So, now that I feel a bit better about my job, just wanted to update you on the kids. John is still sleeping horribly. He generally goes down really easy around 7:30-8:30 pm and has been been waking up between 1 and 3am to nurse. After that, it's all down hill. I will feed him and probably 1/2 the time I can put him back in his crib, no problem, the other 1/2 of the time he cries. I have just been too exhuasted to deal with it so I will bring him into bed and have him sleep with me (usually in the twin bed in his room, so I hardly sleep in my bed anymore). This at least gets him back to sleep. Well, for a while at least...after that point he will then generally wake up every hour or so, act fussy and want to eat. No wonder he is getting so big, the kid eates non-stop! :-) So, I know, I know, this is just insane. Not to mention, he has been waking up the past few nights at 10:30 or 11:30 and then AGAIN at 1:30 - 3:30 and then starting his routine again from there. Needless to say, I am just exhuasted and tired of hearing stories of other babies sleeping the night away. I have to buckle down. So, last night at 11:30, you guessed it, I hear cries. I check John and he is acting like he hasn't eatten in 2 days, although it has been 4 hours. So, I feed him and put him down and he blissfully goes back to sleep. 2am - I hear cries again. I go check on him and he is acting like he is starving again! So, I feed him and after he works an arm free of his swaddle and starts sucking on his hand I tell myself, OK, you are on your own. He eats, falls asleep and I put him down. By the time I make it to my room, I hear cries again. OK, he is testing me. I lay down and wait the recommened 5 minutes, OK, I waited 8 minutes, and he didn't stop crying. I go check on him, telling myself that I will just check on him and walk out, but no, I pick him up. He starts rooting, so I nurse him again and he falls asleep almost instantly, I know, I have become the human pacifier...thankfully when I put him down, he stayed asleep. And then AHHHHHHH - the next time I open my eyes at 4:30 Mark is leaving for work and still no cries. And then my alarm is going off at 6:00 and I realize that John hasn't woken up! YES! I turned down his monitor in case I heard him fuss (I can still hear him if he cries, I just tend to jump up at any sound and go running, was trying to avoid that). Of course, the second my alarm goes off, he starts crying, but I call it success that he slept in his room all night and I got to sleep in my own bed. When I got him he had both of his arms out of his swaddle and was in a different area of the crib, so he must have been moving about. But, my goal in all this is to have him soothe himself and fall back asleep, not expecting to be nursed back to sleep. I told myself I would wait until he "found his thumb" to not go to him every second and I think it is time. He has almost found his thumb, sometimes it makes it into his mouth :-), but I think that will be his thing soon. It was horrible to see he had scratched his face all up (that's why I started swaddling him), but if I can keep it up, hopefully that will stop when he doesn't flail so much. So, long story short, help me keep the strength to keep this up and pray that John starts sleeping better! :-) He made it to 6am, would like a bit later, but at that point I don't mind bringning him in my room if it means he will fall back asleep while I get ready for work. Now, if I can just make him sleep longer on the weekends...:-)
I should point out that Mel tells me how well SHE sleeps. She can be very attention starved lately - I praise her over and over - thank goodness you finally sleep through the night! She now sleeps like a log. Sleeps over John crying even - it only took 5 years!
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