First off, my last post was regarding my weight loss journey, so here's my very quick update: weighed in at 136 this morning. So I am down a little, but it's been seesawing up and down the past few days, and I haven't been doing that great. Haven't gotten back on the horse with my exercise and although I have been doing well on my diet during the day, I usually blow it, or at least push to the VERY end of my points, in the evenings. The sleep issues I have been having with Evie have been stressing me out like you would NOT believe (or perhaps you would, if you've got a little one of your own and have been through the same thing!) and that's been driving me to the freezer. Oh, and to the industrial sized boxes of Skittles and Pretzel M&Ms that I bought at Sam's the other day. Why did I do that???
Speaking of sleep issues... ah yes. Sleep issues. That's been the theme of my week.
Sleep has never been great with Evie, since the day she was born. As a teeny infant I swear she'd go for whole days where she didn't nap, other than closing her eyes for a few minutes here and there. NO NAP AT ALL! She's also always been quite the night owl, staying up until 10 or 11 or 12 even as she has gotten older and developed a more consistent sleep pattern. And don't even get me started on the terrible night I had last year when I had a project due the next day and Evie refused to go to sleep until 5 am!
This week, though, has been 'sleep issues' at a whole new level. It tires me out terribly when she is staying up so late when my husband is deployed, and I decided it was time that I buckled down and got her on a predictable and normal sleep schedule. Suddenly, Evie was seemingly unable to sleep without being in my arms. One night, a few days ago, I tried from 7:30 until 10:30 to get her to sleep. Three hours of literally nothing except trying to get her down. She'd fall asleep in my arms, and then the moment I set her in the crib, wake up immediately and start screaming at the top of her lungs. I cried soooo much that night. At one point I just lay in bed clutching my knees and crying as loud as her for a few minutes. It's just hard to deal with having NO "me" time when you are alone with a baby 24/7!
Every night that I've had an issue I end up on the phone with my mom, sobbing, at least once. Finally she told me that I need to take firm action, and that means getting over my inability to let Evie cry, and to let her cry it out some and learn to self-sooth to sleep. I have felt so horribly conflicted over this concept. I know a lot of people do it. I know people have been doing it for generations and it doesn't seem to have psychologically damaged us all. But it just snaps all my heartstrings to think that my daughter is crying her heart out and thinking that I don't care enough to come to her side. So, although I tried the strategy of letting her cry for 10 minutes at a time, then coming in to comfort (but NOT pick her up), and repeat- I couldn't do it the first few nights. I would inevitably pick her up and soothe her to sleep in my arms. Set her down in her crib- SCREAM- and repeat. For hours.
Three nights ago I was finally able to restrain myself from picking her up for the entirety of the process of getting her to sleep. It took an hour and it was miserably gut-wrenching and painful. After she finally drifted off, hiccuping softly from her tears, I sat on the couch exhausted and feeling like a terrible mother. I had my "me" time and I could not care less! I didn't feel like tackling any of the projects that I had been longing to get my hands on all through my busy day. I felt lonely and wished my little girl was still up so we could play.
Two nights ago, it took an hour again. If this was the way it was going to go every night, I was starting to think that I would have to just deal with a night owl baby. What stopped me from giving up was the realization that I have to regulate Evie's sleep schedule for HER sake, not for mine. I knew that she was tired, and I knew that it was an appropriate time for her to be going to sleep.
Yesterday, finally, we had a pain-free bedtime. I didn't even have to try- she fell asleep nursing at 7 and didn't even wake up when I set her in her crib- she was that out of it! I had gotten her up at 6:30 that morning for a yard sale on base, which is about 2 hours earlier than she normally gets up. Since she slept so well last night, she was up at 6 am this morning. But she got in two naps with little hassle from me during the day, and she was asleep by 7:30 tonight! I started the bedtime ritual at 6:30, because I could tell she was tired, and it only took about 15 minutes of crying before she went down this evening. She nursed to sleep but woke up crying when I set her down, and I let her cry for 10 minutes and then went in to hug, kiss, and comfort her. I lay her down and stroked her head, singing softly to her. I got to watch as her eyelids grew heavy and the length of time between drowsy blinks lengthened. Tonight, I am actually able to enjoy my 'me' time, knowing that my daughter is adjusting to a healthy sleep schedule, and that I didn't have to feel awful about the way we accomplished it tonight!
Anyone else out there had these kind of sleep troubles? I hate that I even tried the modified controlled crying technique- I felt very conflicted about it. I am hoping that things will continue to go well on the sleep front in the days to come...
We've always been lucky that the kiddo would fall asleep in his crib, not while nursing, but we had to do a little sleep training with middle of the night wakings--it was just getting to be too hard for me to handle work with 3 middle of the night wakeups. It was hard hard hard.
ReplyDeleteBut like you said, it's for their sake, not just ours...they don't even know how to handle the fact that they are tired, so it's our job to help them!