I love, love, love my little Zachy man. He is the sweetest little one, so happy and bubbly during the day, but when night comes the little devil comes out! He is the most stubborn baby when it comes to going to bed at night. When I took Emily to the doctor I casually mentioned that Zach was still not sleeping through the night and was up 2 - 3 times and what could I do (I did not have this problem with my girls). The doctor looked at me like I was crazy "You have 3 kids and you haven't figure this out?", me, "No, my girls slept through the night from about 10 weeks on and only woke occasionally when teething or sick so this with Zach was killing me!", doctor, "Well you need to stop getting up with him and wean him off the nighttime bottle. Have him cry it out..it should only take a week or so" My heart sank...what no magic pill to make him sleep? I had to let him cry? I knew deep down I needed to let him cry it out but that always wakes hubby up, then I have to hear him complain that he is awake and has to work...yada yada yada! I was going to be mean and suggest letting him cry it out when I was in the hospital for my surgery since hubby will be off from work but decided action needed to be taken now to save what little sanity I have left. So last night I decided this was it, I am tired of waking up all night with him and having to hold him for hours to get him to stay asleep...my mind was made up!
All was quiet at 9pm in my house...all kiddos were asleep and I was letting hubby get his classwork done, then it happened...Zach was up. "What is going on with him? You just put him down 30 minutes ago and he is up?" my hubby says. Hubby went in to have some snuggle time and Zach fell asleep...or so hubby thought! After 5 minutes hubby had enough and promptly told me "let him cry". I went in and made sure he was ok, tried to give him a bottle and he wanted none of it so time to cry it out buddy! And boy did he cry. Little man cried for an hour and thirty minutes. I started going in every 10 minutes to rub his back and make sure he was ok, he would quiet down and as soon as he heard me leave he was wailing again! So then I went in every 20 minutes just to check and he was still going! I thought the poor boy would never give up and go to sleep! But finally he did..at 10:15 he finally quieted down....till 4am. I did get up and give him a bottle but miraculously he feel back asleep! Woo Hoo!
Unfortunately at 6 am Emily needs to get up for school which always wakes up Maddie and then the arguing begins! As I type they are yelling at each other about who will brush their teeth first. On the bright side I did get almost 5 hours uninterrupted sleep last night so I will not be a part of the living dead today. Here's hoping for another night of uninterrupted sleep! And not too much crying for my little Zachy man....
5 comments:
Hang in there. It gets better! I wish you much luck!
I know it's not fun, but I would reccomend not going in at all tonight. When you keep going in every 10 minutes, or even every twenty minutes you are just reinforcing the idea that you will come if he cries long enough. Also, he's old enough to get through the night without a bottle. Feed him before he goes to sleep and when he wakes up in the morning, and that's it. Otherwise he's eating too much at night, and not enough during the day, which then causes him to wake up more at night, and the vicious cycle continues. Anyway, that's my two cents. :) Good luck!
ack! Soon this will be a distant memory, Wendy!
Oh my goodness I had the same trouble with my Nick. I'm hoping that your Zach will start sleeping better for you. I truly understand how hard this is (I've been there!) and am wishing you the very best.
Hey- thanks for the follow, great blog!!!
I'm actually writing a book about getting babies to sleep through the night. Mostly, it's for brand new infants, though. Good luck. Hang in there. Sometimes love is tough.
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