Sleep

Ok, so my blogging has been slightly less frequent (sarcasm) since the baby has been born than it was when I was pregnant…and even then I was less frequent than I should have been. I have grown to love a very smiley, adorable, headstrong, smart, amazing little boy over the last six months. I headed back to work three months ago and have finally fallen into a routine that I think works for everyone. I am taking on a new role at work that should be more fulfilling and at the same time less demanding. So what is the problem? I’m not sure I’ll ever have a full night’s sleep again.

I am seriously getting close to my breaking point. I don’t know what to do other than to take one sleep book, any sleep book, and follow it to the letter without taking advice from any other book or modifying the advice to suit my instincts, even if that means I get even less sleep for the next two to four weeks while training my son to sleep. I haven’t yet taken this approach, because no matter what I do, I will never have control of what happens during the day while he’s at daycare. I could give them some instructions, such as to put him in his crib and let him cry til he falls asleep, but since I’m not entirely sure I want to enforce a cry it out technique, I don’t think this is a good strategy. I could also tell them not to let him sleep over a certain amount of time, but since I’m not clear on what the magic combination of sleep/nap/wake time is, I hate to disrupt what he’s naturally doing.

So here I am, mother to a six month old baby who still wakes generally twice per night and usually tries to get up for the day around 4:30am.

I know I am doing the following things wrong:

1. Not enforcing a strict bedtime – I love routine and this would be the easiest thing in the world for me to do, but my husband gets home so late that I often try to keep the baby up so he can see his daddy for a little bit before he goes to bed. This often means extending his bedtime by 30-45 minutes. I know this is bad for him, but I’m trying to prioritize time with a parent over a particular bedtime. I think I will modify this strategy and just put him in bed at the same time each and every night. As much as I hate to do that.
2. Putting him to bed too late – Bedtime is generally 7:30, but as mentioned above, I often allow him to stay up til 8:00-8:15pm to see daddy.
3. Nursing him back to sleep when he wakes in the middle of the night – I’m guilty of this because I know it works and it gets us both back in bed sooner.
4. Rocking him, feeding him, bouncing him, etc to sleep for every nap and bedtime. I just don’t know how to break him of this without using a cry-it-out (“CIO” from now on) technique. I tried CIO for a short time and while it did work, it was an awful experience for me. I’m not sure I am hardcore enough to continue it.

I also have great confusion over information out there on naps. My baby has a pretty textbook tolerance for waketime. He is now six months old and he is able to stay awake without fussiness for about 2-2.5 hours…no more. Many of the more casual books/websites recommend a 2-3 nap schedule for a six month old baby. This simply doesn’t fit into the amount of waketime my baby can manage. I also sometimes end up with a baby who needs a nap at like 6pm, but since it’s so close to bedtime, I’m not sure whether to nap him or just keep him up a little longer and put him to bed or put him to bed early. I’m just so confused.

I think the only answer for me now is to take a book and stick to the plan. I can’t waiver from it, look at advice online or pick and choose from different books until I find all the stuff I want to hear. The fact is, what I’m doing isn’t working. I need to alter it somehow.