Hi,
I am first time mom of a 12 mo old. I just joined group tonight and I am sure there is a TON of great info/advice already on this forum about sleep for toddlers. But as I sit here typing, I am listening to my 12 mo. scream as my husband tried to get him to sleep. Six hours ago my son took a 45 minute nap and before that he had been up for seven hours straight (wake up time about 5am.) This has been the pattern for several weeks.
I really really need some help.
Here is the gist:
Nighttime sleep pattern 7pm - 4:30 or 5am: we tried putting him to bed later to see if he would sleep later - not so. He has been waking at this time consistently since he was 3 mo.) Mostly he goes down after a bottle without an issue. He has avg. 1-2 wake ups per night - my husband has been getting up and patting him back to sleep which seems to work much better than me going to him because with me he thinks there is a chance I will bring him in bed with us (we tried co-sleeping for awhile, but for various factors this is not a viable solution for us.) Sometimes he will cry for 20 -30 min before going back to sleep.
However, in the AM, if before 5am, I do bring him in bed and he will sleep for another 30-45 minutes which are pure gold.
Nap time: sometimes he takes a morning nap around 9:30-10am, sometimes he does not seem sleepy until 12 noon. We were on a schedule at one point but I feel like everything changed this last month and I don't know what is going on. I thought maybe he was ready to go to one big nap a day but he will only sleep for an hour at one time, even if we let stay up til lunchtime.
I need to qualify what entails getting him down for a nap because it is important and really what has worn me down to the point of abandoning a schedule and just trying to read my kid for signs that he is tired because it just takes so much out of me. We start 30 minutes ahead of time, making sure he has eaten plenty, turning down the lights, lowering our voices, reading some books, sometimes he will have a bottle. He has never taken to being rocked to sleep. We lay him in his crib and pat him and tell him its time to sleep. For awhile, I was laying down with him for 45-60 min but now if I do this he will not lay down or be still - he kicks and head butts and pinches and tries again and again to sit up/ crawl off the bed. I never thought I would do CIO method, but at 8 months I felt like I didn't have a choice. For awhile he would cry 10-20 min and then settle down and sleep. I think you have to know your kid - and every one needs something different. The crying has gotten worse and more frequent and I can hardly bear to leave him in there. If I give in and get him up I feel like its even more cruel to him, but I can only take the crying for so long. And then, of course, he is miserable for the rest of the day and I have to gather my strength to try it again later. I've tried the stroller, I 've tried the car, I've tried the baby carrier but he wakes up as soon as I try to transfer him to the bed, turn off the car or try to get him out of the carrier. Plus, these methods are not helping him learn to sleep on his own, in his own bed!
My son is not a timid, scared child. He is otherwise very healthy (just went for check up), eats plenty, confident, playful, active, growing, learning, very loved baby. Sometimes I can hear him talking to himself and playing in his crib so I know its not an aversion to the bed space (sometimes I put him in there to play during the day and he is happy so I know he doesn't think of it negatively.) He is teething, but has been off and on for months and doesn't seem to change the pattern much, even with the occasional ibuprofen.
Since day one he has not been a good sleeper. We have struggled all year, white noise, baby swings, baby sleep books, night light/no night light, on and on…there has been 1 night in all of 12 months when he slept 11 hours straight. We felt like it was a miracle! Then I talked to other moms and realized that 10-11 hours a night and 2-3 hour daytime naps are what's normal!
I don't what else to include here, I think I have covered all the pertinent details. I truly ppreciate any thoughts.
Please help. I feel like we are stuck in a sleep deprication loop and I am going to lose my mind.
