We just went through a fairly horrible stretch of sleep which included one of B's worst nights in history. The nature of the horribleness made us think that B was in pain, pretty bad pain. He would cry his inconsolable cry and writhe every time he woke up. If we got him settled back down he would wake up again every couple of minutes with the same display. It was awful but we also felt awful for him. Then a tooth popped through. It seemed like a pretty big display for "just teething" but it's all we have to go on.
Then we had one good night which was obviously just a mean trick.
Then came last night. At several points during the night, B was sitting up, playing, talking to himself, etc. I vaguely recall him smiling at me, smacking me repeatedly, while chanting, "Mama! Mama!" (Mildly cute even at that hour.) Sometimes if you fake sleep then B will get the hint and go back to sleep himself so I did the best acting job ever and actually fell back asleep.
Rather than follow my lead, B took the opportunity to rifle through my stuff, and consequently I was awakened by a crashing noise as B knocked everything off my nightstand (that he was climbing on!!!!!) The actual loud noise was caused by a tumbling coffee cup* which seemed to be B's attempt at some literary symbolism. "Even your precious coffee is no match for what I have planned, mwahaha!" So here we are starting our day long before the sun is up.
Can someone please diagnose this for me? Or at least tell me that your kid did the exact same thing and they are not in fact manic depressive? Help.
*If you are thinking you can solve our sleep woes by telling me not to drink coffee at night and then breastfeed, I should tell you that I wasn't using the cup for coffee but was instead eating cookies out of it before bed. While not healthy either, I don't see how this contributes to this particular problem.
Well, as I say whenever I read your blog both to myself and, at times, on here, is that B reminds me SO much of my daughter who is an insanely bad sleeper. She is exactly a year older than B and last year we went through similar issues. The one thing that works for us, and I was hesitant to believe this would work as you'll read that overtired children don't sleep, is: we don't let her sleep during the day.
ReplyDeleteWell, that's not entirely true. At this point we let her sleep exactly one hour during the day. Even with that she wakes up at 5:30am and she goes to sleep at 9pm (After playing in her bed and talking to me for about an hour.)
At B's age we were trying to keep her taking two naps but by the time she was a year we gave up and cut it down to one. It wasn't working for us and we never got a full night's sleep.
Anyhow, maybe it is cruel to drag her out of a peaceful nap at 3 in the afternoon but if we don't we don't sleep at night and I'm totally over that. We did it for too long with her and this really is all that worked. I don't know how often you have B nap but it might be worth timing his naps and forcing him to spend more of the day awake.
*All of this "advice" with the disclaimer that I realize how rare it is that what someone else does for their child ever works, but on the long shot, maybe it'll help.
Thank you so much for your comment, Chrissy! It's funny that you said that because I've noticed that B tends to sleep better when he's super tired but all of the books have me so scared about an "overtired baby" being up all night. Obviously he's up all night anyways! At this point I'm willing to try anything so I think we'll give it a go and limit his daytime naps. I'll let you know how it goes, thanks again!
DeleteI have to agree! Some kids just don't need as much sleep as others, and too much napping during the day can lead to craptastic sleep at night.
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