Mama's boy
Thanks for all the support and suggestions on that last post. I want to address a few things:
1. Teething. Yeah, I guess he's probably teething. I've heard good things about the Hyland teething tablets, though I don't have any here. I do have some teething gel that I've given him already a few times when I've noticed him chewing hard on his fist, and it seems to help. No chompers yet, but that could happen any time now.
2. Co-sleeping. We have taken Daniel into bed with us. In fact, it happens nearly every morning between 4 and 5:30am, as the only alternative is to get up and nurse/comfort him every twenty minutes. I hesitate to keep him in bed with us all night because:
- we've done it before, and it makes it really hard for him to sleep in his crib later
- our bed is only queen-sized and it gets a little cramped when your kid likes to sleep with his arms straight out to the sides
- if I'm right next to him, he likes to nurse at least half the time we're lying there so I end up awake more than asleep and lying on one side with no circulation in my right arm. In other words, it's uncomfortable for me, and actually less restful than getting up and going to the crib frequently.
That said, I don't have issues with other people co-sleeping. There are some parents who put their babies in their own beds in their own rooms from day one and it works fine, and there are some people who co-sleep until their kids are in kindergarten and that works fine, too. So I'm not judging one way or another; we're just trying to figure out what works for us.
3. Swaddling. I hadn't considered that, actually! When Daniel was a wee newborn, we didn't swaddle him often, just when he had evening fussy time, which thankfully wasn't every night. Now he's wriggly and often flips over to his tummy as soon as he's put down for a nap or for the night, so I don't know how well he would stay wrapped in a blanket. It might be worth a shot, though.
4. Water. He's not able to drink by himself from a sippy cup, and he stopped taking a bottle a little while ago, so I think this might be a strategy a little down the road.
5. Keeping him up. I would love to do that, but in addition to frequent night-wakings, Daniel is finicky about naps. Yesterday, for example, he slept for a TOTAL of 45 minutes, and that was spread out over two naps, so keeping him up until 7:15 was already a challenge. Since he started crawling, the nap situation has improved somewhat, but not every day. When he has longer naps, bedtime is a little later and goes more smoothly, certainly, but that's something we have to take day by day.
Aside from the sleep issues, he's such a fun, sweet, sociable little boy, not to mention a bit of a flirt. He also loves to be with his mama. Now that he can easily move from one place to another, he is no longer content sitting just outside of the kitchen playing with his books and blocks, but wants to be literally underfoot "helping" me:
1. Teething. Yeah, I guess he's probably teething. I've heard good things about the Hyland teething tablets, though I don't have any here. I do have some teething gel that I've given him already a few times when I've noticed him chewing hard on his fist, and it seems to help. No chompers yet, but that could happen any time now.
2. Co-sleeping. We have taken Daniel into bed with us. In fact, it happens nearly every morning between 4 and 5:30am, as the only alternative is to get up and nurse/comfort him every twenty minutes. I hesitate to keep him in bed with us all night because:
- we've done it before, and it makes it really hard for him to sleep in his crib later
- our bed is only queen-sized and it gets a little cramped when your kid likes to sleep with his arms straight out to the sides
- if I'm right next to him, he likes to nurse at least half the time we're lying there so I end up awake more than asleep and lying on one side with no circulation in my right arm. In other words, it's uncomfortable for me, and actually less restful than getting up and going to the crib frequently.
That said, I don't have issues with other people co-sleeping. There are some parents who put their babies in their own beds in their own rooms from day one and it works fine, and there are some people who co-sleep until their kids are in kindergarten and that works fine, too. So I'm not judging one way or another; we're just trying to figure out what works for us.
3. Swaddling. I hadn't considered that, actually! When Daniel was a wee newborn, we didn't swaddle him often, just when he had evening fussy time, which thankfully wasn't every night. Now he's wriggly and often flips over to his tummy as soon as he's put down for a nap or for the night, so I don't know how well he would stay wrapped in a blanket. It might be worth a shot, though.
4. Water. He's not able to drink by himself from a sippy cup, and he stopped taking a bottle a little while ago, so I think this might be a strategy a little down the road.
5. Keeping him up. I would love to do that, but in addition to frequent night-wakings, Daniel is finicky about naps. Yesterday, for example, he slept for a TOTAL of 45 minutes, and that was spread out over two naps, so keeping him up until 7:15 was already a challenge. Since he started crawling, the nap situation has improved somewhat, but not every day. When he has longer naps, bedtime is a little later and goes more smoothly, certainly, but that's something we have to take day by day.
Aside from the sleep issues, he's such a fun, sweet, sociable little boy, not to mention a bit of a flirt. He also loves to be with his mama. Now that he can easily move from one place to another, he is no longer content sitting just outside of the kitchen playing with his books and blocks, but wants to be literally underfoot "helping" me:
Comments
Say, you mentioned naps are an issue for you guys too - have you read Elizabeth Pantley's "No-Cry Sleep Solution"?
I read it when my guys were about that age, and were just having a tough time sleeping in general, and while most of her ideas weren't super-helpful for us (the Twin Effect nullified a lot of them, sadly), the concepts she talked about /were/ helpful.
Like, one of the things she mentioned was the notion that "sleep begets sleep" - that babies who nap better also tend to sleep through the night better. And as an insomniac since I was 11, I can verify - if I can get some good sleep, I then have an easier time getting more good sleep later; once I'm all sleep-deprived and slap-stupid, I tend to stay that way.
So I remember one thing we did was we started with fixing naptime, and bedtime was a lot easier to wrestle with later on.
I know for us, one thing I did is I spent about two weeks taking the kids out almost every afternoon for a drive in the car. I felt bad environmentally, but pinky-swore Mother Nature that it was only temporary. I'd drive 'em up and down the Beltline until they were asleep, then I'd find a nice place to park the car and sit and knit and take a little quiet time for myself. And if one of them started to wake up, I'd drive off again for a bit until they'd snoozed back out, and by that method, we were able to get them on a good nap schedule, and then getting them to nap at home became a /lot/ easier as well. And then bedtimes followed as easier as well.
I don't know if the driving part or whatever would work for you, but maybe the concept of focusing on fixing naptime is something you can work with?
Good luck! I think that's a tough stage for kids - they're doing so much learning and growing and figuring things out, I imagine they kind of feel the way I did the one time I took 18 semester hours (one of them a 4-hour Honors Chem lab!, so actually 7 hours of class every week) in college. Your brain feels all achy and over-crowded and you're so wound up by it all you can't sleep and you're either always hungry or never hungry but never at the right time and it's all just kind of crazy-making.
But the good news is, it's a semester. Once he gets through "Finals Week", he'll be back to his old self, only smarter and faster and with new tricks up his sleeve. ;)
i miss daniel!!!!!
(oh, and you too. :) )
What a great picture! And Jamie responded well to the car rides when he was that age. In fact, he still falls asleep when we're in the car for more than 20 minutes.
Keep your fingers crossed and keep repeating "It won't be this way forever. It won't be this way forever..."
Big hugs!
until daniel was born we didn't use the car much (bike enthusiasts here), but now i have no choice. once he's a year old i can take him for bike rides in the burley trailer.
i have heard of the "no-cry sleep" book, but haven't read it. i have thusfar avoided reading baby books because they make me feel like i'm doing everything wrong, but it might be time to see what the experts say!
glad y'all like the butt-shot :)