- an enigma
- overrated or underrated - depending on whether you're getting it or not
- something you take for granted until you have kids!
- not happening in the Gore house!
Sigh, we have had our fair share of sleep issues. Chloe started out as my all star sleeper. She started sleeping in 9 hour stretches at night when she was only 4 weeks old. I thought, "YES! Finally, I have one of those babies who is a good sleeper!" And of course, "I deserve this after never sleeping when Grace was a baby."
We have lost some MAJOR ground in this area. It all started when Chloe was about 3 to 4 months old - probably about the time her teeth started moving. Why does teething ruin EVERYTHING?!
I went from waking to feed Chloe at 5am and having her go back to sleep till about 7 to putting her down at 8 and getting out of bed up to 7 times at night! Yes, 7 times! She's not crying because she's hungry, although I do feed her one of the times I get up at night. I have no idea what the issue is. It's almost like she is waking and is then unable to put herself back to sleep. I am not sure why that's an issue at night, because I put her in her crib awake and have her put herself to sleep for naps. It's driving me CRAZY! As every parent knows....sleep deprivation affects EVERY part of your life. It makes you crazy, overdramatic, irrational, short and just plain grumpy. Not a good combo when you're at home with kids all day.
One would think Chloe would sleep well during the day.
Wrong.
She only sleeps about 2 hours during the day. That's the same amount most babies her age take for one nap. I don't have the luxury of putting her on a nap schedule during the day because Grace isn't interested in sitting around the house all day long while Chloe naps (or attempts to nap) as the case may be. So, Chloe takes anywhere from 2 to 4 naps a day. Some are only 10 min in the car and others are 45 min in her crib.
Oh, and to top it all off, Grace isn't napping either.
Apparently, I just really need to vent...... Between getting out of bed 4-7 times a night and then getting up for the day at 6:30 and not having any down time away from the kids during the day, I think I'm losing my mind!
Any suggestions? I'm totally at a loss here.
Here is what we've tried:
Grace:
- Quiet time in her room. She is getting much better at this, but it's not really relaxing for me because she's yelling "I'm done!!!" almost the entire time. We set a timer so she knows when it's OK to come out, but I usually end up putting her back in there at least twice during her quiet time.
Chloe:
- I've tried letting her cry it out (on a fairly limited basis because I don't want it to wake Grace up) This just gets her even more worked up.
- Not feeding her and just giving her a paci.
- Having Aaron go in there instead of me.
- Loading her up w/ food at dinner time so she isn't hungry.
- Giving her Motrin to help w/ the teething
- She's not too hot/cold and sleeps with some white noise
Whatcha think?
