since I started, we have every sleep problem! HELP!

[greenteamomma]

I'm writing with nooooo sleep.  please understand and help...

I've read the book, purchased it three weeks ago so we have quick access.  My son is now 14 weeks old so we statrted when he was almost 12 weeks.  The main reason I purchased the book was because my son wouldn't sleep on his own in the day.  He slept quite long and had a good two hour pm nap, on me.  He had a 45 min morning and later a 1:30 hr nap.  I had NO problems with the night time sleep.  He slept 4-5 hours at a time from 8 to 7:30 ish.  He was on a pretty good schedule and was progressing naturally from 8-9 feeds a day to 6-7.  He is textbook according to bw.
 
now he wakes constantly during the night, last night every hr.  He didn't cry before when he woke and now he screams and I do shh pat or pu/pd.  In the day, he sleeps for 45 mins so 4 sometimes more naps a day and he feeds every 2 1/2- 3 hrs.  He is bf.  I do wind down after 1 hr or less by walking or singing to him.  He goes down almost asleep and it was working but for 4 days now he keeps waking and cries constantly...I also hold him alot during activity so he gets what he had when i held him for sleep.  I amcontinuing to try to do an easy routine waiting to feed unless he needs it when he wakes after 45.

I look like I did when I woke from my c-section....Why was this working and now it is torture?   We need sleep.  My hubby is peeved with BW because it was somewhat easier before.  I told him we were doing this to be able to eventually get LO to sleep by just putting him in his crib.

Please help.   

[Barbaara]

Hi,

Sorry you're having such a hard time!

Could you post your routine so we can have a  look at it?

(((Hug))) Hang in there, help is on the way! 

Barbara
x

[Mashi]

I remember the days of my DH being peeved because he felt things were easier pre-BW, but now he thinks that the fact I found it is the only thing that saved us!   

I think that some of what you may be going through is his age - one thing that jumped out is that you said you are doing wind down after he's been awake for an hour, and I wonder if he can handle longer A times, or just a shorter windown period. It used to drive me crazy that I was doing everything to TELL my son that it was sleep time very very soon and he knew all of the steps we were going through, and he was happy with them, but then didn't start to cry until he was in his cot, protesting sleep. And it took me ages and a million posts here to learn that it was because he wasn't actually tired in the first place.

Do post your routine and see if we can spot something that stands out that maybe we can help with.

Hugs until then!  (PS My son is 9 months old and I still look worse than I did post c-section!! LOL)

[jess, lukeys_mom]

hi i'm just checking in, hopefully you can post some more info and we can help you. sorry you're so tired

just wanted to add here - around 4 months is a very common age for sleep to turn upside down for a bit. also, your lo can be at an age for agrowth spurt - have you considered this? x

[greenteamomma]

Thanks for all the support, I really need it.  I have not posted because I was really trying to fix things.  Not much has changed except for a few nights once in a while.  I am at my wits end....I really am trying to follow through but I can't anymore.

here is an average day "routine", please read to the end for a breakdown of 24 hrs:
7 is wake up
E: eat
A:very low activity, playing with one toy with dad, then sitting in bouncy chair with no toys looking around.
S:8:45-9 usually for 45 mins cannot extend, try every time, seems content doesn't show any signes before this time.
A: since 45 min nap
E:10
A:under jungle gym until first complaint, then we do some tummy time which is getting quite long sometimes 10 or more minutes until he is unconfortable then either held, walked around or put on blanket and talked to, read to etc. 
S:11:30 ish for 1 to 1 1/2 with pat shhh at the 20 min mark the 40 min mark usually for 10 mins
A: if nap not long enough
E:1
A:maybe just jungle gym or on blanket with one toy, reading to or talking to.
S: 2:30 ish usually for 2 hrs with extentions usually second half of nap is easy and he has to woken
E:4
A:in bouncy chair watching mom make supper or on jungle gym or blanket again
S: 5:30ish give or take 15 mins for cat nap, sometimes has to be woken
E:6 for cluster feed before bed
A: watches parents eat supper in bouncy chair with one toy then 7 to 7:30 bath or just change into pj's then walk around for 5-10 mins, sing songs and rock (I know!).  Kept in arms and talked to (not directly in face) until wind down.
S: 8 ish

He then wakes at 9:30 ish, pat shhh doesn't work, looks around awake, pick up falls asleep, put down, cries again so we have been rocking until deep sleep or he doesn't go back to sleep. 

