I feel like I'm the only one...
whose baby is not even close to a decent sleep schedule.
He still seems to have his days and nights mixed up, he only wants to sleep in his swing, and wakes up every hour and feeds/fusses for an entire hour before allowing me to put him back down.
I'm cloth diapering and so far have been using prefolds at night. We just ordered some BumGenius for overnight, hoping the drier diaper will help. He also seemed to struggle against the miracle blanket and the sleep sack didn't seem to help. I ordered a new type of swaddler so maybe that will help.
We've also started ensuring he gets a ton of sunlight during the day to switch his cycle and today we attempted to force him to use his crib to nap, but that just resulted in a cranky sleepy baby who didn't ever nap.
Anyone have any other suggestions? Or is this something that I just have to deal with for a bit longer?
Anyone else dealing with this? I get insanely jealous when I read posts that are like "HELP, my baby stays up until 11pm!!!" considering I got only 2 hours of sleep last night--and not consecutively.
Re: I feel like I'm the only one...
Oh dear. Our son doesn't STTN, but he does sleep in 3-5 hour chunks (usually). One thing that we do that I think helps is allow our son to sleep on us for naps during the day if that's the only way he can sleep. Daytime naps are CRITICAL for my son to sleep during the night. If he gets overtired, his night time sleep is totally disrupted. We'll do whatever it takes to get him to sleep during the day. He'll usually sleep in his PNP for naps, but not always. If he won't sleep in the PNP for the nap, then we decide his nap is important enough that he can come sleep on our chests.
Another thing that helps is that we put a light burp cloth or receiving blanket over his head when we're trying to get him to nap. We only do this if we're holding him and it's becoming apparent that we REALLY need to get him to sleep ASAP before he has a meltdown. When he starts to get overtired, he gets overstimulated, and putting the blanket or burp cloth over his face helps him to calm down to go to sleep.
We swaddle for nighttime, and my son sometimes struggles against the swaddle. I put that in the "he doesn't know what's good for him" category, though, because he ALWAYS sleeps better swaddled. We use the summer infant swaddlemes (I think that's what they are) and a Halo sleep sack (make sure you get the right size - we had ones that were too big, and they didn't really work). We sometimes swaddle him during the day for naps, but only in an aden and anais swaddle blanket. We also sporadically use a pacifier. Sometimes he needs it, sometimes he doesn't. Sometimes, I think the pacifier actually keeps him awake. It seems to stimulate him by inducing him to suck, if that makes sense.
For bedtime, we started a schedule a couple of weeks ago in preparation for me going back to work. We try putting our son down at 7pm every night, and there are times when it's earlier (tonight, I put him down at like 6:30). It really seems to be helping. He usually stays awake from 5pm or so until his bedtime, so he's nice and tired (but not too tired) before he goes to bed. If he's overtired and overstimulated, he does a terrible job nursing enough to be full. So, I have to be extra careful to give him lots and lots of time to do his pre-bed nursing session. Otherwise, he won't go to sleep because he's still hungry. By putting him down at 7pm, we actually avoid the evening fussiness that he used to have. He just sleeps right through it.
Good luck! I'm sorry you're having a tough time!
Thanks for all your advice!!
My son won't take a pacifier, we just tried introducing one this week (well we tried three different kind).
Thats interesting about the blanket over his face b/c our son really calms down when we are changing his shirt and it is over his face.
Those swaddleme blankets look very similar to the ones I just bought, so you've given me renewed hope.
I might try the miracle blanket again tonight, just for shizz and giggles. Can't get any worse, right?
This is shot in the dark, but when you put him down is it on a totally flat surface? My LO has been sleeping in the Fisher Price Rock'n Play Sleeper. It has a incline like a car seat. He doesn't have reflux or spit up a lot, but he used to wake up almost instantly if we placed him on a flat surface to sleep like his co-sleeper. We're only now starting to transition him from the RnP. Today he took a two hour nap in the co-sleeper so we're going to try and phase out the RnP.
You could try to let him sleep in his carseat/swing/bouncer and see if that makes for a longer stretch. Or place something under the mattress of the crib/PNP and see if that helps.
6 weeks was the turnaround for us. And it was rough at 5 weeks. From 5-6 weeks he literally was up from 12 am to 5 am every night. It was hard and I sat there crying while I BFed. At 5w6d he literally slept for 7 hours. I woke up in a panic because I thought he was dead. Honestly.
I will say, we tried the Halo, we tried the miracle blanket, we used Aden and Anais blankets - nothing worked. We just got the Swaddlepod (same thing as the Woombie) and it has changed our lives. He does a lot better with his hands resting on his belly, as opposed to his sides, but he still can't wake himself up.
Truly, it will get better. We didn't do anything. We just went with it and he has put himself on a decent schedule. Bed at 10-10:30, wakes up sometimes between 3 and 5, eats and sleeps again until 8 am. Then he takes a morning nap and afternoon nap. We didn't do anything to make this happen - we just waited it out. At 4 weeks, I was thrilled with 3 hour stretches and letting him sleep on me during the day while I rested. It is hard - at 5 weeks I felt defeated and beat down. At 7 weeks I feel like a whole new woman!
