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Sleep Plan: 6 Months

By Goddess in Progress · Comments (5)· January 12th, 2009

Following is copied and pasted directly from an email to a MOT friend of mine. She has been asking me sleep advice, and wants to do CIO with her nearly-6-month-olds but doesn’t have the time to read Ferber (you all know how I feel… read the book!). I’m no guru, but I’m opinionated. So, here’s my epic email to her (verbatim, just with added links), with my mish-mash, cliff’s-notes version of Weissbluth and Ferber. All in what we deemed her “sleep plan.” Maybe it’ll be useful for someone else out there in the blogosphere.

[Cross-posted at How Do You Do It?]

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Alright, this might be the longest email I’ve ever written. Sorry. I just felt like I had to explain things. Let me know if you have any questions. And let me just say: this is what worked for me and my kids. I’m no expert, I’m no doctor. Not all kids are the same, and there’s no one perfect solution that will have your kids sleeping until 8AM every day for the rest of their lives. (ha!) But, overall, this is what worked really well for us.

6:30am (or later, yeah right!): wake up
8:30-9:00: go down for morning nap, depending on how tired they seem or how early they woke up
12noon-1:30pm: go down for mid-day nap, depending on how late AM nap went
3:30-4:30pm: go down for late-afternoon nap, again depending on how mid-day nap went
6:30-7:00pm: start bedtime routine
7:00-7:30pm: lights out

Here’s my philosophy: well-rested kids with a predictable routine are going to sleep better (good sleep begets good sleep), wake up happier, and be generally easier and more receptive to their world than those who are over-tired or unpredictable. Since that is my starting philosophy, I pretty much think that 95-99% of days should revolve around their sleep schedule. Yes, sometimes you can play with it. But you won’t know how and when to take that risk until they’ve settled into it. So my advice is to stick like krazy glue to a schedule for at least a week or two and see how it goes before you try fudging things around. It can feel restrictive at first, and some people give you grief for it. But, honestly, I eventually found it sort of freeing, because I knew ahead of time what were good and bad times of day for my kids (more or less) and could plan accordingly. If you don’t know when your kid is going to nap, how can you know whether or not to sign up for that 3pm class? And it does mean you need to be careful with outings, because you don’t want them falling asleep in the car when you’re on the way home for their nap, and things like that. Not always super flexible, but it pays off. And yes, I always did the same thing for both kids at the same time. One may wake up earlier than the other, but I always put them down at the same time.

Now, for details…

Comments (5)

Categories : Infants, Sleep

Tags : Ferber, nap schedule, Naps, Overnight, sleep associations, sleeping through the night, Weissbluth

Viva la revolution, part 1: naps

By Goddess in Progress · Comments (4)· February 14th, 2008

It’s time for a sleep revolution in my house. Too long has chaos reigned. Too long has it been since M and I spent a whole night, together, in the same bed. It ends now.

OK, I’m maybe being a little melodramatic. But it’s the truth. It’s time for some major changes around here. Nighttimes are not significantly or consistently improving. Naptimes are unpredictable. I’m tired of hearing about people whose kids slept through the night consistently since they were eight weeks old, and I’m tired of not knowing when my kids will need to nap from day to day.

I’ve been primarily a Weissbluth girl. My friend sent me Healthy Sleep Habits, Happy Child when I was in my second trimester. I was all about early bedtimes, and not letting the kids stay up too long. Um, then I kind of realized I had neglected to go back and read the chapter after 0-4 months. Heh.

So, the first change I’ve been trying to make over the last few days is having a predictable nap schedule by the clock. My adherence to “put them down after 2 hours of wakefulness, max” was no longer appropriate, and was frequently resulting in 4 45-minute naps every day. Not cool for anyone. Now, we aim to start the morning nap around 9 (today was 8:40, but they got up early – I don’t know what kind of crack Ferber is smoking that he thinks it could wait until 10 or 10:30). I’ll even give them a little extra bottle before they go down, so they don’t wake up from being hungry. And, may I say, they’re still asleep right now. Two hours, baby! That’s what I’m talking about.

