Where did my baby go?

[Colin Macs Mom]

Well that's good!! 

A lot of LOs have their longest A time at the end of the day, before bed, but not all. My DS does his longest in the middle of the day. You just have to try different things and see what works best!

[nursekat]

ok, I don't know what's going on anymore.    She was sooo great at sleeping through the night since she was 5 weeks old!  Now she wakes up so much it's not even funny - I feel like I did when she was first born.  I'm back to having phantom baby issues again!!    Anyway, going back to the 3hr EASY didn't help any, in fact she's often eating twice in the night.  I can usually put her back down when she wakes, but after an hour or two of waking every 20 mins she loses it and needs to eat, so I know she's hungry and it's not that she's just waking.  So I'm thinking pushing her to a 3.5 or 4 hr easy might help (in that she might eat more per feed??), but she has trouble staying awake longer than an hour still.  The weird thing is that if we have a day out and about she won't sleep, and she does just fine skipping an entire nap.  So I know she can do it.    I'm also gearing up to wean the swaddle and paci, which is hard to get motivated to do when you're already sleep deprived.    Oh I miss those beautiful nights.  I don't do well on little sleep at ALL. 

[Colin Macs Mom]

I know what you mean,  I don't do well without sleep either. I need a lot of sleep - 9.5 hours a night would be ideal for me. HA! That might happen again once DS moves out. But anyway I understand, all too well!

Most LOs are ready to move to a 4 hour EASY around 4 mo., and if she's acting like she can't stay awake longer than an hour, I think it's time to make that change. If you think a 3.5 would be better to start with then that's fine too!

[nursekat]

thanks, ladies.

I feel like I'm looking at a ton of different variables and I'm not sure which one to mess with!  I will leave the swaddle be for now.    She's a wiggler, so I'm sure it helps.  Thanks, stacy.

On her 3 hr EASY, she could only make it awake for one hour and sleep for two.  So she slept for three 2hr naps, and one 45min catnap...total of 6.75 hrs a day.  Then she would sleep 12 hrs at night, occasionally with one night feed.  So...at 4mos I tried slowwwly stretching to a 3.5hr EASY, but by the end of the day she would show all sorts of signs of being overtired, and then she started with night wakings.  So I went back to the 3hr routine since she was born a month early and I was worried maybe I was pushing her too early.  Also, when I stretch to a 3.5, we have trouble in the evening.  She wakes at 45mins during her 3rd nap, and by then it's dinner time so it's almost impossible to get her to extend to a full long nap, and if I get her up after 45mins she's cranky, doesn't catnap well, doesn't go down well, etc. 

I am suspicious of the paci now, just because she is waking up bunches of times as opposed to once or twice to eat...previously if she woke up, it was obvious she was hungry and I'd feed her and put her down.  Now when she wakes up, she's kind of half awake and crying and I can shh/pat her back to sleep but then she's awake in 20 minutes and will keep doing this until I feed her.  So I never know if I should just feed her the first time she wakes or try to coax her to sleep longer (sometimes she'll go another hour before she wakes again).  I do think, regardless of the above, that she is starting to get dependent on the paci as she has it in when she wakes up more often than not now, and there have been times she's woken at odd intervals and falls right back asleep when I pop it in.  So I'm reading up on it and bracing myself to start that whole thing.  I just worry about stretching her A times and doing the paci thing at the same time - her paci really helps when I'm keeping her awake a little longer than she'd like to be!

Thanks!!! 

[nursekat]

Ok, just wanted to post how yesterday went.  She actually did really well and did all her A times for 1.5hrs and took three 2 hr naps and one 20min catnap.  It was suprising that she was able to do it after I had gone back to a 3hr easy, but I guess all that work a few weeks ago to stretch her to a 3.5 hr easy paid off??  Anyway, her last long nap was not so great, as she woke at 45mins and then woke every 10-15mins after that.  But then she was exhausted after her next A time (and not showing signs of being overtired), and went down well for her catnap.  We kept it short because when she does the 3.5hr easy, her last nap is already well into the evening.  So after a 20min catnap, we woke her, did her bedtime routine, and she went down easily.  HOWEVER, she woke at 45mins and it took us an hour to get her back to sleep!!  I think it was about 9:45pm before she fell asleep.  So she was a bit overtired - that's what she does when she's overtired.  She'll wake up and stay awake - she refuses to close her eyes no matter what we do!

Stacy, I also tried your suggestion via pm to give an extra few ounces of ebm after she bf.  She slept until 2:30am last night - which is the longest stretch she's done in quite a while!  Then she slept until 6:30am, when she woke just wanting her binkie.  Then again at 7:00.  Then again at 8:00 when I got her up to start the day.  So it'll be nice to wean that binkie.

SO this is my plan of action, tell me what you think - I would like to get her used to the 3.5hr schedule for a couple of days (should I go longer?), giving her an extra bottle of ebm at bedtime, and then start weaning the paci.  Stacy I know you also suggested not to wean the swaddle now, but what about switching to an aussie swaddle?  I'd like to have it so she could suck on her hands if she wants to.  Just a thought. 

thanks in advance. 

[Colin Macs Mom]

Personally I would give her more than a few days on the 3.5 hour. Sounds like she takes a bit of time to make adjustments. I would also go with the Aussie swaddle. I'm glad that things are getting better!

[nursekat]

So do you two ladies recommend waiting to wean the paci until she's adjusted to the 3.5 or should I just go ahead and start the gradual wean now?  It's easier to extend her A times if I can sit with her the last 15mins with a paci and spend quiet time with her that way.

