More on Sleeping
Some people worry about eating. Some people worry about intelligence. I worry about sleeping. Too much, too little, too long, too short. Patterns, habits, crutches ... you name it, I worry about it.
In the world of competitive parenting, friends of our have their daughter "sleeping through the night" (6 hours). But, she is going to bed at 10:30PM. I know many people that do it this way, and several books / experts recommend doing it this way.
From the beginning I have not done it this way. Bedtime around here is 8PM. I've been doing this pretty much since he came home. Now, Grady starts getting fussy between 6:30PM and 8:00PM, depending on the day he's had. So either we've trained him to do this, or we've taped into when his biological rhythm tells him he's sleepy. I'll take it either way.
But this mandates that I get up once every night. I don't really have a problem with this. He sleeps until 1:30 or 2:00, I feed him (this can take 30 minutes to an hour) and then he sleeps until 6:00ish. I can live with this schedule.
My reason for doing it this way ... I get at least two adult hours with my husband at night. We can have dinner, we can watch TV. We can spend this time together without Grady. I love him, and really I miss him when he's not around, but it's important to me that I get to spend time with Lewis too.
The other reason is that my bedtime was always 8:30 and I figured what was good enough for me, is good enough for him. And maybe it would be easier to sleep longer than it would be to train him to go to bed earlier? I don't know.
But lately, things have been dicey. One, the doctor told us to stop swaddling. When he said this I literally felt the worry start in my gut. If I don't swaddle him, he might not sleep, if he doesn't sleep, I don't sleep. If I don't sleep, I'm a miserable person. Please Doc, don't make me miserable.
So for the past few weeks we've tried napping unswaddled. He'd sleep for about 30 minutes and then wake up. We had not progressed enough to attempt nighttime sleep without the swaddle. I am not a crazy person.
So last week we try at night with one arm out. This works, but he starts waking up more and more. His feet increasingly are coming out. He's waking up two, three, four times. These times are not for food, something else is wrong.
So last night, I'm thinking (at 4AM - and note I'm not my most coherent during these early morning sessions) ... I think his arm that's out is cold. I think when he kicks his legs out, he wakes up because his legs (bare) are cold.
Tonight, I put him in one of his sleep sack pajamas. No swaddle. He's been down almost an hour. Cross your fingers he stays down, but I've checked on him. He's not flailing. He's not grunting. He's sleeping. Calmly. Warmly.
I feel like an idiot. So much of this is guessing at what will work and what won't. Trial and error. But when something is so obvious ... it just makes you shake your head. So tomorrow we'll be buying more sleep sack pajamas (he's pretty tall - he needs the 3-6 months size). I could try the full body suits we have - and maybe that's the way to go. We'll see.
I am breathing a sigh of relief. I was really afraid that he was delayed in his motor development because he was still accepting the swaddle. Who knows about that, but all I know is that when the doctor asks me next month if he's sleeping swaddled, I can say that he has moved on from that baby crutch.
Now that I think about it like that ... it makes me sad. My baby's growing up!
In the world of competitive parenting, friends of our have their daughter "sleeping through the night" (6 hours). But, she is going to bed at 10:30PM. I know many people that do it this way, and several books / experts recommend doing it this way.
From the beginning I have not done it this way. Bedtime around here is 8PM. I've been doing this pretty much since he came home. Now, Grady starts getting fussy between 6:30PM and 8:00PM, depending on the day he's had. So either we've trained him to do this, or we've taped into when his biological rhythm tells him he's sleepy. I'll take it either way.
But this mandates that I get up once every night. I don't really have a problem with this. He sleeps until 1:30 or 2:00, I feed him (this can take 30 minutes to an hour) and then he sleeps until 6:00ish. I can live with this schedule.
My reason for doing it this way ... I get at least two adult hours with my husband at night. We can have dinner, we can watch TV. We can spend this time together without Grady. I love him, and really I miss him when he's not around, but it's important to me that I get to spend time with Lewis too.
The other reason is that my bedtime was always 8:30 and I figured what was good enough for me, is good enough for him. And maybe it would be easier to sleep longer than it would be to train him to go to bed earlier? I don't know.
But lately, things have been dicey. One, the doctor told us to stop swaddling. When he said this I literally felt the worry start in my gut. If I don't swaddle him, he might not sleep, if he doesn't sleep, I don't sleep. If I don't sleep, I'm a miserable person. Please Doc, don't make me miserable.
So for the past few weeks we've tried napping unswaddled. He'd sleep for about 30 minutes and then wake up. We had not progressed enough to attempt nighttime sleep without the swaddle. I am not a crazy person.
So last week we try at night with one arm out. This works, but he starts waking up more and more. His feet increasingly are coming out. He's waking up two, three, four times. These times are not for food, something else is wrong.
So last night, I'm thinking (at 4AM - and note I'm not my most coherent during these early morning sessions) ... I think his arm that's out is cold. I think when he kicks his legs out, he wakes up because his legs (bare) are cold.
Tonight, I put him in one of his sleep sack pajamas. No swaddle. He's been down almost an hour. Cross your fingers he stays down, but I've checked on him. He's not flailing. He's not grunting. He's sleeping. Calmly. Warmly.
I feel like an idiot. So much of this is guessing at what will work and what won't. Trial and error. But when something is so obvious ... it just makes you shake your head. So tomorrow we'll be buying more sleep sack pajamas (he's pretty tall - he needs the 3-6 months size). I could try the full body suits we have - and maybe that's the way to go. We'll see.
I am breathing a sigh of relief. I was really afraid that he was delayed in his motor development because he was still accepting the swaddle. Who knows about that, but all I know is that when the doctor asks me next month if he's sleeping swaddled, I can say that he has moved on from that baby crutch.
Now that I think about it like that ... it makes me sad. My baby's growing up!
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