I love these forums. So much useful information. I've read "The Baby Whisperer Solves All Your Problems", and I don't doubt she could solve all of mine, but I am having so many problems I don't even know where to begin. I know they are all related, but I don't know HOW they are related, and I just can't figure out where to start. I will try to be as brief as possible, thanking everyone in advance for any help they can offer.
Baby is 11 weeks old. Was almost 9 lb when born. I am ebfing him, and things have gone...ok. It is sometimes a struggle. I have overactive letdown,especially on one side, and we struggle sometimes with that. He has never fed for longer than 5-10 minutes at a time (even a really hungry, full feed is 7-8 minutes, always has been. On average, he probably nurses just 4-5 minutes on one side), and rarely from a second side. He is growing fine (90th percentile height 85th percentile weight at 2 mo visit), but the short feeds used to have me always wondering whether he was getting enough to eat. Because of this, I always fed him "on demand". Because of THAT, I think he might have become a snacker. I feel like he's probably old enough and efficient enough at the breast by now to not need to eat any more often than every 3 hours. We have been working on this. He can definitely make it 3 hours between feeds, even we have to work at it occasionally. I'm hoping if I keep on it he will just get used to eating less often and do a better job of eating more at each feeding.
Our second (bigger) problem relates to sleep, namely short naps. When he was very little, he would sometimes take a 1.5-2 hour nap on occasion (accidentally, I am sure) but never at a predictable time. I always figured "it will get better; just tough it out." and didn't try to implement a schedule even though I would have loved to. For the last 3-4 weeks, his naps have been 45-50 minutes on the dot without fail. No longer ones thrown in, ever. And he can't stay up much past an hour for his wake time, sometimes less (this is nothing new). This has led to his having - brace yourself - 6 or 8 sleep cycles (wake time plus naps) every day! Just during the daytime! Not counting his nights! I feel like I'm constantly putting him down for another nap! If I could just get him to sleep a decent stretch, I could work at getting him onto a four nap a day schedule. I would have something to work with, at least.
Night time sleep is better, but definitely not under control. He has always wanted a very early bedtime, like 5:30 or 6:00. I have been working on trying to encourage a later bedtime but we are still all over the place on this one. He is usually up every 3 hours or so during the night until 3:30 (this is the only predictable thing about this baby, that he will wake up at 3:30 every morning), at which time he seems like he wants to be up for the day. I'm sure this has to do with such an early bedtime, but even when I get him to stay up later [last week I woke him up after he thought he had gone to bed for the night (I know when he thinks it is bedtime because he settles in & sleeps past his famous 45 minute intruder) for an additional cycle each night, trying to make for a later bedtime. I was able to get him down at 7:30 or 8:00 and he still woke up at 3:30.] Sometimes he will fidget and chat in bed at this 3:30 time before getting fussy; other times he cries & just wants to get up. He is hardly ever hungry at this time so i think it is just habitual. He will eat, but not take much. If I try to put him back to bed it usually takes a long time to get him to go to sleep. Do I need to try wake to sleep before this 3:30 thing?
I don't doubt that our sleep struggles are at least in part due to accidental parenting. For several weeks, he wouldn't go to sleep unless we walked with him. He would stay awake forever (once I timed it - 2 hours, just staring at us) in our arms, just staring wildly off into space. My husband figured out that he would go to sleep more quickly if you walked laps around the house with him, so that is what we did for a while. We have finally broken him of that habit, but now we have to pat and bounce/jiggle him to get him to go to sleep. He has gotten better about letting himself fall asleep this way, though. He doesn't stare off wildly anymore unless he is still hungry, which makes me think he probably wasn't getting enough to eat in those earlier days when it was such a struggle. I know this is the place for shush pat but I don't know when to start wait until we are more used to the Mommy's-not-a-snack-bar eating every 3 hours schedule?
I am going to try to include an EASY, but it seems almost silly to do so. We have no schedule. No predictability at all. But here goes anyway:
wake up for the day at 5-5:30 after fidgeting on & off since 3:30. Sometimes wakes up for the day at 3:30 or anywhere in between. Awake 1 hr, sleep 45 minutes, awake 1 hr, sleep 45 min....{EASY on & on like this in 45 minute sleep+1 hr wake cycles all day long. He is never tired, hungry, or going down or waking up at the same time.} final EASY cycle before bedtime starts anywhere between 4:30 & 6:00. He goes to sleep for the night anywhere between 5:30 (if he is in charge)-7:30 (if I intervene by waking him hup & adding an EASY cycle to extend bedtime later). He will wake up every three hours (sometimes he'll go four or - rarely - five in the first sleep of the night, between say 6:00 and 10:00) until 3:30, when we start it all over. I have never done a dream feed because I guess I had forgotten about it since raising my older kids.
Whew. Such a mess. So many problems. I hate to unload it all in such a messy heap, but like I said I know it's all related but I just can't figure out how to tackle it. I have been craving a routine all along this process - I just want a predictable way to schedule my day so I can find some special time with my older kids - but I can't dig myself out from underneath all these problems to figure out how to implement one. I did Babywise with my older kids (6 yo twins) and it worked great. They are great sleepers! But I know I don't have it in me to let this one cry it out. I want Baby Whisperer to work for us. I am so tired of flying by the seat of our pants! Please help. And thank you.
