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May 2012 Moms
kgauntt
member
Tell me how...
kgauntt
member
to get baby on a sleep schedule without using CIO. Not knocking it, just not ready for it. I just don't understand how you are supposed to get them on a schedule this early. I try and put her to bed around 9 and she knows I'm trying to, because she'll squeal until I give up rocking her. She takes a late nap around 6:30 and random 30 min cat naps during the day. Usually about 3-4 of them. It's not easy to stop her from napping when she wants to. Another problem is, unless she has had a certain number of ounces to eat, she will wake up even if I have her down to get in that feeding. I EP, by the way. She usually sleeps until 7 am. Should I wake her up earlier to move up her feedings, or will that just do jack squat?
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Re: Tell me how...
During the day we have not even tried to get them on a schedule. They wake when they want, eat when they cry the "hungry cry", play until they are tired and then nap. Lately they really aren't napping much at all. Every night around 5pm or 5:30pm they start to melt down. They're not hungry, they won't sleep. When they get like that we put them in the bathtub, give them a bottle and rock them until they are sleepy. We lay them down drowsy but awake, and go back every time they fuss a bit. We usually don't have to go back more than twice, but if we do we get them up. I just can't let myself let them cry. We may never get around to CIO. Honestly, they made their own schedule. We just tried the bath one night as a last ditch effort and it worked so we did it again. Now it's routine.
Daytime, though...forget it. They run the house from about 7am-6pm.
Sounds like by 9pm she is overtired when you are trying to put her to bed. When she takes her 6:30pm nap, do you wake her or would she keep sleeping if you let her? You may need to gradully move up the bedtime. Nothing wrong with a 6:30 bedtime! My DS wants to go down at that time a lot and he's a good sleeper for the most part. He will usually sleep until 4:30am. I have missed the window with putting DS to bed too late before and it takes so much longer to get him to sleep. Also try a bath or some other routine so she is cued it's bedtime.
DD doesn't STTN well if she is put to bed before 9:30. We get a good 12 hours (maybe 1 feeding in that time) if she is put to bed later... but I am SAHM for this year, so we've got that luxury. My nephew was overtired. He didn't know how to sleep. They did some of the techniques in Healthy Sleep Habits, Happy Child and are singing it's praises. I think it's mostly about getting them on a routine of morning nap, afternoon nap, nightnap, bed. That way they aren't overtired when the nightcomes and sleep is actually easier then. Kind of like pulling an all nighter in university and then trying to sleep the next day, or jetlag. It's not as easy to sleep when your patterns are thrown off. Not sure if there is any CIO in that book. I think they may have let him CIO for about 5 minutes before getting him.
We were blessed with a good sleeper... but she does nap throughout the day. Ditto trying a routine like bath to indicate nightime. Also, do you have a mobile or fish bubbler? DD likes looking at hers when we put her down for the night. I think it helps relax her.
https://www.sears.ca/product/fisher-price-ocean-wonders-aquarium/616-000080820-L6925?extid=112311_ca_1search_2en_3gogl_4toy_5toy-dynamic_6toys&gclid=CKDlnYKav7ICFQjc4AodL1EAyA
ETA: We don't let DD CIO, but we do let her "Fuss it out"... If she starts crying we pick her up because in her case it usually means she is still hungry. If she is just whining or making little noises in protest, we leave her there with the bubbler on.
I don't wake her up for the 6:30 nap, she wakes up wanting milk. I'm just at a loss as to how to move up her bedtime. One thing I have noticed - she'll have about 20 oz of milk in her around 6:30 and at the end of the day she's usually at 27-30 oz. So, that's about two more feedings (BM) after 6:30 and I really don't have any control over when she eats. That's why I was wondering if I got her out of bed earlier, maybe it would move up her feedings. It just seems cruel and stupid to wake her up so early though. I give her a bath around 7:00 but I guess I could always move that up. However, it seems to do the opposite of calm her down because the bath tub is her playground and she splashes up a storm. I've also tried offering her more milk in one feeding, but she's pretty content at 4 oz. Maybe I could do a dream feed but how does that work if you don't burp them? I don't want her to get a belly ache..
I think that if you want to get your child on some sort of schedule (which will be rather loose at this age) you need to decide when you want to do naps, bedtime, etc. and then build routines around those times. With babies this young the times are going to need to be flexible and you won't get the same results each day but you just need to stick with it. Most babies aren't going to put themselves on any sort of routine. My DS1 (now almost 3) has always been a horrible sleeper and while I attribute a lot of that just to his nature I also think that I was clueless on how to establish good sleep habits and it shows. It took until he was over 1 and weened (I EBF) for him to get on a good sleep schedule and think a lot of that was due to the fact that I didn't teach him how/when to sleep.
Now with my DS2 (4 months and 3 days) he has already fallen into a fairly predicable routine around DS1's schedule but I made an effort early on to actually put him down for naps at the times I wanted him to sleep, it didn't always work but over him he fell into it. DS2 has a morning nap about an hour after he wakes up and then maybe another short morning catnap while we are out running errands or doing whatever activity we have for the day. We come home for lunch and I put DS1 down for a nap at 1:00 every day. I then put DS2 down for a nap. At first he didn't always seem tired at that time but over time he has gotten used to sleeping at that time and it has become routine for him. He is still a cat napper so he usually has another nap in the late afternoon and then we do bedtime for both boys starting at 8:00. Our routine for all sleep times is the same, I swaddle him in his halo sleep sack, turn on his sound machine and rock him for about 5 minutes and he's down. I feed him on demand (EBF) but his feedings are not connected in any way to his sleeping schedule (except the end of day feeding).
I think the most important things are, like I said, decide on a schedule that is age appropriate and works with your life, take feedings out of the sleep equation (find another way to get them sleep), and then just stick with the routine until the baby falls into the rhythm you are looking for. For us, the best way to divorce feeding and sleeping was to get into an EASY routine where we feed immediately upon waking have some awake time then go down for a nap (without nursing first) and then repeating the cycle. GL!!