sleep STRESSES me out

[abbysmomma]

Hi

My DS is almost 14 months old, and has as looooong history of sleeping absolutely terribly. So finally, just after his first birthday, i cracked down and stopped breastfeeding at night, and after a few weeks, he was going to bed happy, putting himself to sleep and on good nights, was sleeping up to 10 hours without a peep. Naps were still propped (i held him until he was asleep then transferred him) but as long as the nights were ok, and he was napping a good amount i didn't care. So about a month ago, he learned that he could actually stand in his crib and it all went downhill. He was already walking at this point, so i know he knows how to get down, but he just. couldn't. stop. standing. I've heard to from many that you shouldn't put them down and to wait for them to go down by themselves, and at one point, he was standing and crying for up to 3 hours after i've put him in bed. This was while i was in the room with him. So i gave it up as a lost cause, and put a mattress on the floor next to his crib. I've gone back to night feeds, he wakes up probably every 3 hours or so (or more often) and he naps absolutely terribly. I don't know how to sleep train at this point because he REFUSES to lie down until he's exhausted. and believe me, i've tried waiting for him to do it on his own, and i've tried putting him down every time he gets up, and i've tried (God forgive me) gently holding him down so he couldn't get up. Here was his day today:

A 7:30am
S 10:50 fell asleep in the car back home from groceries but woke up when i tried to transfer him to his bed (which always worked until a few days ago) - so a total of 10 minutes
S 1:45ish for 30 minutes then i breastfed him back to sleep for another 20 minutes
A 2:40
S 7:30 fell asleep on the boob

I realize there's a big boob prop, which i know from previous experience is just a few days hard work to get him off of, but normally i don't use the boob to sleep unless it's the middle of the night. Previously, i did wi/wo waiting a few minutes each time before going in. now that he's standing (and refusing to lie back down) this isn't working. staying in the room becomes another prop, since i've tried gw and can never go past the leaving the room stage. he's got a sound machine to block out big sister's noises. what else... he's due to have his bottom two molars in soon, which might explain his extra grumpiness today. DS currently has a lot of food allergies and possibly celiac disease, and occasionally this does bother him enough at night.

any help/suggestions would be greatly appreciated, as i feel a stomach ulcer coming on from thinking about this too much. i don't sleep well with him, and i can't tend to my daughter when i'm stuck in his bed. please please help!

*whine*...

[londonmama]

I'm at work so can't reply in detail right now, but didn't want to leave your post unanswered as it sounds like things are really stressful right now!

Sounds like a combo of needing to work on the routine plus weaning the props, which you already know.  If the naps are always as bad as the day you posted, he is probably OT by bedtime which makes it harder for him to give up the standing malarky and just relax into sleep!  (but one full month not giving up standing in the crib...you have to give him respect for persistence!)

Does he ever take decent naps?  Under what conditions?  If you were at home rather than in the car in the morning, how long would he have slept at 10:50?  Do you have timing constraints like school run or can you be pretty flexible with his routine?  He is probably somewhere close to moving to just 1 nap, but can't tell how close from the day you posted.

I would focus on improving the day routine and naps first, and then deal with nights.  Some of the night waking might resolve naturally if he is rested better.

[koe2moe]

big hugsss for u!!  i'm afraid i don't have any answers and i hope to bump this up for you

[abbysmomma]

londonmama: in fact, it's even harder to put him down for a nap when we're at home. if we happen to be out, and he falls alseep in the car, it's easiest to just transfer him and he will usually sleep longer (1-1.5 hours) than if we're just at home. sad, but true. nowadays, i'm sure he's starting to get ready to drop his nap since he's screaming his head off, tired but not willing to sleep, when he's usually due for a nap. USUALLY, this is how our day goes:

A 7:30ish
S between 10:30-11 for around an hour
A 11:30-12
S catnap about 4 hours after he wakes up from his previous nap for 10-15 min
S 8-8:30pm

i was getting to the point where i could put him in bed awake and he would put himself to sleep, but i couldnt' leave the room. these days, he's waking up 2-3 hours after going to bed and i just bring him down into the mattress with me. he will go back to sleep with a little fuss (and no boob) but will wake again couple of hours later. then all hell ensues and he rolling all over me, trying to fall asleep but not being able to, screaming his head off. last night i just had it and put him back in his crib. after multiple standings and me patting the mattress and pleading with him to sit down, he eventually sat on his own and flopped over. slept for about 2 hours in the crib, then was awake and standing again, this time wanting to be fed. so i put him off until 3:30am (8 hours!). he was awake again 5:30 and finally fell back asleep at 7am after multiple boobages (and him signing "all done" many times). he's still asleep right now at 8am and i will have to wake him for the day soon. i get very little sleep, and have been sleep deprived for over 14 months (minus those few blissful weeks). anyways, now i'm just rambling, but kudos to anyone whoe gets this far. nice to know somebody cares!

i know he needs to fall asleep on his own for all his naps and night sleeps/wakings, but the naps are hard to do with a 3 year old running around. there's only so many dvds the child can watch. to be honest, the night sleep stuff is easier for me to deal with, so would it be ok to do that first? the day sleep has always been kind of messed up, to be honest. anyways, gotta jet. thanks again!