NIGHT WAKES:  when he wakes he screams like he does when he takes a nap and it's too short and I am able to prolong.  He will not calm with shhh pat.  He is wide awake, looking around and moving his head from side to side. I don't feed unless its been at least 4 hrs, sometimes only feeding stops him.   

SWADDLING:  He was swaddled very tightly until just a few days ago.  We have not gone to a sleep bag with his arms in and the uber swaddle (found link on this site).  He almost doesn't cry when we uber swaddle him but was violently screaming when we even just put him on the blanket before.  He also could get out when he wanted to. 

DREAMFEED: we have tried with and without dreamfeed. 
He then wakes with or without dreamfeed sometimes every hr sometimes at 2 or 3.  I feed depending on when he ate last.  He then wakes at 4 or 5, we feed again depending when he ate, it changes every day. 

BREASFEEDING TIMING:  I have increased my breastmilk (I will explain below) because he WAS feeding every 2 1/2 hrs. He can hold on for 3 hrs now. Note that my breastmilk went down suddenly and my prolactin levels went down really low too.  The lactation consultant said is was because I was scheduling instead of demand feeding.....so on top of increasing my breastmilk I had to increase it twice as much just because of this "routine"!!!!!
 
NIGHTSLEEP DURATION:  He has given me up to 5 1/2 hrs on a few occasions during the night! I analized the day and it was the same as usual and there didn't seem to be more or less activity etc.  ON those nights, he had NO DREAMFEED and slept from 8 to 1:30 and then slept till 5. 

please help me out...
 

[Barbaara]

So sorry you're having such a hard time! Try to hang in there some more and we'll try to help you!

You're little one is probably a bit OT.  At his his age they typically do A time of about 1h20-1h30.  Looking at your routine his first A time is 1h45-2h.  Then he has a short nap, but you don't shorten his next A time.  So by the following nap he's definitely OT.  Try shortening his A times and see what happens.

It was my understanding that a clusterfeed is an extra feed and therefore I would move the 6 pm feed to 7 pm.  If you do a clusterfeed it's done at 9 pm during GS. (according to Tracy's book).  When you did try a DF, how many days have you tried it?  Sometimes it takes some time for it to work.  But some LO's don't react well to it.

As far as I can tell I would say your LO is OT and that's probably also the reason why he's not sleeping well at night.  That and needing a feed sometime during the night.

If you are having problems with your supply it might be he's not really getting enough during the day.  Have you tried to extract and see if you have enough?  When I was in doubt about my supply I would give my DD an bottle of extracted milk after feeding and if she chucked it down I would know I just didn't have enough milk.  I can't give you any advice on this matter unfortunately, as I'm definitely no expert.  maybe you could also post on the breastfeeding board? 

Hang in there!  Could you post today's routine so far so we can have a look at it?

Barbara
x

[Mashi]

Hi there
Sorry to hear things are still not going well.  This is an age where there are a lot of developmental leaps and big growth spurts, so things sort of take a bit of a juggle!

I do remember at about this age it was very hard to figure out how long my DS could stay awake because he wasn't great with showing tired signs; sometimes they were bored signs and I was misinterpreting, and also the A time is starting to increase and you really have to watch some days.  Does your son give good visible tired signs, like playing with his ears, rubbing is eyes, a certain kind of fussing or looking away, yawning, etc?  I watched for these and always made a note so that I could start looking to see how long it took him from awake to sleepy signs.  Then I would start my wind-down 3 or 4 minutes before that.  Some babies need a longer wind down time and others need it to be short and sweet.  Just to be difficult, my LO needed a short wind down if he had been having calmer activity and a much longer wind down if he had been having more active and laughy interactive play.   So if you can figure out things like this you may find it helps to get him into his cot at the right time.

If one nap is short, say only a 45 minute nap, then you need to put him down much earlier for his second nap.   So, if he takes a 45 minute nap from 9:00 - 9:45, then he will probably be tired again sometime around (guessing here) 10:45ish?  Again, you'll have to watch and see when he is tired, but I don't think he would go longer than an hourish on a short nap at that age. So, by 1130 ish he is definitely exhausted! Same for the nap after that one - if he wakes early, you will have to put him down early for his next nap. Go more on when he woke up rather than when his next sleep is "supposed" to be.

