SLEEP IS FOR THE WEEK part 7 -- prop your eyes open with matchsticks here

[MegBusset]

Zzzzzzzzzzzzz...

Ah... just had a thought... as DS has eczema apparently he is v likely to be allergic to lanolin, so I guess the sheepskin wouldn't be a good idea

Any other ideas of how I could cosy up his cot?

Meg: old duvet under the sheet?

Yay for the good nights and for the bad ones. One word here: COLD. Bad night, DS coughing and crying, and a nappy explosion at 6am. Have vented on the blog.

CM: that's exactly where I am atm, life is too short to be obsessing about sleep ALL the time. It just wore me out in the early months, worrying about sleeping, feeding etc. Nowe I try and be a bit more chilled (though difficult after baaaad nights).

afternoon all

good night here - no probs during the night, and then 1st waking at 7.15...i couldn't be bothered to get up til 7.30 (once the heating had kicked in a bit!)

trying a new schedule of naps here though have been skipping out the 9.30am one, and just going for a long lunchtime one (ds never ever very good at napping!), so yest he slept from 12-1 with a 6min (count 'em!)crying session (i waited outside door ) and then back to sleep til 2pm - hoping he does it again today, but with a 5min crying session!

welcome charlie

never got round to the sheepskin thing, though my mum swears by them and we had them on our bedroom floors once we were bigger - they are lovely! With regards to cold rooms, we've taken to keeping a heater on in ds's room all night - means he can sleep in his summer grobag (which he seems to find more comfortable as it's easier to move about) and room seems to stay a pleasant 19deg all night

that's enough of my rambling for now

ep, i tried to do some yoga at sunstone today and ds screamed his head off in the creche and i had to abandon. i've lost all hope that i'm ever going to be able to leave him with anyone except dh.

I have a question - those of you whose lo's are starting to sleep better than previously(I think this is you Tam) did it just sort of happen or do you think there was something that you did to help it along? I am just thinking of improvements in general ie 6+ wakings down to 2 wakings, or consistency where it was lacking, this sort of thing.

Chibi, we've gradually got better and better with sleep. 4/5 months being the peak of unsettledness. Gradually improving and we've been on an average one waking since about 11 months finally getting the evenings back however this does regress if teething and ill.

Meg, we have a sheepskin. Not sure about it with the eczema on the face, DD doesn't have eczema on her face anymore but I have it under a sheet and then a fleece blanket over that anyway. It's lovely and warm then when we lay her down and soft and comfy. When she was younger we had her laying on it directly and she loved it but once she started sleeping on her tummy I put a sheet on so it didn't tickle her face. We got ours from Spirit of Nature and it's medically tanned (?). Might be worth checking to see if the lanolin is washed out in the processing.

We have another tooth and I'm pretty certain we have a molar on the way which coupled with the cold explains the rubbish nights.

Can't remember what I just read about everyone's nights. EP, hope the little man is ok after his tumble. Meg, hope your night is better. Tibsy, for your lay in and Tam for another good night. Charlie I'd have thought your DH would pay good money for a night sleep. We saw a CO with DD and it didn't make any difference unfortunately but lots of people swear by it. The worst thing to do is compare your life to others and that goes for anything. It makes you feel inadequate, makes your life feel boring and makes you feel like a failure. You're non of those, we're all different and you may well have something that they all want. There are no rules for babies so just accepting it will probably be very liberating. It doesn't make sleep deprivation easier to deal with but accepting I can't do anything about it certainly helped me come to terms with it.

Oh and Tibsy, thanks for asking DD's eczema isn't any better in fact at the mo it's a little worse because of the illness but we're not using a great deal of cream at the mo which is a good sign. Meggy, how is your DS's? What about the 'experiment' you were doing with the hospital?

chibi, we got down to 2 wakings a night for quite a while, and i thought we were doing well, but then it all went haywire at 9 months-ish. getting down to the 2 wakings - i'm not convincedthat anything we really did helped definitively, though i tried to give LO opportunities to self settle where possilbe, and tried to space night feeds no closer than 4 hours. tried to sort out naps, but to be honest i don't know if any one thing was the reason things got better. i think it was a matter of time, as obviously we were going through a 'good patch'. we've just had a bad patch, but i'm hopeful we're seeing the tail end of it now.

