Please tell me it gets better
It has really been a rough week and I am feeling pretty defeated/down. ?It started with the MIL issues, and DD has continued to have a tough time. She needs a lot of sleep (that 1-2 hours of wakefulness - she's more along the lines of 1 hour at a time, max). However, she is fighting sleep like never before, and only sleeps for 15 minutes if I put her down, versus 3-4 hours if I have her in the Ergo. When she's awake, she has about 10 minutes of cheerful, and then it dissolves into tears. ?It takes me about an hour to get her to sleep and if she wakes up too early from a nap, takes me another hour to get her back to sleep. ?I feel like all I am doing is walking/rocking her to get to sleep, feeding her, and holding her while she sleeps while sitting absolutely still in a dark room to make sure she gets quality sleep. She's not doing as well at night either as she was before, although that's much better than her naps. ?I have memorized HSHHC, but nothing is working well.
I am so tired of doing nothing with her but getting her to sleep. ?I miss playing with her and interacting with her (I try to keep stimulation to a minimum when I'm trying to get her to sleep). DH comes home, gets the fun part, and I do 90% of the work helping her sleep. ?I am feeling resentful and down. ?I should feel grateful that the first 7 weeks were as easy as they were, but now I feel less able to handle the difficult parts.?
Tell me this is just a stage she's going through and that it will get better. ??
Re: Please tell me it gets better
I'm sorry you're having a tough time.
At that age I liked Happiest Baby on the Block
Swaddling helped us.
Sounds like a phase. I'm sure things will get better.
It's definitely just a stage and will end at some point...but if feels like an eternity when you are going through it! We had a lot of sleep issues in the beginning. For a good couple months, DD slept in her swing because it got everyone a full nights sleep.
I had to tell DH that I needed a little time to myself everyonce it in while. It helped me cope when things were difficult. Even if it were a 1/2 hour or so, it really helped me deal with the tough times. It refreshed me and made things so much more bearable!
Good luck - you'll get through it!
it will eventually get better; definitely be sure to have time to yourself, when your DH comes home, go outside for a walk by yourself (or w/ dog if you have one), go to the grocery store. I remember going to Giant on Sundays was something I looked FWD to all week long while on ML.
my DD still fights sleep so I don't have much advice for you on that, have you tried white noise (radio tuned to the very end where all you hear is static)? or music?
Maybe she's sleeping too much, or, needs longer naptimes?
I'm just throwing that out there... I can imagine how frustrated you are. So, I hope it gets better soon!!!!!
Ditto Jenn. At that age I did whatever I could to get my baby to sleep- swing, swaddling, white noise, wearing him in the moby or sling, etc.. I was determined to make him a good sleeper and so far (knock on wood!) he's has been. There were definitely a lot of days that he fought it and it was tough. At some point after 3 months, his naptimes became more predictable and he was down to 3 naps a day. When he dropped the 3rd nap, I was overjoyed since that meant I could run errands in the late afternoon (I rarely have him miss a nap at home in his crib unless it's for a good reason). Now, his naps are like clockwork usually: 9 am and 1 pm, for 1.5-2.5 hours (usually 2 hours though). I also followed alot of the advice in HSHHC and Happiest Baby on the Block.
Hang in there, it does get easier (and I'm sure your efforts will pay off)!