Please help... about to lose my mind

[MamaNay]

Hi...

I'm new to this posting stuff, so bear with me.  So we started the PD method with our daughter about 4 weeks ago.  She is 14 months old. (We have been doing the EASY routine for quite some time, but were rocking her to sleep each night before starting PD).  It went pretty much like the books described... got better each day for the first 3 days, then had a few days of it being really difficult, with it taking a long time and many PD's until she fell asleep.  I thought things were getting better over the last 2 weeks, but now I'm questioning it, because she has been SCREAMING at the top of her lungs, like her pain-I-just-got-a-shot cry every night at bedtime when we leave the room.  It used to just be a loud cry, but now it is ear-piercing screaming.  When we first started PD, we stayed by her side, then gradually moved closer toward the door, and now we are actually leaving the room and shutting the door, and she is just a mess.  It has been lasting anywhere from 30 min to an hour at night, of this screaming and us going in and doing PD.  I feel like we have regressed, and I'm not sure why.  Nothing else has changed, she is not teething/sick.  Shouldn't we be past this after 4 weeks, or am I just expecting too much, or are we doing something wrong?  I feel terribly guilty when she screams like that... like I'm a bad mom.  I mean, we soothe her pretty quickly, and do not let her cry it out, but it just sounds awful.  We have never let her cry it out.  Also, tonight, my husband said that she started the screaming as he carried her toward the crib... now I'm afraid that she is going to develop a fear of her crib. 

As far as naps go... they have been getting better.  For the last few days, there have been times when I have been able to lay her down and leave the room, and she has put herself to sleep after only a little moaning/whining.  But there have also been a few times where she screams like she does at night, and again I feel awful.  Is there something I should try differently?  Please help... I don't know what to do, because I don't want to go back to rocking her after 4 weeks of not doing it, but I am about to break down if I have to listen to her scream anymore.  The one thing that makes me feel like we are doing something right is that she has been consistently sleeping through the night since we started PD, from about 7:30pm to 6am. Any advice is welcome.

[deb]

She's 14 months old? Just checking before I dive in with any ideas.

[MamaNay]

Yes, she turns 14 months tomorrow.  Last night, my husband just ended up staying beside her crib, occasionally rubbing her back until she fell asleep, b/c we couldn't stand the screaming anymore.  But, I hate to do that too, b/c I don't want to go back to that stage.  We were past that stage.  Sigh. :-(

[deb]

I asked about the age because that sounds suspiciously like what we were dealing with around 14 weeks with my first baby, wanted to make sure I wasn't giving the wrong advice.

Hmmmm..... this is more of a toddler thing than a baby thing, so different approaches apply.

How verbal is she? Some of this you can probably have conversations with her about now. If she's averse to the dark room, or to being alone, you can shop with her for a night light perhaps, a special bed buddy/stuffed animal, something to help her "own" that part of her world, which often helps. Not sure if PD would be the way to go with this age. (Wouldn't have worked with either of mine at that age, anyway. )

Does she already have a lovey/comfort item of some kind? What does your bedtime routine look like? Is it long enough for her to get her fill of Mom and Dad? Is she OT or UT perhaps?

Can you post a basic schedule for the day, a sort of framework? What time is she waking for the day, eating (especially last meal), napping, bath, bedtime? Maybe we can find something to try tweaking.

[deb]

I found this in the Toddler Sleep forum; it's people posting their schedules for their toddlers. Ages vary wildly from 14-16- months through 3 years or so, but it might give you a starting point if you're stuck for inspiration. (I know I often am! LOL)

http://babywhispererforums.com/index.php?topic=49006.0

[MamaNay]

Yes, she has a "blankie" that she sleeps with... that was something I encouraged several months ago when I knew we would eventually stop rocking her to sleep. She is very comforted by her blankie. 

She tends to sleep best in a darkened room, but my husband and I did try a brighter night light recently, to see if her being afraid of the dark was the problem.  We only tried it for two nights however, maybe we should try it for a week or so to see if any changes happen.

Her schedule is something like this:

Wake 6am (a bit earlier than she should probably, but this was the time she had to wake when I was working, and we've just  sort of stuck with it when I quit working 4 months ago)
Get dressed and nurse till about 6:20am (we have been down to one breastfeeding a day for about a month now... I'm planning to stop this weekend)
Breakfast 6:30
Play until about 7:40, then we start her wind down for nap
Nap 8ish to 9ish
Snack when she wakes, about 9:15
Playtime
Lunch 11:15ish
Quick playtime, then winddown for 2nd nap
Nap 12:15ish to 2ish
Another snack after waking from nap
Playtime
Dinner between 5 and 5:30
Brief playtime
Start winddown for bed at 6:15
Bedtime is usually around 7, but lately she's been screaming so much that she's not asleep until 7:30 or 8pm

For naps, our routine is to change her diaper, read a few stories, rock and cuddlefor a few minutes with some humming from mommy, then I lay her down.  Today, for both naps, I was able to lay her down and leave the room, and she was fine, and fell asleep on her own.  I guess it's the nighttime that we have the biggest problem.


Routine for bedtime is to get undressed, take her vitamin, brush teeth and take a bath, all done by mommy.  Then daddy takes over and gets her dressed, reads stories, says prayers, then rocks/cuddles for a few minutes before laying her down.  That's when the screaming begins.  So, it's sort of an extended version of her pre-nap routine.  Just with daddy involved and a bath.

I think there may be times when she is OT or UT, but on the whole, we have been doing this bedtime for awhile, and that hasn't seemed to be a problem.  We watch for sleepy signs, and will start her routine earlier if she seems tired. 

I keep telling myself that what we are doing is in the right direction, because her naps have been getting easier, with me being able to lay her down and leave the room (not every time, but several times over the last few days) and with her sleeping consistently through the night, which she did not do before we started PD. 