[Kay Dee]

You poor thing!! That sounds soooo tough. On his daytime sleep, I think I'd start by pushing him to one nap around 12/12.30. Hopefully he'd settle easier for you and sleep a bit longer. I think I'd just go straight to one nap, cold turkey, as he's probably already OT so no point in doing it gradually.

At night time, I think if he's taking so long to lay back down by himself maybe a form of PD with WI/WO would work better for him. At the moment waiting for him to lay back down himself is backfiring on you as he's being rewarded in a way by standing because it means you stay there with him for longer. It might work better for him if you go in, lay him down with little fuss, then leave the room, and repeat until he's asleep.

What do you think?

[londonmama]

Agree with KDee about pushing to one nap.  If you're trying for a nap just 3 hours after he wakes up, he is probably fighting it because he isn't tired enough.  In the process he ends of getting overtired and then it spirals through the day.

If he wakes at 7:00 or 7:30, a nap at 12:00 or 12:30 sounds good.  Hopefully that way you only have to struggle with him once a day anyway!  Sounds like your 3 year old doesn't nap anymore?  If you would rather start this nap in the car and transfer him while you get the nap established, then I can't see any problem with this (I never have luck with this but if it works, go for it!).  At least for the first little while this might help get his body clock used to better napping.

If he is going all the way from 11:00 am to 8:30 pm with just a little 10/15 min catnap he is definitely OT at bedtime which will make him more prone to waking often.  Hopefully a longer nap at lunchtime will help this naturally.

How did you stop BFing at night last time?  Did you do a sort of gradual withdrawal, or walk in walk out?  Like KDee says, you might be best with some version of Put-Down/Walk In Walk Out (listen to cries and assess when you need to go back in) or Put-Down/Gradual Withdrawal (i.e. if you think he'll settle faster with you in the room, you put down and then go back to sitting quietly in your chair or whatever).

Can you choose a 3 day period when you have someone who can help?  Because as you know, it might get worse before it gets better!

Also, if you think that the molars and/or food allergies are bothering him right now you might want to just work on the routine stuff and not make major changes at night.  If those other things are bothering him, you're going to be fighting an uphill battle on the sleep training front.

Finally, on a bad nap day, I would go for an earlier bedtime.  He may be waking at 7:30 am but that is after a bad night with lots of long NWings, so I would aim for an earlier bedtime for a few days to see if it helps.  Even as early as 6:00 or 6:30.

Sounds really tough - this seems a tricky age for sleep (my DS is 15.5 months) but I'm sure we can help you make some vast improvements at least!

[abbysmomma]

hi all

first, thanks for responding. it's nice to know that others out there are listening and caring.

second, today, after waking him up at 8:30am, i put him down for a nap at 1:15. sadly, he was boobed to sleep, but i'd rather work on the nights before the days. chances are, he won't sleep as long as i would like, but i'll try for only one nap and an early night.

as to how i stopped BFing last time, i did wi/wo until he stopped crying, offering water when i thought he might need it. honestly, i don't think he actually gets too much milk at night since it didn't seem to make a difference in terms of his hunger in the morning or the amount of food he eats during the day. it's much more of a comfort thing, i suppose.

i found out that if i stay in the room sitting on the mattress next to his crib and patted the bed, telling him to sit, he would eventually go down. kind of comical really, since it was like magic words and he had no choice but to sit. it sure made him mad though, and most of the time he would stand right back up. but all in all, only 30 minutes of hard crying/standing before he went back to sleep. i'll try putting him to bed like this and do all night wakings. my patience only lasts so long before i pull him into bed with me though,  but my goal is for him to stay in his crib until at least 5am. wish me luck ladies. i'll report back tomorrow morning.

[londonmama]

That sounds like a good plan.  5 am is a whole different story - more sleep by any means possible!  If you manage to keep it up through bedtime and NWings, that will be a great start.

Hopefully he took a decent nap this afternoon.

You may also want to start waking him by a certain time each day, just to help set his body clock for a similar routine each day.  Hard to do after a bad night I know!

Do you have anyone that can help you for a few nights?  It is so hard on your own.

