Thursday, July 24, 2008

Sleepless Nights Part 2


So I thought we were in the clear since earlier in the week when- I posted about our sleepless night with Jack. We had 2 nights where he slept through and it was great; I had made some changes that I thought were helping, I started giving him a sippy cup of water and of milk (I know he is not yet 1, but it is only a little over a week away.) I was also making sure he had good naps and not too late in the afternoon, since I think that might have been making it harder for him to go to bed at a good time. This is all new territory for me, Allie is so different, she is just so easy going about everything- she could wake up from a nap at 5 pm and then go to bed at her regular 7:30, no problem. Anyways I thought that all these things had turned things around, until last night.

Jack woke up at 3:30 ish and I did the usually, it is so hard to think clearly in the middle of the night *grin*; I got him from his crib and nursed him in the rocker in his room and when I thought he was done I put him in his crib, covered him up and as soon as I started to walk out of the room he started crying and stood up at the end of his crib. So, I layed him back down and rubbed his back a little bit to calm him back down and left the room again. As soon as I got to our bedroom door he was crying again, but I decided to try what Sam's Mom had suggested, so I went into our room and waited for 5 minutes. Can I just tell you that those 5 minutes felt like 20. When they were up he was still crying so I headed back into his room and layed him back down and rubbed his back some more to calm him down and then left the room again this time for 10 minutes, just like last time he was standing in his crib and crying, but I waited it out and as I lay in bed watching the clock I heard him stop crying every so often and then start back up again. When the 10 minutes were over he was crying again so I headed back in and layed him down and rubbed him some more and this time when I left the room I waited for 15 minutes. The same thing started to happen he would cry some and then stop, but this time the stops were getting longer than the crying and by the end of the 15 minutes he was quiet and he didn't start up again.

I am really glad that this worked, but this was the hardest thing to do as a mom. All I wanted to do when I heard him crying was to go in and pick him up and calm him down. I haven't wanted to go this route with these sleepless nights until now; but I was starting to feel like we were building some terrible habbits with this whole waking up in the middle of the night. Hopefully tonight he will sleep through the night; of course who knows if that will happen we will be at Grammy's house tonight.

1 comment:

Charity said...

Best of luck! My Jack didn't sleep consistently through the night until he turned two! I tried everything and can honestly say that I don't think it made a difference, he finally just got big enough to where he sleeps like a grown up now for 8-10 hours per night. I will never take sleep for granted again! ;)

They are worth it though, right? ;) I found you from 4 little men...