Greetings!
Last week I posted an urgent request for help. My 3mo was really fighting her daytime naps. Aly Mac made some good suggestions and things have gotten soooo much better! We have changed our routine (I no longer take her to work with me - I go alone when my husband gets home from work), I've been much more attentive to her sleep window (sometimes her first yawn is within a half hour of her waking) and I no longer bounce around her room to get her to relax. And she is back to sleeping between 9-10 hours/night!
It still takes me a while to put her to sleep, though, but thankfully there is no screaming . . .just a lot of fidgeting.
This is our wind down routine:
I say "It's time for nighty-night" and take her into her room. I turn the lights off except for a lamp which is next to the chair. We sit down and say a prayer then I sing to her until she: a) yawns again, b)begins to get fussy, or c) buries her head into my neck. At that point I start to sing "Twinkle Twinkle" as we go to her crib where her swaddle blanket is. When I lay her down to get swaddled, she always cries. I don't know if she hates to be swaddled or hates the fact that she is about to go to sleep. Once she's swaddled, I pick her up again, put her pacifier in her mouth and we sit back down & "say goodnight to the lamp" at which point I turn the lamp off. She fidgets a lot, spits out her pacifier, cries, I put it back in. Repeat all of that for about 5 minutes. Then she settles into me - sometimes with her eyes open, sometimes not. Either way, I usually sit with her for about 5 minutes after that, sometimes more. I then get up and try to transfer her gracefully into her crib. She always fidgets again but usually (with about 10 minutes of continued sh/patting) she goes to sleep. Sometimes when I walk out of the room she wakes up (and we do it all over again).
Are we still working towards the goal? Going down this road, do you think there will ever be a time when I don't have to lean over her crib and sh/pat for 10+ minutes? Or am I becoming a prop again? She will be 4mo on may 8. Do you think I should do Pu/pd until she can fully put herself to sleep?
thanks!
jenn
