I could just go crazy!

[coopers_mommy]

We are going to see what tonight + tomorrow morning brings us.  He was up again at about 6am this morning.  I am having to take grace with it though because he is back on steroids for his cough (I hate having a "sick" titled child!), so he is VERY hungry most of the time.  Anyhow....he also still have a crummy nap at MDO, so he's in bed and I think just fell asleep (6:50).  I'm hoping for a regular wakeup time (6:30 or 7)....then we'll see about pushing his A time. 

[coopers_mommy]

Well Cooper woke up at 5:30 again this morning....which equals a not so happy mom! 

Any advice as to what I'm doing wrong?  I'm catching the vibe that he only needs 11 to 11.5 hours of sleep....but I REALLY don't want to push his bedtime back too much.  I'm nervous about his nap today too.....I'll probably stick with about 6 hours of A time this morning....hopefully he'll be okay with that.  If not, then we'll try for 12 at the latest. 

Off to get coffee now

[jess, lukeys_mom]

Can you try pushing his bedtime to very early just for a couple of days (so he can catch up on some rest)? Then in the meantime you can start pushing his nap time up little by little so his A time is longer, and let the bedtime creep back up with it.

IMO you will prob have to do the early bedtime temporarily in order to catch him up on sleep and get away his OT so that he can handle having his routine pushed back, does this make sense to you?

[newmama12]

Coopersmommy, my dd is the same way and will only sleep about 11 hours at night. Sometimes 10.5. Rarely 11.5. And, to top it off, her nap is never that long. Today only 50 minutes (but I'm waiting to see if she falls back asleep).
She's waking early too. Although, last night I pushed her bedtime back, so she slept till 6:30am today. It's very hard to keep her afternoon A time so long when she only takes a short nap. She's usually up by 1pm and then we will do bed around 6:30/7.

It's very frustrating! I hate those early mornings too!

[coopers_mommy]

I had figured 6:30 was an early bedtime considering that his normal bedtime is 7:30.  Also, he didn't go to sleep right away last night, instead he talked in his crib for about 10 minutes.  If he was super OT wouldn't he have fallen right to sleep?  Also, he woke up happy this morning.  Normally if he's super OT, he will cry when he wakes up. 

We will watch him today.  I'm going to see how he does this afternoon, he's making noise right now from his nap (it's only been an hour).  I'm praying that he goes back to sleep on his own right now....WI/WO has NEVER worked for me during naps....so I won't even try.  So we might just do a 6:00 bedtime and see what that brings us tomorrow. 

[coopers_mommy]

Well tonight is horrible!  DS went down easily, but has had a restless night so far.  I decided to cut out two of his medications since I don't think he truly needs them anymore.  One was his benadryl that he was taking before nap and bedtime.  He has now woken up 3 times tonight, and this last time I thold DH to stop going in there and holding him and rocking him back down.  So the last time he began WI/WO....it is now 4:10 and DS has been up since about 3 crying, calming down, and then crying more.  We went ahead and did motrin just in case those bottom molars are bothering him....but OMG I think this is insane.  I almost told DH a minute ago to just rock  him down so that we can get sleep....but I know that we'll never get out of this cycle if we do that. 

Could he be hooked on the benadryl already to help him sleep?  He's been taking it for about 2 weeks now.

So, I totally understand an early bedtime to cover OTness....although I'm curious about ya'lls thoughts on saying "7:30 is bedtime and the earliest we'll go is 7".  Then we'd just have DS grow back into that bedtime that he was doing so well on.  I know it somewhat sounds awful and I'm sure we'll have more horrid nights like tonight in our near future...but I KNOW that if I put DS down at 6....he'll be up at 5, and I don't do 5am that well.

Thoughts?

[deckchariot]

we had the same issues with Benadryl, and Abby was only taking it for a week.  So yes, I do think he could be hooked on it for falling asleep.  The good news is that it only took 1 really bad night and 2-3 not so bad nights to set her back to independent sleeping.  We did wi/wo and it worked.  And made me much more cautious about using Benadryl again!!!

With the early bedtime, we never did put Abby down earlier than 7 (once maybe at 6:45), but her bedtime is usually right around 7:30, so I did exactly what you're suggesting (and still do it in fact, if she has a bad nap day - like today....)

hope tonight is better!!!!!

[coopers_mommy]

Thanks Michelle!  We stayed with a 7:00 bedtime last night.  Cooper went down easily and only woke once around 2:30....mainly for more pain meds (those bottom molars and finally coming through I think!). He slept till 6:30 this morning and woke up happy, which hasn't happened in a  while! 