Also, we use a white noise machine at night. I haven't got the slightest idea if that is helping or not, but it was recommended to us.
And I do think that using the BG might help. He didn't start going longer stretches as soon as we put him in pockets, but he feels so much drier as compared to the PFs.
One other thing: Have you tried rocking him while you're feeding him? If my son is already upset when he's trying to eat, he gets all flustered and doesn't eat enough. I sometimes have to rock him while feeding him so he's calm enough to get enough food.
Good luck!
You're totoally not the only one. We don't have a routine or pattern to any of our awake or sleep time yet. My boy is 3w3d and while he will take a nap for 1-3 hours during the daytime - our nights are rough. One night a week ago he slept for 6-7 hours straight and I thought I'd hit the lottery. The next few nights after that were 1-2 hour stretches and some nights have been just a restless fit all night long with not much real sleep for either of us. One thing that seems to work to get us a 3-4 hour stretch at the start of the evening is a warm bath. We give him a warm bath at night and he'll be quite content for an hour after the bath and then sleep REALLY well for a few hours. It isn't ideal and the bathtime makes *me* tired, too... but it seems to work for us.
Wishing you lots of luck in finding some sleep...and a good routine that works for y'all.
I've read these 5 S's and I think I'll watch the dvd b/c I haven't gotten anywhere with them.
Which swaddling blanket do you use?
We have a white noise machine (well, an air purifier). I'll try the swaddle pod if the new swaddling blankets don't work. My boy is big though (already near 11lbs) so a lot of these swaddling blankets won't work soon.
Yes! He hates being flat on his back. We currently use the PNP at night, but with all his moving and grunting we were hoping to transition to the crib so I could squeeze every minute out. The PNP is slightly inclined, but you are the second person to recommend the RnP so I might try that if I get desperate.
I don't really want to bring the swing into the bedroom as we don't have a ton of room, and he hates his bouncer and car seat so who knows!
Although I hate to read that you are in a similar situation it does give me hope that I'm not doing something wrong as a mother to hear another person in the same situation!
Our LO really likes the bath, but so far it hasn't helped with sleeping.
Good luck to you!
I'll add a few of our tricks - maybe one will work for you...
-We used to swaddle LO's legs. Since he always broke his arms out anyway, this kept his lower body still. We also put a small rolled blanket on either side of his body to reduce the vastness of the crib. He was super cranky last night and I didn't have a swaddle blanket so I did this with two larger blankets - knocked him right out.
-Like pp did with the light blanket, I will cover LO's eyes when I put the pacifier in his mouth and hold it there for a few minutes. This cuts down on stimulation for him.
-A Sleep Sheep set on the heartbeat sound always works.
-I know newborns aren't supposed to understand routines/schedules, but we've definitely tried to do the same thing every night at the same time - bathtime to calm him, then bedtime lotion and PJ's, then a big bottle in our bed. Even if it takes an hour, I try to make sure he drinks a full 4oz now. We use a little bit of Target's nighttime lotion on his feet and a tiny bit on his belly.
-I read somewhere that afternoon light helps infants sleep better at night (no idea why...) so I try to take him out for a walk in late afternoon.
Hope you've found something to help you and your LO!
We used the summer infant swaddleme but Kassia busted out of those (i think her torso was too long for them). We are trying the halo sleepsack swaddle now and it is working much better. If you do the 5 s's I would get a white noise machine. We have the cloud b sleep sheep and the dex sound sleeper. I also have heard people mention gripe water (spelling?) but I do not know if that works.
LOL! Thats what I did the other night! I have an amazon cart filled with different options just waiting for the next one to fail...
No advice - you sound well informed.. and everyone gave good advice and what I would say.
Just wanted to give support- when I am up for the 4th time in 1 night, I always think of my DD leaving home. With a total tool. In a band. With nipple piercings. And then I don't mind the night wakings so much. I kind of want to freeze time... Just keep perspective mama!! This will soon pass. And we'll miss it in a weird twisted way.
LOL! I like your perspective
Exactly, hope everyone experiences the turnaround... just when I thought it would never get better - suddenly LO slept for 6 hours in the night! It's not every night but most, and makes mama very happy.
I just want to add that we also a small rolled blanket on either side of Sebastian's body after we swaddle him and it works every time. I discovered this neat little trick when we had Sebastian at children's last weekend for his surgery. The nurses had his crib like this. Of course I held him non stop until after the surgery and i thought it looked weird. (They had 4 small rolled blankets shaped into a rectangle and then another blanket on top of it). After his surgery they wheeled him back in and he slept like that for 4 hours. I tried it again later that day and at night and thought it might just be the effects of the surgery but nope-tried it at home last week and been doing it ever since. Getting 3-4 hour stretches each night. Sebastian was born on the 30th so they are the same age. Good luck!
This is so true... I am firm believer in good sleep begets good sleep!!!! Even my DD who is almost 4 sleeps better at night when she takes a good nap during the day!
The bumpie formerly known as First Time in MI