(playing in front of the mirror is one of David's favorite activities now)Sorry it's been so long since my last post. I don't really have a good excuse other than I've been somewhat of a slacker lately. I'm now a mostly stay-at-home mom because the ladies in my office had a harder time with David than they anticipated. I guess they've been able to make it work with some babies in the past but David seems to demand more attention than a lot of babies (I could have told them that). He wants to be held CONSTANTLY, and just holding him's not enough. If he doesn't have my undivided attention he lets me know who's boss (as if that were in question). He even insists I hold him during naptime and if I try to put him down he'll wake right up. Or if I do happen to get him to fall asleep on his own he's awake within 20 minutes or so.
When I was pregnant I started boning up on parenting books and sleep guides so that I would be prepared. I even recommended Dr Ferber's book to a mom who had difficulties getting her son to nap. HaHa!!! Following his methods I get David to sleep after about 20 minutes of screaming. He'll sleep for about 15 minutes and then resume screaming for the duration of the nap. Has anyone else had this problem?
4 comments:
I saw this thing on a tv show one time. These hydraulic thingies went under each leg of the crib, and they moved in sync with each other to mimic being in the car (where, presumably, all babies fall asleep, though mine never did... :)). Then there are those wedge sleepers (to help with digestion and reflux) with nice little cushiony things to make them feel cozy--and you can even get the ones with heartbeat sounds so they feel like they're back in the womb (do you think any baby really WANTS to be back there? :)). Add those two gismos to, say, virtual reality goggles and I bet any kid could learn to love sleeping alone. :-D Easy peasie.
(I like the other suggestion better, but I was just talking about this with my brother and his wife--it worked great for us, and turned their 7-month-old around in just a couple of nights. David might be a little young...? I don't know. But what we always did with Seth was make it totally clear to him, hey, we hear you and we respond to you, dude. If he cried, boom, we went right in. Not after five minutes, or two minutes, but right away--so he could feel that security, I guess, and also associate his crying with an immediate response. If we picked him up and hugged him, or whatever else, and put him back in bed--or just went and fixed his blankets and gave him his pacifier--and left and he cried again, maybe one or two more times we'd make sure to respond to him really quickly. But then, bummer dude, you've been attended to and now you're just being fussy, and you need to just go to sleep now. So if we decided to not go in again, we made ourselves stick with it no matter how long he cried. Tough sometimes! Except not too often because, really, he figured out SO early and SO fast that crying for more than 30 seconds or a minute is pretty futile. The worst was that rare instance that I gave in after a long wail--which only reinforced the idea that, hey, if I cry for an hour I get picked up! I'm gonna cry for an hour all the time then! But we didn't make that mistake more than once or twice.... Gotta be strong! Anyway, for what that's worth.... I think it really helped Seth feel very secure and safe, being responded to so quickly--while at the same time helping him enjoy sleeping on his own more than throwing a fit. That's a lot of stuff in parenthesis! But it IS secondary to my first comment, after all.... Hehe. Good luck, whatever you try!)
Oh...yah...sleep is a tough one to learn. Eventually they figure it out and you stumble upon whatever might help, but it's so individual. A friend of mine has luck lying down next to the baby so he can sleep. We swaddled Paela until she was almost five months and let her have a pacifier, and that helped her settle well; if she got loose from the swaddle naps only lasted 20 minutes, but otherwise they were 45 minutes on the nose. Every two hours. Like clockwork. :) My sister-in-law only had luck with naps when he fell asleep while eating, and then couldn't move him without waking him; he was probably 6-9 months before he had "better" naps. But the good news is, they get older and it gets easier. And the details get fuzzy. Which is probably for the best.
HeHe, thanks for the suggestions. I wonder if they have virtual reality goggles that make it totally dark like it is in the womb. Oh wait, maybe that's a blindfold and maybe he wouldn't really be keen on that. Swaddling does help somewhat, but he still just doesn't like to nap. He sleeps pretty good at nighttime. I just don't get it. Probably it would be easier if I could figure out what schedule he needs to be on, but every day's still so different...
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