I have multiple sleep issues with Bram, and always have. As background, Bram is 3yrs 4 month is an independent sleeper, who sleeps in a blackened out room with a sound machine. He has a lovey but was weaned from the paci about 4 months ago. From day 1, he's been an awful night sleeper. Always. Awful.
One of my concerns is he takes at least an hour to fall asleep every night. Sometimes it can be as long as 2 hours. It has been this way since day 1. As a newborn, he didn't fall asleep at night ( I'd rock him, bounce him, nurse him, wear him for literally 1-3 hours to get him to sleep at night), as an infant, toddler and little boy, it has always taken him ages. I thought that would stop when he dropped the nap, but even on nnd, he still takes at least an hour to fall asleep.
We have a solid bedtime routine. We've tried it all. Looooong WD, short WD, no TV, yes TV, no bath, yes bath, food log, sleep log, probiotics, sitting with him and trying to soothe him...you get the idea. however, we have not tried melatonin, our pediatrician isn't a fan, and really, I'm hesitant as well. So, as you can imagine, with dropping the nap, it is near impossible to get him to fall asleep at a reasonable time and his day usually ends up being at least 12-14 hours. I know the suggestion is when dropping the nap to keep the day to 11hrs max, so we've tried to put him down really early to get him to sleep by the 11hr mark, but A) it's just not a sustainable option (we need a 9.5-10hr day...not an option) B) it still takes him ages to fall asleep. I honestly don't think he is ever going to be a 12+hr a night sleeper.
So, I guess what I'm asking is, do you think that this is indicative of a sleep disorder? We also deal with confused arousal at night. I know that this is usually due to OT, but I can't MAKE him fall asleep, so then we end up with about 3 confused arousals at night where he wakes up crying/screaming (the intense high pitched screaming also happens when we have wake him from his nap during the day. This high pitched screaming also lasts for at least 30 minutes, not matter what we offer him to try and snap him out of it). We've been through a severe NT phase with DS1, and DS2 is much more aware than we saw with DS1 NT. The confused arousals with DS2 often last upwords of 30-40 minutes, he's not consolable, he's very physical, he communicate a little with us, and he remembers the events the next morning.
We are completely grasping at straws and are prepared to pay out of pocket for a sleep study at this point, but we're just not sure if it's the right solution. What if it's one of the random times he actually sleeps through the night?! They'll think I'm a nut! For the first time since his birth, I am going back to work next week, and 3 years of sleep deprivation has been tough, but I can't imagine working with the sleep debt I've wracked up.
I'm open to tweaking advice too. Our day looks like this.
7am: this can be as early as 630 or as late as 8:00
1:30- nap, however, he usually skips it. He has quiet time though from 130-3. If he does fall asleep, I limit the nap to 1hr at most. *one day last week we allowed him to sleep as long as he'd like thinking maybe he's just ridiculously OT, but the night was horrific. He took 2 hours to fall asleep. Was up every hour, then a loong NW from 330-5, and went back to sleep until 830.
BT: 7:00 NND we aim for 7, nap days we aim for 8. With the long time it takes him to fall asleep, he's very very VERY rarely ever asleep before 8, often it's 9-930.
His best nights happen when he has a random very short car nap of 30ish minutes. He still takes about an hour or more to fall asleep, but he sometimes will sleep through the night or his NW will be more brief, and less frequent.
Holy Moly, that was a book.
