Tuesday, January 21, 2014

Sleep Training Day 2

I don't intend this to be a sleep training blog, but I'm so happy I want to shout from the rooftops. I learned with my experience with Sam that you never talk about (brag about...) your kid's sleeping - unless it's super troublesome - then you're allowed to complain. And I have also learned that there is SERIOUS and AGGRESSIVE thought against letting your baby cry, so I'm a wee bit reluctant to put it out there that we're doing this, but I also feel like it's working and that's so important for others to know.

As I mentioned, this was what I was obsessing over the last few months and had driven me to near insanity, I CANNOT BELIEVE it has changed so quickly and I have hope that I will be a normal person again! I even feel normal today!

So last night Elie woke up twice, which I'm okay with for now - once at eleven and once at two something. Then he slept until 6:30. Both times he went back to bed easily with me rocking him, but only for a couple of minutes.

For his morning nap, I started settling him at 7:20, I left him at 7:35, and he cried for 35 minutes, but then he slept for an hour and forty five minutes!!! Unheard of!! Luckily our cleaner was here so I could leave him to take Sam to school and also to go get a coffee with a friend (felt like luxury to go without a baby attached!) in my neighborhood. I'm not sure how we will sort this out when I can't leave him sleeping - he might have to wait until 9:15 to nap, which I think will mean that he'll be super overtired...but I will sort that out later.

At noon also he cried for 35 minutes and then had a short half hour nap. I felt bad about that one since it was more crying than sleeping...but there was nothing I could do. At two he was ready again for a nap and cried for 30 minutes and slept for nearly an hour.

Yes - that's a lot of crying, but it's also a lot more sleeping than he had done before. And seriously, he does not seem like it phases him. After a nap he's totally normal, happy baby.

This evening was the biggest win yet. I put him to sleep at 6:25. At 7:05 I started hearing him moving around and talking (I cannot be away from the monitor right now, unless I'm sleeping - then it's off). I said to Sam, "Here comes the crying." We were reading a bedtime story and I was totally ready to become Stressed Mom Pretending To Be Paying Attention To My Three Year Old But Really Freaking Out That My Baby Is Crying. He talked for about ten minutes and then he WENT BACK TO SLEEP with NO CRYING!!! I literally couldn't believe it (neither could Sam).

Ok - we're still on day two, and he cried for 100 minutes today (yeah - I have a spreadsheet - I'm that crazy), and that is HARD as a mom, but there is hope that he will learn how to do this. I'm staying positive.

And during the time that they were both sleeping this afternoon, I found a site that has online yoga classes, and the one that I did was actually pretty ok, and it felt SO good, since I haven't done yoga since bed rest last January. On the way to normalcy...

No comments: