Author Topic: Problem falling back asleep (I think)  (Read 928 times)

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Offline jdarcy

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Problem falling back asleep (I think)
« on: January 06, 2006, 21:14:47 pm »
My 15-week-old DS was sleeping a good 6-hour stretch at night from 6 weeks until he hit his 12-week growth spurt -- he hasn't slept longer than 3 hours at a stretch since then.  Right after the growth spurt he was still up every 2 hours at night; I finally figured out he wasn't hungry at those wake-ups so have not been feeding him between 11 p.m. and 4 a.m. 

Problem is he generally wakes up about an hour after his 7 p.m. night-time feed, and his 10:30-ish feed.  We can usually put him right back to sleep at those times.  He then wakes up fairly regularly at 1:30 a.m. or 2:30 a.m. -- and it takes an hour to get him back to sleep!  So last night he was up at 2:30 a.m. and not back asleep until 3:30 a.m. -- then was up at 4:15 a.m. hungry.  We've been using a pacifier at his bedtime and I started giving him the paci to put him back to sleep during night wakeups.  So last night at the 2:30 a.m. wakeup I waited until it fell out and he did NOT wake up.  So I don't think it's the pacifier -- I think he just wakes himself up as he goes into a new sleep cycle.  He also only takes 30-45 minute naps (3 or 4 a day), and I think it's the same problem of waking up at the end of a sleep cycle.

So ... any advice on getting him to put himself back to sleep when a new sleep cycle happens?  Or any ideas on anything else that could be the problem?

Thanks!

FrasersMum

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Problem falling back asleep (I think)
« Reply #1 on: January 06, 2006, 23:31:10 pm »
Hi jdarcy

Our starting poing is

How does you DS fall asleep at the beginning of the night?  Is he falling asleep independently in his own bed?

Cheers
Jo

Offline jdarcy

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Problem falling back asleep (I think)
« Reply #2 on: January 07, 2006, 00:00:42 am »
Funny you should ask. :-)  During the holidays we had my entire family visiting and with everything so hectic, I accidentally started nursing him to sleep -- I was so crazed I didn't even realize what I was doing until after everyone had left the last day, I nursed him that night and he passed right out.  Whoops.  That was a week and a half ago and since then we've weaned him from nursing to sleep.  At this point, he eats about 30 minutes before bedtime, I read him a story and rock him until drowsy (eyes drooping but still open) then put him in his crib with his pacifier.  He usually squirms around and eventually puts himself to sleep.  But if he starts crying, I pick him up and get him calm and drowsy again and put him back down...

FrasersMum

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Problem falling back asleep (I think)
« Reply #3 on: January 07, 2006, 00:11:25 am »
Hi again

Well it sounds like the problem could be that DS has formed new sleep associations - either with the feeding to sleep (SO easy to do, I know!!  :D ) or possibly the rocking.

Well done for identifying that this might cause a problem and starting to work on changing it.  I would suggest that you keep working on putting your DS into bed more and more awake, (ie less and less rocking).  Yes, it will be a gradual process but it really sounds like he is hitting the end of that first sleep cycle and having trouble transitioning to the next without having help from you.  As he re-learns to fall asleep independently, you should hopefully start to get past that first hour mark, and then the wake ups later in the night, without him needing help from you.

Good luck!
Jo