You're right GN comparing myself with others always end with me feeling crap about my life and myself. Unfortunately it is something I have been doing since I was a child although I try to talk myself out of thinking like this now I'm a grown up!!

Had a bit of a rubbish day today which I won't go into because I'm too tired. In a nutshell I am struggling with ds1s behaviour. When he gets angry or frusrtated he tends to lash out. Usually his sister takes the brunt, but occasionally its also his friends. When I try to punish him he reacts by trying to hit me. After its all cooled down he is often very emotional and upset about what has happened. He really pushed me to my limits toady. I'm shattered and finding it hard to stay calm and coolheaded with him. Its really hard when he behaves like this because I know how lovely he can be and I worry he is going to alienate his friends. Then in my lowest moments I feel like I'm letting him down because ds2 is so demanding.

One day I might come on this thread and say something positive you never know!!!

In fact I will end on something positive to hopeful cheer some of you up. I suffered with bad sleep from ds1 in particular, he now is a fantastic sleeper and often sleeps 12 hours+ My dd who had awful coilc didn't wake up until 8am today and that is quite normal for her. There is hope!!!

Charliemama, you're feeling so low. Post on the behaviour threads too and get yourself some support about DS1 behaviour. I haven't got the first clue what to suggest, sounds like a control /frustration thing but I'm sure there are lots of people suffering the same that can offer some wisdom. It must be exhausting. Remember that you're a fab mummy and doing your best under very very difficult conditions.

Thanks GN. Imight post on the behaviuor thread. But now I think I am going to bed as dh is watching football.

Ds1 is in many ways a lovely child. His teacher raves about him and he can be really caring and kind. But he has had a lot of changes recently with a new baby and starting school. My dh reassures me it a phase and marks another stage in his development. but it is hard to deal with such antisocial behaviour because i do worry about his relationships with his peers. Nobody wants their child to be aggressive but I am having to work out ways to teach him how to deal with his anger. I am sure we'll get through it. I just felt very tured after it all today. Tommorrow is another day.

charliemama for your emotionally draining day and for ds. have you read the book rasing boys by steve biddulph? he explains the ages/reasons boys behave the way they do. lot to do with testosterone/male role model etc etc. i found it fascinating. ds1 is behaving like all boys, learning to cope with their strength, their feelings and how to control those feelings.
ds has started this already. lashes out at me and then is very remorseful and upset. as with everyhting you're not alone in this!

Ginger yay for dd's tooth! and hope that molar comes through soon so you can get back to how well you were doing before

amber for your interrupted yoga session but at least you were brave enough to try. ds has only been left once in a creche too.
would you think about going back and hoping he gets used to it or (like me) has it put you off?

Chibi with regards to your question. I don't think ds's better sleep is down to anything we've done as we haven't really done anything iykwim!
I have talked about co-sleeping, GR, pu/pd at length on here but have never actually implemented any kind of sleep training as such.
If anything ds has grown into it himself and we've just supported whatever phase he was in at the time. When he wanted milk he got milk, when he wanted in with us he came in with us etc etc
He's now co-sleeping 7-7 with no official(requiring attention) wakenings.

maybe the 1 thing that helped was reducing his milk slowly until he would take water at bed time and now doesn't want/need anything. even that though he prob would have done on his own!

anyway i'm rambling on tonight.
off to bed to watch some crap telly

x post ginger and charlie. night

tam, i don't think i'll go again, as the gym wants a 12 month membership in order to use the creche, and as it didn't go so well today, i'm not reluctant to waste time and money trying to make it work. it's not even ideal for my yoga practice, i would rather be in a dedicated yoga space than a gym.

so am looking for a childminder/nanny who can come a few mornings a week for a few hours so i can duck out to do practice. maybe if he gets used to someone and it's in his home environment, it might be better? or maybe i'm going to have to put yoga on hold for another year might take me a while to find someone because frankly i'm very scared of leaving him with anyone!

will see. another option is that i might be able to find someone to meet me at the yoga studio and take him for a walk in the sling or buggy for an hour and a bit. wonder if ds would be amenable to that? but now the weather's turning, is not so great to be outside. corams fields is prob a 10 min walk from my old yoga studio though, so could take him to stay and play for an hour?
anyway, am still plotting to get some yoga time.

charlie, thanks for the glimmer of hope!

am reluctant

Busy night!

