Hellobee

I hesitate to even write about T’s sleep yet, as the superstitious side of me says, “Don’t do it! You’ll jinx it!” I figure most of you readers are parents yourselves though, far more experienced than we are, and you’ll understand the desire to celebrate the small victories even if you know they might be short lived. I write this as I peer at the video monitor where I can see that he is stirring…

I’m pretty proud of how far we’ve come in such a short time with T’s sleep. He’s almost 7 months old and wasn’t a terrible sleeper when he came about a month ago. Clearly though, T was unsettled when he first arrived. He slept reasonably well at night, although woke every hour or two briefly to have his pacifier reinserted after his initial 3-4 hour stretch. Luckily, he only woke for more than 30 seconds or so once each night and was easy to soothe back to sleep after a bottle and diaper change. His naps were so hard though. He would rarely nap in his crib for more than 10-15 minutes. Occasionally he’d get to 25 minutes and very rarely to 45 minutes. He was tired during the day, ready for another nap with under two hours of awake time.

The hardest part about learning T’s schedule was not knowing him. I’m sure this is an issue to some degree with all newborns, but T isn’t a newborn. He is far less of a blank slate. T has a past and he may or may not have had a schedule, but we have no access to any of that information. So it felt like a big guessing game trying to figure out what he was telling us. After a month I can say that I am fairly confident that I know what to expect as far as when he will need to nap, eat and play.

Naps have become more consistent and easier to predict. Most days, if we are home he will take three naps in his crib (I still hold him for naps sometimes, but now it’s more because I like the snuggles), that last between 45 minutes and 2 hours. This afternoon he slept for a whopping 2 hours and 45 minutes. I’m guessing we will pay for that tonight! He usually lasts about 2 hours between naps, although if we are out and can time feedings strategically, he can stretch it to 3 hours without too much fussing. Feeding solids entertains him for quite a good chunk of time.

This is what has worked for us so far: In attempting to establish a routine for T, we have been pretty methodical about how we put him down for naps and for the night. We haven’t developed a perfect bedtime routine yet, but some things are starting to work well for the ritual.

T loves to fiddle with something when he’s falling asleep. He uses my hand when I’m rocking him and feeding him, but I found that this often caused a problem when I finally had to pry my fingers out of his grasp. We started using a lovey, a stuffed animal head with a small blanket attached, that we had picked up before T came to us. At first he ignored it – of course it didn’t mean anything special to him – but after a week or so I noticed he was starting to rub the satin edges of the blanket and hold the ears as he was falling asleep.

Taking a nap in Missus Turtle’s arms.

We used a sleep sack at night from the beginning, but for some reason it didn’t occur to me to use it for naps. The house is warmer during the day and T is a bit of a hot body, so I didn’t want to overheat him. Finally, a few days ago, I put the sleep sack on him for a nap. He fell asleep faster and stayed asleep longer than he had for any previous naps. When it’s warm in the house we just strip him down to a diaper first. We have a couple of microfleece sleep sacks that work well as backups. Our favorite, though, is a 3.5 tog sack we found here that keeps him warm and cozy (and slightly less mobile!) in his crib in our chilly room.

We have an extra cell phone and I found a white noise app that works well. I’m also learning to tell when T is soothed by a lullaby, and when it keeps him awake. I think I’ve sung “Hush, Little Baby” 1800 times in the last two weeks, but sometimes it’s better just to stay quiet and let him fall asleep without as much stimulation.

Helping me hold the bottle. Wouldn’t want to let it go!

We have learned to read his cues and respond quickly. When he first came he got overtired very quickly, and the window between the first yawn or eye rub and “too late I’m never sleeping again” was pretty short. This seems to have improved, although I’m not sure if it’s because we’re better at reading him and knowing what to expect when.  I don’t usually rely on bottles to help  him fall asleep. They are handy, though, when he’s gotten overtired and is really fighting sleep. He almost always drifts off if he has a bottle.

It’s been an interesting journey getting to know this little person. After a month, though, I’m really beginning to feel like we are in sync for the most part. It’s going to be awfully hard to let him go if that time comes.