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I really need some help ladies........
Ladies, I really need some help here. I cannot for the life of me figure out how to really get a routine going and how to put my 3 month old daughter on some type of schedule. I just started back to work this week from being off on mat leave for 3 months and we still have no schedule as far as a nighttime routine goes. My daughter just cat naps through the day and plays and eats whenever. Sometimes she stays up with DH until midnight! This is insane. I realized that I should have probably started a routine while on leave but we just got so used to doing whatever she wanted and following her and being too laid back about things, and now its starting to bite me in the butt!!!!
How do I start? She still is bedsharing with us which I dont like just because I cant really get a restful sleep when she is right up under me. I wish she would sleep in her own crib. We are getting baby monitor this weekend so we can try to start the transition to the crib. Any ideas how I can make this transition? She starts daycare next week and we need to try to get things moving now.
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Re: I really need some help ladies........
I was in your boat. We did not have a routine AT ALL when DS started daycare at 3 months. He did not have a napping schedule, and he did not really have a set nighttime sleep schedule. I assumed that he was too young to really have much of a schedule and did the same thing as you -- he slept when he was sleepy and he ate when he was hungry.
I found that DS naturally developed his own schedule almost as soon as he started daycare. The sleep schedule was the first to come -- within the first few days, he started getting very sleepy everyday at about 7:00 or 7:30 and we started putting him to bed then. He started waking up at the same time every day very quickly, too.
Napping took a lot longer -- it seems from the stories here that almost all babies have difficulty napping in infant rooms at daycare. (It *really* worried me. He was never a good napper in the infant room, so if your DD doesn't nap well, don't fear that she never will.)
I'd start with trying to get a good bedtime routine. Try to do the same thing every night, in the same order. When DS was your daughter's age, we nursed at 6 pm, played for about an hour, had a bath, changed to jammies and nursed again. Then lights off and in the crib with a sound machine on. I answered your post about bedsharing on the AP board, but we started DS off for the night in his crib and then brought him to bed with us when he needed to eat in the middle of the night. He never had any issues with it. A 3 month old is a lot more adapatable that you might think.
Have you read the No Cry Sleep Solution? It has great tips for getting into a routine. It helped us a lot when DS was about 9 months old, but a lot of the tips would have been very helpful from 4 months on.
Ha. I had no routine. At 10.5 months old, DD is only now getting one from us. My sister, who is my daycare, gave her a routine.
As for the crib, I'd start putting her down at night there, then bring her in with you after a waking, and slowly work towards putting her back in her crib after each waking.
To be honest, I don't think it's the end of the world if your baby doesn't have a routine. She's only 3 months old, there's plenty of time to make changes.
1st off - take a deep breath and know that a routine will happen. Neither of my girls were on much of a routine at all at this age and I really think that at 3 months, you will start to see more of routine from your baby start to form. Make sure daycare keeps good notes on the timing of things (when she eats, when she goes down for her nap and for how long). I think both my kids were on 3 naps at this point but I don't remember how old they were when they went to 2 naps but it was over 6 months of age I think (the things we forget with time). I know both my kids were pretty much STTN or getting up 1 time a night at 3 months (and by STTN I mean 10-12 hoursa night).
I would start with a nightime routine. Read your baby as you know her best as what time really works for her to go to sleep. Both my girls were early birds and were down for the night between 6:30 and 7 at that age. Move backwards from there on what you need to get done with baby each night - bath (does not have to be every night, we do every other for the most part), eating, etc. We have always read stories as the last thing (other than going potty once trained) as it calms them down but doens't put them sleep like eating does and I always put my girls into the crib awake.
As far as moving to the crib - given that naps will be in a crib at daycare, that will really help. You just have to stay strong and know that at first, it might take going into the room a lot each night to calm your child down. Try not to give in and bring her bakc to your bed as that will cause you to have to start the whole process again. Go in, rub her back, talk to her and tell her she is OK. Try to not get into a habit of rocking her to sleep unless you don't mind having to break another habit later on. Sleep training such as getting her to learn to fall asleep on her own is key. Its OK for her to fuss some at this point, I'm not saying CIO although I let my girls CIO at this age but never for longer than 10 mins (which neither ever went past at that age so I never had to go back in). With my girls, my going back in often just ,made the whole situation worse but every child is different. If you child still swaddles, swaddle her in the crib.
Good luck and know that a routine will start to fall in place now and that you will spend the next 18 or so years adjusting that routine as your child grows.