The goal for the afternoon nap is for them to go down somewhere between 12 and 2. It’ll depend on how long the morning nap lasts, but instead of trying to put them down earlier, I’m now trying to stretch things a little bit. I don’t want to wait until they’re hysterical, of course, but try to keep them awake and entertained for just a little longer.

Some days there’s a 3rd nap in there, at this point more often than not. If they wake up from the afternoon nap before about 3pm, there’s almost no way on earth they’ll make it to bathtime at 6:15 or 6:30 without going completely bonkers. In that case, I shoot for a catnap around 4:30. But if we’ve made it past 5pm and they’re still up, then no 3rd nap.

As far as naps go, I’m definitely still a Weissbluth girl. Ferber, as I said, seems to think the morning nap should be around 10. And there’s just no way that’s happening right now. He also thinks the 3rd nap should be about gone by now, which also isn’t in the cards. My nap schedule is straight Weissbluth, with that 3rd nap hanging around potentially for a few more months.

Anyways, so far so good on the nap thing. But it’s all about to be thrown for a loop, because tomorrow, we introduce Doctor Ferber… back soon with more.

Comments (4)

Categories : Infants, Sleep

Tags : Ferber, nap schedule, nap transition, Naps, Weissbluth

All night long

By Goddess in Progress · Comments (6)· December 17th, 2007

Of all the milestones my kids will reach in their first years of life, one I’m looking very much forward to is the fabled “sleeping through the night.” As is the case with many milestones, sleep in particular seems to have a huge range in terms of when this would actually happen. Unlike things such as sitting up, which is a clear “you are or you aren’t” kind of thing, “sleeping through the night” has an enormous gray area. What is “through the night,” anyways?

Let’s start with some less debatable parameters. I once had someone try to tell me that her baby started sleeping through the night at 3 weeks old. I was beside myself. Well, upon pressing for further details, she said “well, I mean, she still eats three times, but she’s not really awake.” OK, I’m sorry. That doesn’t count as sleeping through the night. Does that sound like pretty good sleep for a 3-week-old? Absolutely! Lots of babies don’t differentiate between night and day that early, and are frequently wide awake at various points in the middle of the night. But if you, the parent, must get up and feed or otherwise tend to the baby, I would argue that it does not count as sleeping through the night.

The really gray area, in my mind, concerns the definition of “night.” It depends on when you put the baby to bed, first of all. I’m more of a Weissbluth devotee, so baby bedtime in my house is early, generally between 6 and 7pm. Already, I’m thinking something very different from someone who puts their baby to bed at 8 or even 10pm. Second of all, I’ve talked to many people who say their babies wake up only once per night, and come to find out that really means they really eat at 10pm (when mom & dad are still up), and then wake up “once” at like 3am. So people who are in that frame of mind would consider “sleeping through the night” to be “sleeping while mom & dad sleep.” And they say baby is sleeping through when they drop the 3am, but are still getting up/eating at 10 or 11pm. Again, I think this is excellent progress, and I can’t wait for it to be the norm in my house. But by my standards, 10pm and 3am equals getting up twice.

I suppose I’ve set my bar for “sleeping through” somewhat high. I won’t call it that until they go down at 6-7pm and wake up at a reasonable morning hour. (OK, right now Daniel thinks 5:30am is a reasonable morning hour, but sometimes I get lucky and it’s more like 6:30-7am.) So, to me, “sleeping through the night” means around 12 straight hours of sleep for baby. I know this is possible. I know it’s actually quite good for them. But I know I won’t be all the way there for some time yet. For now, both kids are generally waking up around 11 and 3, though Daniel had a stretch last month of only waking up once, and Rebecca has managed a single bottle the last couple of nights.

Believe me, I’d be psyched if we were consistently down to one wakeup at 11pm-ish, and then asleep until 6am. That would positively rock my world. I’m thinking about trying to wean them off of the 3am bottle after the holidays, when things settle down. So far, we really haven’t taken a particularly active role in getting them to sleep through, aside from the bedtime routine and feeding them in place overnight. But the time is coming. I don’t think they’re ready to meet Dr. Ferber just yet, so I’m going to start by gradually decreasing how much I put in the 3am bottle in the hopes they’ll get used to taking less and less, and then just won’t get up for it. We’ll see.

Oh, and if your four-month-old is sleeping through the night even by my standards? I’m beyond jealous.

Comments (6)

Categories : Infants, Sleep

Tags : Ferber, Overnight, sleeping through the night, Weissbluth

That wasn’t pretty

By Goddess in Progress · Comments (4)· November 1st, 2007

Alas, Halloween was not a joyful day in my house. It was one of those nightmare fussy days. Both babies fought every single minute of sleep they had. The spit-up and drool machines were on such high gear that the Halloween shirts had to be ditched by 3pm (and that’s when they were so soaked I just couldn’t ignore it any longer). Nothing worked to get them to sleep for longer than about 25 minutes. There was a lot of screaming, some of it my own. Not fun! M and I were so ragged by the time we finally sat down to eat dinner, we were practically zombies. What a romantic anniversary! But with my mother-in-law arriving for the weekend, we will hopefully manage a date night. M is even suggesting an overnight at a hotel, but we’ll see.

We’re in a sort of tricky stage as far as sleep is concerned right now. They don’t yet have a regular or predictable nap schedule, but they still need to sleep kind of a lot, and I’m following my Dr. Weissbluth rule that they should go back to sleep after being up 1-2 hours (max). When I can get them down, it makes a huge difference as far as ease and fussiness. We’re all much happier. The difficult part is that they don’t fall (or stay) asleep nearly as easily as they once did. No longer can I rely on the magic of a moving car or stroller. It’s a very sad fact, indeed. It has made getting out of the house (in general a top priority for me) quite a bit more difficult. While I used to just do my best to leave shortly after feeding them and then they’d fall asleep in the car, I can no longer count on them falling asleep while we’re out. It’s really making me not want to leave the house, because I want/need to have all of my tricks and tools at my disposal to get them to sleep.

That’s how it all went down yesterday. They were up and ate at 7:30am, then a short walk in the stroller to get the poor dog outside. Both only dozed a little when we got home, not sufficient for “real” napping. But they ate again around 11, and I figured it was a good time to pop out and run an errand or two. They hadn’t slept well between the previous feedings, so hopefully now they’d be a little extra sleepy and the car would work it’s magic. No such luck. Well, Rebecca did sleep for a bit, but Daniel only catnapped for 5-10 minutes at a time. There was much overtired crying. And while sometimes an overtired morning can give way to a nice long afternoon nap, that was not to be the case. Nope, more screaming all afternoon long, and a complete refusal to sleep more than 25 minutes. These are the days when you can almost understand how a mom can snap and do her children harm. Obviously I wouldn’t harm my kids, but I know that all that screaming with no solution can addle your mind, and the frustration can lead some people down a slippery slope.

Anyways, when M came home he was finally able to take Daniel upstairs and put our exhausted boy to sleep. Then it was Rebecca’s turn. She had slept marginally better during the day, but elected to scream bloody murder when her dad tried to get her to bed. So much intense screaming we honestly wondered if she had somehow injured herself. And then, at one point, she finally stopped and then smiled at us. No idea what caused the crying, or what made it stop. No wonder M and I were practically hysterical by 8:30pm. We closed our door to trick or treaters (yeah, because that was the extra complication I needed last night) and turned off lights so they wouldn’t trek up our sidewalk. We half-laughed and half-cried as we recounted the insanity of the afternoon and evening (did I mention his usually short-to-moderate commute took an hour and a half? Awesome). I went to bed around 9:30 while he took some late-night baby duty. Rebecca woke up more often than usual, but overall the night was a blessed improvement over the day.

So, here I am at 5:45 in the morning. I fed Daniel around 4:30, I don’t even know when Rebecca last ate, but I’m sure she’ll be up soon. Here’s to hoping that today is better than yesterday. I admit I’m concerned, though. I have my usual walk with the twin moms at 10:30, and a chiropractor appointment at 3. Will two outings spell doom, or will the babies be more cooperative today? Tune in later for the next installment of the sleep chronicles…

Comments (4)

Categories : Holidays, Newborns, Sleep

Tags : Halloween, NaBloPoMo, Naps, Weissbluth, witching hour

Sleep Nut

By Goddess in Progress · Comments (3)· October 10th, 2007

I can feel myself becoming one of those people. You know, the ones who will let nothing stand in the way of their child’s nap time. I have friends like this, and perhaps wondered what the deal was. I’m just beginning to understand how precious baby sleep is.

Granted, my two are only just over two months old, and therefore too young to have a particularly regular nap schedule. However, last week I decided to try a little experiment. Not only do I have my two-month pediatric appointment coming up this week, but the topic at my mom & baby class this week was going to be about sleep. So I decided last Friday to start writing down what the twins were doing with regard to sleeping and eating. In part, I wanted to be able to ask and answer questions of my pediatrician with actual facts, not just my blurry memory (Was it yesterday he slept five hours straight, or two weeks ago? How much do they really eat in a day?). I also wanted to see if there were patterns emerging, which might help me predict things a little better.

Well, as they say, the act of observing something can change it. I started keeping track on Friday morning. In the back of my head were two things my class leader mentioned in passing last week: first, that babies this age should get at least some sleep every two hours or so, and second, that good sleep during the day equals good sleep at night. Within the first hours of Friday morning, I realized Daniel had been up and active for a while and was starting to get fussy. Instead of passively waiting for him to fall asleep, I decided to try to get him to sleep. Some combination of swaddling, rocking, and pacifier later, he was out for a nice nap (an hour and a half!). My whole awareness was shifted that day, and I started becoming more aware of whether or not either of them had taken a good rest between feedings. What do you know… that night was a stellar one for sleep. One good 5-hour stretch, sound sleep, and easy to get back down after a feeding. Brilliant!

Now, has this been perfect ever since? Of course not. Sunday, Daniel fought sleep all day long, tooth and nail. Not surprisingly, he was particularly overtired and fussy at my aunt’s house that night. But now I didn’t just pull out my hair, wishing he wouldn’t be so crabby. Now, I knew he was obviously overtired, and we just had to do everything in our power to get him to sleep. It took a long time and a lot of rocking in the carseat, but eventually he let go, and life was a little better.

When I have a few moments to myself, I’m trying to read Healthy Sleep Habits, Happy Child, by Dr. Weissbluth. This was sent to me early in my pregnancy by my friend, the Beppy, a hardcore sleep fanatic. At first I thought the book seemed a little harsh or cold, but I’m quickly converting. Even the good doctor doesn’t suggest trying to really get into a true schedule until at least 4 months, but I figure it’ll take me that long to read the whole thing at my current rate. We also discussed sleep in class this morning, and I picked up advice about starting a bedtime routine and the minimum amount of time that constitutes a restful nap (30 min).

And so, I am going to spend the next month or so working toward a regular bedtime routine for the twins. It’s a little tricky because I don’t have them on the same schedule right now (they’re such different weights, I don’t want to enforce eating at the same time), but we’ll figure something out. I’m just glad for progress, since I was not pleased with the nighttime routine we had going previously. Oh, and they’ve slept up in their room the last four nights. Finally, I’ve convinced M on that one… He thinks I’m a sleep nut already. He has no idea what’s coming.

Comments (3)

Categories : Newborns, Sleep

Tags : Naps, Overnight, Weissbluth