Micro Preemies
davekotschessa
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Will our beautiful micro-preemie EVER sleep?
davekotschessa
member
Hi folks! My wife is not much of a forum person, so of course I am posting this on both our behalf.
Our gorgeous, beautiful baby boy was born almost a year ago, at 25 gestational weeks. He spent 3 months in the NICU.
We have not had even a half night's sleep since!
We've read every manual, book, website in existence, from attachment parenting (which we think is more our style) to the books that tell you that you're a horrible person if you don't have a routine and a strict schedule and that you're supposed to lock your baby in his room until he cries himself to sleep.
On the "cry it out" end of the spectrum, we (reluctantly) tried for up to a week and up to 2 hours of not picking him up and just checking in occasionally. He writhed and screamed the whole time while we were wide awake feeling horrible, before he managed to throw up his dinner forcing us to pick him up. (Nice loophole you found there, buddy!)
No matter which extreme we take, our little guy still wakes frequently, sometimes as much as every half hour between 1 and 5 AM. (You know, the time when we've actually start sleeping ourselves).
There is nothing medically wrong with him. There is no more reflux. He is not hooked up to anything or on any medications. He is the cutest baby in the entire world (no bias here) and super intelligent (no bias here either) and curious and playful. He's almost crawling (doing army crawl with some leg assistance). He gets occupational therapy, passed his 8 month evaluation, and has swimming and music lessons. He is a happy, giggling (although sometimes very whiney) little boy.
He is too old for swaddling (it didn't work anyway). Schedules don't matter. He never could keep a pacifier in his mouth. Routines don't make a difference. Even if we take him to bed and he is literally sleeping on top of me or my wife, he still wakes and cries for no reason that we can see.
The only reason *sometimes* is teething.. He's got 2 that came in and one more coming. But this has been a whole year and I cannot recall a time where he woke up less than 5 times during the night.
I look for information everywhere and am at a loss. Nobody has info on 25 weekers. Lots of "my baby was born 3 weeks early and..." well HA, try 3 months.
The only possible bit of hope we got was from the doctor at his 8 month evaluation who told us to really try to fatten him up. He is 16 pounds, which is awesome, but he doesn't have the little chub factor you get with the older guys. I'm wondering what this will do, since, it's not like he's waking up just to eat. But perhaps his preemieness generally is just translating into weird sleep habits until his weight catches up with his (adjusted) age.
Any info at all, pleeeease!
-Dave K (Daddy of Dylan)
Our gorgeous, beautiful baby boy was born almost a year ago, at 25 gestational weeks. He spent 3 months in the NICU.
We have not had even a half night's sleep since!
We've read every manual, book, website in existence, from attachment parenting (which we think is more our style) to the books that tell you that you're a horrible person if you don't have a routine and a strict schedule and that you're supposed to lock your baby in his room until he cries himself to sleep.
On the "cry it out" end of the spectrum, we (reluctantly) tried for up to a week and up to 2 hours of not picking him up and just checking in occasionally. He writhed and screamed the whole time while we were wide awake feeling horrible, before he managed to throw up his dinner forcing us to pick him up. (Nice loophole you found there, buddy!)
No matter which extreme we take, our little guy still wakes frequently, sometimes as much as every half hour between 1 and 5 AM. (You know, the time when we've actually start sleeping ourselves).
There is nothing medically wrong with him. There is no more reflux. He is not hooked up to anything or on any medications. He is the cutest baby in the entire world (no bias here) and super intelligent (no bias here either) and curious and playful. He's almost crawling (doing army crawl with some leg assistance). He gets occupational therapy, passed his 8 month evaluation, and has swimming and music lessons. He is a happy, giggling (although sometimes very whiney) little boy.
He is too old for swaddling (it didn't work anyway). Schedules don't matter. He never could keep a pacifier in his mouth. Routines don't make a difference. Even if we take him to bed and he is literally sleeping on top of me or my wife, he still wakes and cries for no reason that we can see.
The only reason *sometimes* is teething.. He's got 2 that came in and one more coming. But this has been a whole year and I cannot recall a time where he woke up less than 5 times during the night.
I look for information everywhere and am at a loss. Nobody has info on 25 weekers. Lots of "my baby was born 3 weeks early and..." well HA, try 3 months.
The only possible bit of hope we got was from the doctor at his 8 month evaluation who told us to really try to fatten him up. He is 16 pounds, which is awesome, but he doesn't have the little chub factor you get with the older guys. I'm wondering what this will do, since, it's not like he's waking up just to eat. But perhaps his preemieness generally is just translating into weird sleep habits until his weight catches up with his (adjusted) age.
Any info at all, pleeeease!
-Dave K (Daddy of Dylan)
Re: Will our beautiful micro-preemie EVER sleep?
We didn't have any sleep issues until she was 7 month (4 adjusted). She would wake up at random times every night, wasn't hungry, sometimes wanted to play sometimes wanted to sleep in our bed (if you start that good luck), sometimes was just restless.
It's gotten better now that she's older, she still tosses and turns but doesn't wake up anymore. She also sees an OT and she told us that Isabella was caught up mentally and in her mind at that time (11 months adj) she should be running but physically wasn't yet walking. Her OT suggested that we try to stimulate her as much as possible during the day so that she would sleep better. Now that she is able to run she'll sleep 11 hours straight sometimes.
Here are some things you can do (if you haven't already):
- make and obstacle course out of pillows/ couch cushions and let him tire himself out. Make sure he gets enough stimulaion during the day.
-Around bedtime turn down the lights, speak in a lower voice, keep noise to a minimum, tv off
- to make bath time extra soothing add lavender oil to his bath followed by a massage (YouTube) with lavender lotion.
- Does he still take the bottle? No judgment, Isabella does. If so I would add organic coconut oil, oatmeal cereal and bananas that way he is nice and full. I make Bella's bottles that way, it adds good fat and calories.
- If he's kicked the bottle oatmeal for dinner + milk will keep him full.
-put a cool mist oil diffuser in his room with some lavender oil.
- Himalayan salt lamps are awesome, they give off a relaxing amber glow and are supposed to have healing properties.
Btw...
Bella is 17 months, 22 lbs, 32 inches
We have ALWAYS added organic coconut oil to her bottles. Coconut oil is amazing, I encourage you to read up on it. She has been on the growth curve for her chronological age since about 9 months, I really feel the coconut oil played a role.
If you have any questions please feel free to send me a message. I found your post by accident so I wouldn't know if you respond or not, I don't get notifications.
I almost forgot.... I do have some questions.
How do you know he doesn't have reflux anymore?
Isabella still hs issues with it occasionally, particularly at night.
Where does he sleep? On/in what?
Good luck to you guys!
SI TTC 7 months
DD born 10/2015 @ 27 wks. 4 days > severe pre-e (TTC 1yr.)
Hystero./Laproscopy/Ovarian Drilling/ D&C/ HSG (2/2015)
Present:
DX: Moderate Endo./ PCOS/ Diminished Ovarian Reserve(1.2 amh)/ Low Morphology (0%)
HSG (3/2017)- All Clear
RX: Follistim (75iu)/ Trigger/ IUI/ Progesterone
Starting 1st IUI cycle Friday 4/28