[abbysmomma]

Nap schmap, what a horrible sleeper. He only slept 40 minutes on his own yesterday, then another 20 minutes on the boob, waking up at 2:20pm. Went down for the night at 7:15pm (fell asleep on the boob again) then woke up again at 9:30pm. Then again at 11pm, 2:15am and didn't fall back asleep until almost 4am, and was up again at 5am where i boobed him until 7:15am. The only good thing about last night was that he stayed in his crib, not fed until 5am. For the nightwakings, i just stayed next to the crib, and patted the bed once in a while and he would eventually sit on his own. If i put him down, he gets really angry and pops back up. The first two nightwakings it only took 1/2 hour or so for him to fall back asleep, but that 2:15am one was brutal. He kept falling asleep (usually holding my hand) then waking back up and starting all over again. It was so hard to watch him try to squeeze through the slats of the crib. Hopefully this night will be better, but he's so tired by the end of the day that he's falling asleep while breastfeeding pretty much every night now for a week. Today he only managed 50 minutes in the car (on our way to a playdate) for a nap. Man, just reading what i wrote sounds exhausting. I don't know how that kid functions on so little sleep. I don't really have anyone to help me at nights as DH really needs to sleep, but he's "on call" with my daughter, so as long as i don't have to worry about two kids, i'll deal with it. Tomorrow i'll stay home for most of the day, so maybe i can work on his nap. I know he's in an overtired cycle, but i really don't know how to break it. Anyways, thanks all - especially londonmama for your help. KDee, i'm definitely going to have to do some form of wi/wo soon, as my presence is definitely a prop.

wish me luck for night 2!

[koe2moe]

wow it's good that you're making progress.  I just want to share my experience with sitting on mattress next to the crib.  I first did the same as you to sit there and then told DS to now get down to sleep.  And like you, he did   and then.. he tried to hold my hand, etc... which in the end was taking too much of his attention me than to relax to sleep.  I then stop extending my hand to hold or let him hold.  I just lay down on the mattress and said the same things.   When he reaches out for my hand, then I let him but otherwise, I just talk to him now and again.  But in the end, I didn't even bother when he fell asleep coz I just settled myself to sleep on the mattress so I don't have to wait till he's deep asleep before I can sneak out and I don't have to wait at all.  I think once or twice I fell asleep before him    He knew I was there and started to relax and the room was totally dark and he wouldn't see whether I was there or not.  Once he's drifting off to sleep, it doesn't matter whether i was there or not. 

[londonmama]

Ugh - I wrote a long reply earlier today, but just looking now I must not have posted it properly.

My main point was similar to what koe2moe is talking about - do you sneak out once he is asleep?  If so, I would probably plan to stay on the mattress all night for at least a few nights, or even a couple of weeks.  Just to make sure that he isn't fighting sleep because he is afraid you will leave.  Once he is okay with being in his cot all night, you can move further away from the mattress, but you do so when he is still awake so that he knows you are moving/leaving.  Maybe you're already staying all night, in which case all you can do is keep it up!

Have you tried any pain meds in case those molars are bothering him?

I wouldn't worrying about boobing to sleep for the nap, at least to get him caught up and get his body used to napping at the same time.  When you are home, do you do a nap routine similar to bedtime routine?  This really worked for us after a couple of weeks.  So he knew what to expect and could wind down.

[Colin Macs Mom]

Hi Aeri!!!!! No advice other than what everyone else has said, just wanted to offer hugs.

[abbysmomma]

Hi all

Jessica!!! long time no talk. Holy, has Colin gotten huge! thanks for the hugs..

last night was better. we had no long jags of crying, but lots of popping up and lying back down crying. i lost count, but i feel more rested. so he must have slept, right?

londonmama, i usually sneak out once he's asleep but will stay after his first night waking (usually 2.5 hours after he's fallen asleep). i gotta get some dishes/next night's dinner done at some point! today, he slept without the boob for nap time, and slept for 1hr10 min on his own! yay! and then i boobed him for another 40 min, which meant he had almost 2 hours nap today. the longest in ages! Fell asleep for the night around 8:20pm after lying happily in his crib for 20 minutes with me next to the crib. he does definitely want the hand, so i'm going to have to stop doing that as well, but in the end, most of the time he falls asleep without my hand. i think he just likes to make sure i don't sneak away.

koe2moe, do you still sleep in the room with him? and has he stopped waking up at night? hmmm, maybe i should get rid of our nightlight too. i really would like to eventually sleep in my own bed, but the mattress beside the crib isn't half bad.

thanks everyone for replying! happy easter all!

[abbysmomma]

Hi

Thought it's time for an update:

Last Friday night, he actually slept from bedtime (8ish) to past 4:30am on his own!!! yay!!! of course, i had to ruin it all by going away for easter weekend and reboobing him all night. but now i know how to fix it, so we're starting over, but not from scratch. thanks everyone!!!

Aeri

[Colin Macs Mom]

Way to go Aeri!!!!!

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