[nursekat]

Good deal on the ebm!! If you were a milk factory you could top up at bedtime with it and dream feed with one and probably really maximize your night!!

Oh yeah forgot I was going to reply to this part too.    I can express about an extra 2oz during the day, so that's what I gave her last night.  However, she sucked it right down and prob could have taken more, so I'm toying with the thought of adding a little formula to the ebm.  Not sure about that one, tho.  Still warming up to the idea.    And she has never had a DF - when we first tried doing it, she wouldn't wake up enough, or she'd wake up all the way (she's a bit spirited) and it would be hard to get her back down.  She started sleeping 12 hrs without the df so we dropped it.  Plus, I tend to go to bed right after she does, so I'd rather just wake whenever she does than set an alarm to do the DF.  Is this the wrong idea?   

She has not used the paci during A time for about 6 weeks now - we have pretty much strictly used it for naps and nighttime since she was 3mos.  I just started using it recently when I was extending her A times as she'd get a little cranky towards the end, and using it for wind-down time anyway.

[Colin Macs Mom]

I'm with Stacy. I would get it to sleeping time only and then go from there. And don't be afraid to be creative either. With my DS we took it away cold turkey and he didn't even notice for about 3 days. Then all of a sudden it was like he remembered and boy was he mad!    So then we reintroduced it but in the crib only. And to this day he gets it for sleeping only, he knows that and it's not an issue at all. The paci never became a prop to him again after that.

I'm not saying that you should do the same thing necessarily, but think about your DD and what sort of kid she is, KWIM?

[nursekat]

So I'm going to lose this baby weight after all - the easiest thing to distract her (other than her paci) during the last stretch of her A time is to go for a walk with her in the carrier so she can watch and giggle at the dog the whole time.  We pretty much have done everything in the house there is to do by the end of her A time (she's at a very-much-needing-to-change-activities-every-10-mins stage), so going for a walk is the best thing.  I'm so out of shape! 

So, no binkie during A time now.  But to clarify - should I get her settled in her 3.5hr routine before taking it away during S times?

[nursekat]

Oh, I would put it off indefinitely if it were up to me!   

I pulled it out after she fell asleep today...we'll see how that goes over...so far so good.  Man, she had it in there tight, though!

Stacy, I read in the props page that you had a pretty successful paci wean...did you do it gradually?  Sorry this is in the wrong thread, but what did you do exactly?  She puts herself down with the paci in, so I'm usually not in there during her different stages.  Is it ok for me to just go in after 5 mins and take it out?  Or should I sit there and watch her to take it out?

[nursekat]

Well, after yesterday evening I decided to hang on to the binkie a little longer...

Again, we had the problem with her third long nap of the day...her 45-min mark was at 5:30pm, and she didn't want to go back to sleep, and was super cranky that evening.  She did a 30min catnap, then we did our bedtime routine (including an extra bottle of ebm) and she went to sleep GREAT at 7:30pm.  So...we thought we were sitting pretty...only she woke at her 45min mark - 8:15pm, and didn't fall asleep until 10:30pm!!  Oh, I had a little bit of a meltdown last night...I don't do well with little sleep at all.  What makes them do that??

The good part of it was she only woke up ONCE at 4am for a feeding.  She slept until 7:30am, and really just wanted her binkie and go back to sleep.  But I got her up...she wasn't happy about that.  AND, she managed to stay awake 1hr 45mins for her first A time!!  After she got past her 1hr mark, she was great and so I just waited until she looked tired again.  Then with a little break at her 45min nap mark, she made it to the 4hr mark...I had to wake her up...maybe she's already ready for 4hrs??  That suprised me a little bit.  She did 1 hr 40mins for her second A time just fine.  We'll see how this evening goes - cross your fingers.  I definitely think the extra bottle could be a huge part of the solution, though!  I noticed she slept from 4am on without her binkie, so maybe that's not as much of the problem as hunger is...

[nursekat]

Since I have your attention, ladies...

She is still waking late in the evening, as if she is treating her bedtime as a nap.  She wakes 45mins to 1hr, then doesn't want to go back to sleep until 9:30-10:30pm.  I've noticed that her first A time of the day is the hardest (and thus usually the shortest), so I'm thinking she's doing the extending her night time deal with her first nap that I've read about elsewhere...and so her 12 hour "day" is like from 9:30a to 9:30p...what are some good ways to fix that?  Or do you have other ideas on why she's doing this in the evening?

Two night feeds last night, but those were the only times she woke up, so we're getting there.  The two nights before that were just one waking, so I'm optimistic.  Slowly but surely!    She is doing really well on her new routine, too!!

[nursekat]

Oh yeah I had another thought (sorry for incessantly bugging you):

Does shortening the catnap sometimes work?  I let her do a full 45mins and wonder if that is too much...like maybe 30mins?  Just to make her a little extra tired at bedtime so she doesn't wake 45mins later?

[nursekat]

She seems undertired, just by looking at her - usually if she's overtired her body is just wiggling out of control and she's making weird noises.  When she wakes and stays up until 9:30, she is cooing and babbling and doing everything she can to get me to play with her!  Also, we had a church class the other night so she was awake almost an hour (!!) more than she normally is (can't sleep in the nursery - spirited!), and she conked out with no other wakings until 4am.  So I will try the shorter catnap, or bumping the catnap up a teensy earlier and see what that does...

Thanks, Stacy!!!