Hi, thanks for your replyes.
Here we go with some more details, starting from the very beginning.
Alexandra was born in the 37 week. She was 2.385 and lost 300grams in the first days what made us to start feeding her every 1-2 hours. After the birth she was diagnosed with a problem in both legs. The doctors told us it's something quite common for babies born early and/or with the cesareum. Because of this problem she had to wear a kind of plastic pillow between her legs until the 4th month, 24 hours a day. all that just to make clear that the start didn't gave us much of advantage... but she was a great baby till the 3th week...
She didn't seem to be very disturbed by this plastic thing, anyway... She didn't cry except for maybe the first day she was wearing it, and now that the doctor said she seems to be perfectly ok, we will have to put the plastic pillow only 12 hours a day for the next month and then never more. Honestly, we hoped that taking the pillow away in the night (she's still wearing it in the day) was going to help her to sleep better, but it doesn't seem to change that much.
Also the lack of weight is almost solved. Now she's almost 5 kilos, and as much as our doctor is always keeping her weight under control, she's developing very good. She's a very active baby, she's very friendly also with new people, she's smiling and playing a lot.
About her daily routine... she's usually waking up in the morning between 7.30 and 8.30. 99% of the time she's in a good mood during the morning, "chatting" with mommy a lot, playing, smiling...
She's having a first nap around 10, for one hour more or less.
Another nap, a longer one, after the lunch hour (around 1 pm till 3 or even 4 pm).
She's having 6 meals a day (eating quite normally). She's eating breast milk, and sometimes the artificial one (if she's with the grandparents, for example).
She's having a last nap around 5 or 6 pm, but usually a very short one (never more than one hour).
And here comes the difficult part...
For the first 2 or 3 months, Alex was usually starting to be very annoying around 8 pm, crying a lot, not enjoying any game, not getting in a better mood even if she was in the arms. We discovered one month ago that the only thing she wanted was to go to sleep, but at 8 pm the house was too much of an exciting place to sleep :-))
We're living in a 3 floors big house: we're at the ground floor in our own apartment, at the 1st floor there are the grandparents (age 50, Davide's parents.. Davide is Alex's father) and in the top floor there's a 3rd apartment (Davide's sister, Chiara, with the husband and a baby 2 month old that is sleeping ALWAYS and EVERYWHERE!!).
So... we were keeping Alex awake with the all of us, we're usually having a big dinner all together, and then spending the evening chatting, with some music or the tv, etc...
One month ago we were in a long vacation in Israel, then we started to put Alex to sleep in 8, 8.30 pm, after the suggestion of a relative. And it was working very, very good in the beginning. This, plus the night meal we were giving her around midnight, made her almost a perfect baby. Funny during the day, and very silent and good in the night. She was going to sleep in 8 pm, eating in 12 pm, then usually waking up around 7 (sometimes before, but not often).
We came back to Italy, around 10 days ago. Everything was supposed to be easier as we had our house, not a vacation house, and it was supposed to be easier also to keep her with the new routine. But it's not as easy...
She's usually starting to be in a bad mood - crying or moaning - around 7.30, 8 pm. We are then trying to put her to sleep but it's taking sometimes even one hour to make to fall asleep. She's totally in the need for sleep: she doesn't want to play and if she's staying awake she's getting more and more difficult. But as we got in to the bedroom, that is usually dark and quiet, she's starting to cry and scream.
More than this, she's waking up now 2-3 even 4 times at night! She can stay awake - screaming to the point that we are almost screaming to back - for an hour or more from 4 in the morning!
Any more details needed? Hope to hear from you soon, we need all the help that we can get!
Tamar and Davide.