Ginger do you mean your LO sleeps on top of a fleece blanket? I had considered doing that with DS, if I can find one big enough to tuck in under the mattress (or if I can find fitted ones anywhere).

DS' eczema is not too awful at the moment, but still flares up especially on his face, hands and feet. Makes it tricky to feed him, but thankfully he has started accepting spoon-feeding after a couple of weeks' refusal so I feel like we are starting to get somewhere with weaning.

We are still taking part in the research trial but are part of the control group so not actually doing anything other than going to the hospital for check-ups every few weeks.

Amber, do you have any yoga-loving mum friends nearby that you could set up a baby-friendly yoga session with? ie you all bring LOs who stay in one section of the room, with mums taking turns to watch them? Might be a bit hard to concentrate with the noise, I spose...

morning all,

not too bad a night, ds woke up just once, but then started his day at 5:30. he then went back to bed to 6:30 and is still there now! i made DF take him downstairs so i could get some sleep, he was rather reluctant but still did it! DS1 didn't wake till 7, which is very unusual so i had quite a nice lay-in, maybe thats why i feel so rubbish now!

any ideas on what we can do at 5:30 when he just wants to play and we just want to sleep? we tried toys in his cot and room but he just wants to see us it seems!

morning all

hope we had some good nights.

v. good night here again, bed at 7pm, up this morning at 7.30am - bliss Still, must enjoy it while it lasts, won't be long until I have another little one waking me up at all hours!

amber - i know what you mean about leaving ds. I've never left ds with anyone other that dh, except if he is asleep in the evening - i fear he will just scream and scream and i'd feel awful for inflicting that on someone (oh...that's not very helpful is it ) I would agree with you on getting someone to take him for a walk - ds loves being outside in the pram

chibi - unfortunately, we did a sort of cc type thing with ds and his early morning wakings. Basically just left him when he woke at 5am, and he would go back to sleep withing 5-10mins - the good thing is that it only takes one morning and he is good as gold the next day

ginger - ouch for big molar - i am not looking forward to getting those - we have been incredibly grumpy and dribbly here so heavens knows what they will bring!

charlie - we all have those crap days hoping it is better today but feel free to vent and unload as much as you want here - no judging from us!

morning to everyone else - think i'll finish this essay off!

crapolla nigt here. ds has heavy cold (again sigh) so he tossed and turned and sneezed all night. medised tonight!

morning!!
ginger, pleased to hear that lo not needing so much cream and for the tooth but for the molars.

beal - for df taking lo off your hands for a bit

skirmish for your night, well done lovely!!

charlie - chin up love. you're doing a grand job by the sounds of it, lesser mortals would have crumbled with lack of sleep and 3 littleys

our night ok, bed at 8.30pm
fed at 11.30pm
fed at 3.30am
up at 6.50am
think she wanted another feed then, but held her off to make sure she wanted breakfast

am going to try to cut down again on night feeds (wish i could be more consistent )

awwww tamdin, sorry to hear about your night, that was me last week. we put karvol in ds cot and it made a bit of differene however it;s notw gone to his chest and he;s on antibiotics and i have to shove these drop things up his nose!!!

for your night tam. hope ds feels better soon. his system probably a bit knocked about after the tonsilitis maybe?

amber - keep on plotting love, you'll find something that works. if i was nearer love, i'd look after lo myself

yukko night tams - seems to be going around. We got a calpol plug in which seemed to work quite well, combined with the medised. Still snotty here (almost 2wks since cold started) but i'm guessing a runny nose might last longer when you don't know how to blow it

calpol plug in? never heard of that. how does it work? i might get one for my bedroom, let alone ds'.

tam, sorry for your crappola night,hope ds better soon.

my night was similar to yours tibs, waking at 12ish (dh settled), feed at 3.30 up at 6.30.

oh i see, its a eucalyptus oil thing ... i thought it was actual calpol medicated stuff somehow, though couldn't work out how!