We ended up putting his black blanket over his window again.  With DST, it was too light at the house around 6 in the morning which I think was waking Cooper up even more!  We've now had two mornings in a row that the wake up time is between 6:30 and 7...which I can handle!   

[deckchariot]

YAY!!!! So glad things are getting better

[coopers_mommy]

Quick question...has Abby ever simi woken in the night, made some noise (even a little cry) then go back to sleep and then wake up again 10 minutes later and repeated this cycle for an hour at least? 

Cooper has been waking and doing this and it of course wakes me up, but I'm sure he's having a restless sleep and I don't want that!  BUT if we go in there, then of course we wake him more than he was already.  So, do you leave them and let them work it out, or try WIWO or something?  He's been doing really well, especially on days that he's here. 

MDO is really beginning to aggrivate me on his naps (this morning for example he woke at 7:15 and they put him down for a nap at 11:55.  He's not going down for naps at home till 1 and sleeping till 3.  He then WOKE at 1:05 and couldn't make it at all to his 7:30 bedtime.  He was out at 6:45.  We are doing some major adjustments with this!)

Anyhow...I'm more aggrivated at that right now than I am at him waking restlessly in the night....thanks for letting me vent! 

[Sarahboosmom]

Hi!

Sorry to bust in on the thread but I have a question.  What is the deal with Benadryl?  Is it addicting?  Did it make your LO drowsy?  Sorry just had to ask about that!

Now I will say about your 10 min cry cycle I've had that with DD when she's had pain issues before, she usually just settled herself but mostly when she had an ear infection.  Also when she is chronically OT she sleeps so restlessly that she fusses in frustration because she is so tired and finds herself a wake.  My problem is DD will sleep 12 or 13 hours at night but skip a nap (dealing with that in another thread).

What is MDO?  Is that like day care?  Yeah that is frustrating when you don't have control over that.  That is the EXACT reason we are in the pickle we are in now as the day care naptime did not match with her A time threashold.

Good luck!

[deckchariot]

Yes, Abby does the restless sleep bit, and Justin and I lay there and have the following conversation:

me: should we go in?
J: hmm...let's give her a min....
minute given...alll is quiet, we role over...just about to nod off.....cycle repeats.....

if it's been an hour, then I usually just go in and do wi/wo (because once I go in there, I'll have to...), but at least at first, if it's just one cry, I stay out in the hopes that she'll settle herself.  We got into a bad habit of going in with just the one cry because we were sure it was 1)pain or 2) it would get worse if we didn't....and turns out, we were just teaching her that we'd come in on one cry....and that led to our 4 hr marathon wi/wo sessions.  So now we wait, and if the every 10 min cry continues for an hour, then we go in.  Lately she's been doing this cry of "mommmmmmeeeeeee" in the middle of the night - just once, just enough to wake me up, and that's it

Benadryl - I don't know if it's the addicting or what it is, but yes, it did make Abby very drowsy, but I found after several days of using it, she all of a sudden had sleeping issues when we stopped using it.  So now I am super-cautious to use it when she has a cold.

[coopers_mommy]

Thanks for the help!  Yes, Benadryl def led to some sleep issues with us (well, I'm not sure now if it's the benadryl or the fact that we would go in at the moment he woke up with more drugs!)  

Wow....we have the same conversation (DH and I!) when the cycle begins.  Then after the first few times of the cycle, DH is out hard and doesn't wake back up until I wake him at the hour mark! 

Tonight is the first night back to WI/WO after the entire teething and meds addiction () and the overally cautious running in "to keep it from getting worse" episode.  I have to say, I just did a 30 minute or so bout of WIWO with a few tweeks (changing of PJ's becaues he was too hot and a little water because he was crying so hard)...but I never picked him up!  YEAH!!!  DH is finally on his way home....I think he gets the next WIWO round. 

Oh and for the MDO (Mother's Day Out, it's like a Day care only 2 times a week), DH is now going to take a late lunch and pick up Cooper from MDO to bring home for his nap.  Then I get home an hour later to allow him to go back to work. We're so grateful that he has a job with a flexible schedule!  Hopefully this will be the last weekend of getting "back on track"....well until the holidays come around! 

[coopers_mommy]

Oh and one more thing....to add to the stress/emotions....I just weaned Cooper from his final nursing 2 days ago!  It's odd to not rock him while he's nursing anymore!

[deckchariot]

{{{{{{hugs}}}}}}} on the weaning!  Well done though, but I know it's so weird....Abby's been weaned now for almost 6 mos, and I still miss it!

Awesome job on wi/wo!!!  Dh and I actually alternated nights when it got to be really bad - and somehow - it was ALWAYS worse on my night!!