I'll take a look at the other toddler schedules.  What do you think?  Thanks for your responses... it helps just to know someone is out there who can relate!

[deb]

I'm wondering since her first nap is so short, almost like a catnap, if this might be a sign of an impending 2-1 switch - in other words, to a single midday nap. I remember when it was getting to be time with both mine there were some sleep disturbances and it was especially hard for my older one to go to sleep at night - she just wasn't ready to be done with her day. It was almost like she was OT and UT at the same time!

Does she go down easily for that first nap? Have you tried moving it a bit later and seeing what happens, or is she clearly tired then?

Another suggestion is to treat that first waking like a night waking. If it's dark enough - it is at that hour now where I live! - I'd just try to get her right back to sleep and see if she'll extend that morning sleep. If she can do without the first nap after a later wake-up, you may have your answer. When my second started sleeping till more like 8AM, she was a lot less likely to need any extra sleep. (And Mommy celebrated! )

Alternatively, have you tried changing up the evening winddown so she's already in her room earlier, like maybe for an incidental diaper change, and then just stay there? We had to do that for J's naptime when she was a baby as with her reflux she associated the crib with pain and would scream bloody murder at the regular sleep routine - but when we switched it up she didn't know it was coming and was a lot more relaxed. It's possible you might be able to stretch her to the time she's already falling asleep, only without the scream-fest.

Anything there sound like it might be applicable?

[MamaNay]

I have been thinking about  making the 2 to 1 switch with her naps, but I fear doing that because she is clearly tired for that first nap, and she does go down easily for it. 

Maybe I'll try getting her into her room a bit earlier in the evening... maybe letting her have her after dinner playtime in her room, then just start her bedtime routine when she is showing sleepy signs.  If I try that for a few days and it doesn't work, then maybe I'll consider changing the naps.  We are going out of town for a few days... I'm afraid of what that will do to her considering she is already having trouble going down at night.  Any advice for that?  We will try to keep her routine as much as possible while away.

[elmarie]

I do agree with Deb that that she might be doing her 2-1 switch.  At 14 months she can handel 4-4.5 A time easily.  Just some ideas about the PD.  It is very important that no form of prop is present when you do PD, so if you are rocking her to sleep before starting PD you are using a prop and PD will not be working and just confusing her. 

You can start by using GW (as you have been).  Staying at her cot until she is calm.  Then very slowly (one step at a time) move away from the cot, until you reach the door.  Maybe you are leaving to soon.  We did wi/wo successfully at that age, but it took me 2 weeks of moving slowly to the door.  Make sure that dd can always see you if she maybe bobs up her head to check if you are there.  Once at the door you leave the room.  If she starts crying then you do wi/wo

I used to do a modified wi/pd/wo.  When my DD started crying I would then wait for 1 min (the 10/20 ect sec was too stimulating for my lo), so you must take your lo's temperament into consideration.  If they get too upset go in. Once the min was up of real crying (you don't go in on a mantra cry) I would go in  put her down, because she would usually be standing at this point and say "mommy loves you and Courteney needs to sleep" put her down and leave even if she is still crying or standing up.  I will then start timing again for a min, the moment she stop crying even for a second, I will start the min again. I found that most of the time she would just lay down before the min is up and go to sleep.

Sleep training takes a while so you need to be patient-it can be tough on you but it WILL work.   

[deb]

If you're going out of town, you may have to "fake it" while you're travelling. Sometimes I find that it messes things up more, but other time I find it helps us get out of ruts. A child who falls asleep at a later time might sleep in come morning and re-adjust naps on their own, or a child who's too interested to sleep for an early catnap might suddenly begin to give you a long midday nap instead.

[MamaNay]

So it's been almost two months since I've posted- and I think you guys were right... the 2:1 transition was the culprit.  So we have made the transition, and things were going MUCH better- my little one was sleeping 12 hours at night, and a 1 1/2 hour nap around noon or 12:30pm.  Still keeping the EASY routine.  It was BLISS!  She was putting herself to sleep with no troubles after our wind-down routine, and sleeping without waking (unless a tooth or something was bothering her).  However, now things are a mess again, and I just don't know what to do.  I fear having to do WI/WO again and hearing the screaming... I just don't think I can bear it for very long.  My husband went out of town for work for two weeks and things just seemed to go haywire, and there were about 4 nights where she screamed for an hour before bedtime- with no reason I could figure out.  Then things were fine for a few days, and then she came down with a stomach bug- diarrhea and feeling yucky for about a week.  She just got over that about 5 days ago, and things have been out of whack since.  She has been waking during the night, mostly inconsolable, and she has refused a nap the past few days.  Now I think she may be OT, which I'm sure is not helping, but she just screams for the entire hour I try to get her down for a nap (doing WI/WO). 

I was starting to think that maybe she is just not tired enough at 12:30pm, and maybe needs a nap closer to 1pm, as she had been sleeping about 8pm to 8am, but does that explain the night wakings?  I can't figure out what causes things to be so out of whack when things were going so well.  Could it just be leftover from her being sick?  She seems completely normal during the day, except surrounding her sleep times.  There were a few nights that I rocked her for awhile or held her while she was sick, and I feared she would get used to that, but she was sick so I of course I had to soothe her. 

Also, she just seems inconsolable at times lately- the other night when she woke, I could not calm her down.  I tried turning the light on/off, rocking, walking, letting her in her crib, rubbing her back, and we eventually came downstairs and turned the TV on for a bit to calm her down, b/c it was going on an hour of her screaming with nothing working.  I'm wondering how much of that is her personality?  I'm just so confused.  And my anxiety is getting the best of me I think... I feel like it is so hard to know what is the right thing to do.

Sorry for the long post... any suggestions?  I feel helpless.