My dear friend M, one of the gentlest, kindest, most compassionate souls I know, is having a really rough time with her daughter E, who will be two in May.
It sounds like E is pretty much ruling the roost with her sleep. She is up for the day at like 4.30am, with a couple of NWs. Trouble is, if she gets at all upset she will start banging her head really hard against the cot - hard enough that she'll have a big bruise that lasts for days. Which of course M finds really upsetting and goes to her because she feels like she can't leave her to brain herself on the cot!
At the moment M is sleeping on the floor in E's room - because her older son was being woken all the time and getting upset at E's distress.
She goes for a nap at 1pm every day - it could be anything from 45 mins to 2 hours. Sometimes she goes straight to sleep, other times she insists on having M stay with her.
M is in a bad state. She is going on two years of disturbed sleep now and six months of 4.30-5am wakings. She's feeling resentful and overwhelmed. She's trying to set up a business and super busy so since she had typed out a bunch of stuff to me I said I would post here for her and come back with questions, and maybe she'll join the thread later...
Here's what M sent me:
"So, she started waking up in the summer we let self-settle, which she did sometimes, but woke up again half an hour later, & then it just got progressively worse & earlier & she would just cry forever & not give up, & be absolutely totally beside herself (like beyond redemption). I had to go in to her to try get her to calm down. A week of that and it upsetting Dyllon so much, I had to pull the plug on trying to get her to self-settle & would bring her through to our room to try calm her & at least be able to let us all have some sleep. Then I started staying with her in her room to get her back to sleep, to get her out the habit of being in our room. She'd wake up, & I'd lay next to her cot on the floor - it worked for a bit, but then even putting her down at night or for naps during the day, I'd have to stay with her till she was asleep. Then the wakings at random times stopped but the early rising started...she would wake for the day sometimes 5.30, sometimes 6, but it always got earlier & earlier...till eventually since beginning December, 2 or 3 times at night again. She has had colds on and off, and beginning December seemed to have a cold virus, which kinda explained the waking up, but it hasn't stopped.
She'd wake up & I'd try the stay with her till she fell asleep thing, but then would wake up again & I'm not there, so start screaming again, and as soon as I went in, she'd lay down and go back to sleep. I got so tired of getting up and going through, I just set up spare mattress so I could at least try sleep inbetween the wakings...
But she still wakes up and goes mental if you don't get her out her cot now....like going mental & harming herself in the cot even if I'm there in the room with her. Also if I'm not.
I've been to the docs soooo many times (at least 15!!!!) cos I just find it really hard to believe that there can't be something wrong with her, the way she goes off sometimes (mothers intuition?), but they cannot find a thing wrong with her, other than a cold. I can tell when she's in pain, and maybe when it's not so much bad pain, but something niggling her.
That's why, my only conclusion is that she just cannot deal with pain, she doesn't have the temperament others do, and that I have become her sleep aid, in trying to do the training with her?
Interested to hear what you think....
I really feel like I'm being held hostage too, and I don't want you to think bad of me for saying this, but it's making me really 'hate' her (obviously I love my baby deeply, but the way she is is making me feel really bitter and angry about the situation - it's very hard to be loving and understanding when you gave this never ending crap to deal with every freaking night.
The weird thing is, I know she can self settle! Most nights (99%) I put her to bed awake and let her go to sleep, which she does just fine. Other nights she'll have a bee in her bonnet and kick off and only go to sleep if I'm there."
