At my wits end

christinasullie37 · July 2013

I'll try to keep this short and sweet but here it is another post about sleeping issues. LO has been sleeping in her own crib since three months and until about 2 months ago has been sleeping well through the night, despite the fact that she rarely take a nap. She started crawling and getting in her first couple of teeth at about 7.5 months old. Since that time sleeping through the night has stopped. In fact she never wants to go to bed. We tried it all and finally broke down and bought the Ferber book about CIO. While I not 100% ok with it, I have run out of options. Well we have been doing CIO for a week now and I am ready to give up. SHe cried so hard the third night she barfed.

We make sure the evenings are not to stimulating, stick to the same routine we have always had and yet, she struggles every time. What's worse is bed time is getting later and later each night and she is waking up earlier each day. She has become very agressive as well. Last night she sat in the highchair slamming her sippy cup down and growling at me and when I tried to take the sippy away she threw it at me. Last week we were at a friends house who's son is the same age as she (and she is used to being around him). She wants to be picked up yet put down immediately. She hates being in the carseat, high chair, jumperoo, etc. I noticed yesterday she now has circles under her eyes.

I don't know what to do anymore and I am beginning to suspect that we could possibly be dealing with something much bigger. Hubby and I fight non stop out her and this issue, though not in front of her and I am to the point that some days I don't evern what to pick her up from my mom's house. I send DH instead. I put a call into the pedi this morning but he has yet to call back. Any advice?

cedenton · July 2013

You said she doesn't nap. Since working on bedtime isn't working maybe try working on naps first, instead. Maybe that will help with bedtime.

Do you have a white noise machine? Do you follow a loose schedule?

Try putting her down twice/day - morning 2-3 hrs after wakeup, afternoon 3 - 4 hours after wakeup from 1st nap and then bed 4-5 hrs after wakeup from 2nd nap. Dark room (do you have blackout curtains?), white noise machine, etc. Maybe give her a lovey.

You may have to do ferber for naps to. If she doesn't fall asleep after 30-45 minutes with regular check-ins, try again for the next nap or for bedtime. On the weekends when I'm home DS usually goes down for a nap immediately following a bottle in the rocking chair.

I usually know right around when he's ready for a nap when he starts fussing for no apparent reason and/or rubbing his eyes.

I don't know if any of this will be helpful, but I hope things improve for you.

ETA: I'm sure you've tried Motrin/Tylenol, but just putting it out there if you think it's teething related. Perhaps a pedi visit is warranted at this point. Maybe she has an ear infection that isn't presenting traditional, i.e. fever and ear pulling.

christinasullie37 · July 2013

I forgot to ask about the motrin at her 9 month appointment last week and will ask about it today when I talk to the pedi. We do all of the things you mentioned before and my mother is good about keeping to the schedule during the day. I think part of the problem is she lets her nap, when she does decide she wants to nap in the swing, which by the way is too small for her. I have asked her repeatedly not to let her nap in the swing, I have given her the book to read, and have asked her to follow it.

We were just at the pedi last week so I know there is not infection. Thanks!

We will just keep on pluggin away. I mean it can't get any worse.

cedenton · July 2013

I think I'd have to have a serious, "sit down" conversation with my mother. She needs to know this is a serious issue that is affecting the health of your family.

I might even threaten to find other care for her if it comes to that (unless she absolutely knows you can't/won't do that).

ballstar · August 2013

I highly recommend reading a book called "The 90-Minute Baby Sleep Program." It talks about how babies have very specifically timed awake cycles and how missing the cues that those are ending and not putting the baby down at the end of their cycle makes putting the baby to sleep hard, and leads to a sleep-deprived baby.

My LO slept through the night from 3 mos. to 6 mos. and then started waking up once a night. Naps and bedtime were all over the place regardless of what we tried. Since reading the book 2 weeks ago, we've unraveled some mysteries, including why she would want to take a "nap" at 5:30 pm, wake up at 6:30 pm, and then be ready to go to sleep again before we could even do dinner and a bath—she was trying to go to bed for the night, and the 6:30 pm wakeup was essentially a "MOTN" wakeup!

Now, her naps are longer; her bedtime is earlier; on great days it takes 5 mins. to put her down, on "bad" ones when we miss the cycle there's no guesswork as to when the next best time to try will be; her sleep schedule is like clockwork most days and can be measured in multiples of 90 minutes.

Definitely worth a shot! Good luck!

ballstar · August 2013

Just wanted to add that the book's author mentions that sleep training is useless on a sleep-deprived baby—the baby wants sleep, but he or she is way overtired, so CIO and other methods just exacerbate the problem by piling on more fatigue. She says and that you need to fix the sleep deprivation problem first.

tamararachel2 · August 2013

You might not be for it, but have you tried laying your LO in your bed with you when it's time for her nap/bedtime? We do that with DS2 because that's the only way to get him to sleep. We will lay there with him sometimes singing, sometimes really quiet and once he's out we move him to his crib. Now every night he doesn't stay in his crib all through the night, but he does sometimes. When he wakes in the middle of the night, if he can be comforted and fall back asleep that's great. If not, he goes in our bed and DH and I both get sleep as well as our LO. We had sleep issues, but we had to do what worked for us.

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