, and have been waiting until she needs us to  go to her, but it seems right now she goes from asleep to the "i need you" cry right away.  Poor DH is so tired at work from being up so much, and i'm exhausted, as even tho he is the one getting up, i am still awake the whole time he is in there, in case he needs help.  So anything you have for us is greatly appreciated!!!

Thanks,

Robin