As the ticker says, it is 18 days until we leave for Thailand, wow!! I'm not exactly sure where the time is going but in the midst of all of our preparations, we have had some sleeping trouble with JBB. We had always been pretty lucky with JBB, he has tended to be a good sleeper, sleeping through the night from about 12 weeks and apart from a few nights here or there when he was sick or teething, he continued on that way until a couple of months ago.
I don't know how it happened but two months sped by without me really realizing what was going on. I know that's probably hard to believe but it is actually true. There have been a couple of contributing factors, he has been sick and teething on and off but on Wednesday night, I realized that it had been two months of getting up with him anywhere from 2-5am. Over that time we have done almost everything wrong, fed him in the middle of the night, brought him into our bed, rocked him back to sleep etc. Honestly, it is tough not to do those things when you are absolutely and utterly bone tired.
On Wednesday night, I got it into my sleep addled mind that we would give controlled crying a try (stupidly, I had done no research and decided on the spur of the moment, der!!). So I proceeded to let the poor darling cry, going into his room at longer and longer intervals. This did not work and he ended up crying for nearly 2 hours. I'm horrified with myself and feel terrible about how poor JBB must have felt. In desperation, I sent an SOS out to all of my girlfriends with babies asking for advice and they all contributed their thoughts. The 2 things I have realized is that firstly, he could be cold (thinking about my poor gorgeous little boy crying for all that time because he was cold makes me feel physically Ill and secondly, that we had not been as rigid with his routine over the past few months which has probably created some anxiety for him.
Last night, we reinstituted his bedtime routine and we allowed him to go to bed and settle himself, which he did with barely a protest and we left the heater on overnight because it has been quite cold. He slept from 7am to 5am which is pretty good. I am also changing his routine a bit during he day to see if that will also help, so far so good. We are going to focus on a nice familiar routine over the next couple of weeks and we will keep it going whilst in Thailand so we can give JBB that level of familiarity and comfort.
It hasn't escaped my notice that in my zeal to be as prepared and organized as possible for Thailand, I have let some of the fundamentals slip, no more, I tell you, I want JBB to be back to feeling safe and secure and all of us to be a bit more well rested. It is back to the routines now!!
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Steel bars and shoelaces
2 years ago
Wow, only 18 days! I bet it will go by rather quickly and before you know it you will be in Thailand!
ReplyDeleteTry not to beat yourself up about what happened with JBB. The important thing was you knew things weren't right and it sounds like you have found a solution. I will share with you my own "greatest moment in parenting" when TK was about JBB's age. TK had been sleeping through the night with occasional wakeups. But, usually, if we just let him cry for 10 minutes or so he falls back asleep. One night TK started crying, 10 minutes passed, then 20 minutes. My husband says to me it's pretty cold tonight, I wonder if he is cold. I tell him TK is fine, I don't feel cold at all, TK will go back to sleep soon. I go back to sleep. Half an hour later, TK is still crying. I get up out of bed and throw off my warm comforter only to realize, it's cold! I go into TK's room and it feels cold in there too. I pick him up and there is not a warm spot on his body! I felt so awful, I cradled him and pressed him to my body to warm him up. He fell back asleep and I stayed up the rest of the night, cradling him in my arms to make sure he stayed warm!