With feeding, one of the main points of following a routine like EASY is that there is always some A between the E and S -- you aren't feeding to sleep.  But always always feed when your LO is hungry! Especially with breastfeeding. Lots of BF babies can't go 3 hours between feeds and need to be fed sooner, so don't worry so much about the clock but in watching your LO and when he is hungry. 

I hoe those things are of some help!? Let us know how you are doing!

[greenteamomma]

thanks for the help everyone! 
I have some questions:
If he goes for a 45 minute nap, his next nap should be earlier then he would be napping all day!  He is 15 weeks now and supposed to be transitioning to 4/4.  I am so confused now.  I have been looking at when he woke up and going about 1:30 minutes after that...if, as you say, he has a short nap and then needs to go down an hour after that and only sleeps another 45 minutes so lets say he wakes at 9:30 and goes down again at 10:30 and sleeps till 11:15 and then goes down again at 12:15.....

I hope you guys don't think I am disrespecting your opinions, I respect your experience with this but I don't understand
anymore. 

As for his A time, since I wrote the routine, he only show signs passed the 1 1/2 hr mark sometimes closer to 1:45 mins.  He is also taking really long late afternoon naps and has to be woken.  I will start putting him down earlier for his first nap to see if that makes a difference for later in the day.

As a side note, he woke every hour two days ago and yesterday, took 2 two hr naps, one at 9 and one late in the pm, a 1 hr nap in the early pm and no cat nap and slept unswaddled with only two wakeups last night......I am totally confused!!!!  Is there something else I am not doing right?  thanks again

[Mashi]

I'm off to bed now but one thing I forgot in my first post was to ask if you have tried "wake to sleep" (W2S)?  I was trying it ALL of the time when my DS was younger but only in the past couple of months realised I wasn't really doing a very good job of it and it wasn't working.

Pay VERY close attention to what time he falls asleep. I take my mobile phone up with me and as soon as he has closed his eyes and is asleep I check the time. Tiptoe back up to his cot 22 minutes later.  That's where I went wrong, I was waiting until 30 minutes and was waking him up fully, but have learned recently that 22 or 23 minutes is the crucial time for my DS - you may find a minute or two later works best.  When you go to him, very gently touch his cheek, stroke it a couple of times, JUST to make him flinch. He may turn his head, move an arm, jump a teensy tiny bit, any form of movement.  What you are doing with this is interrupting his sleep cycle every so slightly, and it is enough to make him start that sleep cycle over again, and hopefully extend his nap.

Something to try!  Like I said I got it wrong for months, it takes some practice but if you are having short naps anyway it is worth a shot. Do it 2 or 3 days in a row, every nap, don't give up if it doesn't work the first time!

Will be back tomorrow, hope you get some sleep tonight. (Hey, I hope **I** get some sleep tonight! )

[A pair of Charlies]

Hi there

We had terrible sleep issues for months and months - and like Mashi part of our trouble was being able to recognise the sleep cues and the sneaky misleading boredom cues (which are just plain mean to Mamas). I found with my DS that up until around 6 months, he was OT / OS by the time he showed sleepy cues. So I became a clock watcher and took him off so that I had him on his way to bed by the time the first yawn showed up. This way we got longer naps.

I also found that if I kept that first A time of the day a little shorter, say 15 mins) we got a good nap and this set the rest of the day up well.  A lot of Mamas experience the same here. A rough first nap can hack up the whole day as you're fighting to reclaim lost sleep.

And yes, when naps go rotten and you shorten the next A time, it does make the routine a little crazy and feel like all you're doing is getting them up and putting them back down...particularly if you're spending lots of time trying to help them back to sleep too. But to get past the OT monster, it is worth it in my experience. Once they catch up on a little sleep, then start your days back to normal.

Don't worry or beat yourself up thinking that you're doing it wrong. I had months and months and months of routine tweaks to get past chronic OT only to find myself giving my LO too much sleep and him getting OT from that (too many short naps aren't restful so they get OT...urghhh). But it all worked out. And I know Mashi has experienced the "is he OT, UT, normal...what am I doing wrong?!?!!!!" feeling too. So you're not alone; you're in good company. 

HTH

Charlotte