Well, our world has pretty much turned upside down over the past week or so…and this is a good thing! 2 weeks ago, our life revolved around the following cycle which we played out at least four times a day:
Minute :00 - “He’s rubbing his eyes! He’s yawning! Ready, set, go! Get him down for a nap before he gets overtired!” – and no, this wasn’t us overreacting – he seriously was ALWAYS on the brink of being overtired which when allowed to occur (i.e. waiting 5-10 minutes beyond a yawn), resulted in a VERY crabby boy who seriously fought his nap.
:00-:20 -One of us (usually whomever lost the “rock/paper/scissors” contest) would trudge upstairs to put our boy down for his nap. Sadly, cuddling and rocking this boy did nothing except infuriate him and we were met with screaming and crying. No, this boy needed some serious motion to get him to sleep – we did squats, we did lunges, we walked up and down the hallway, we danced, we jiggled, and finally after many many minutes of this aerobic routine, the screams would die away and our little overtired dude would finally give in to sleep and let his beautiful little eyes close.
:21-:30 -Keep holding him until he gets into a really deep sleep – these 10 minutes go by slowly but they are essential otherwise he’d definitely wake up when we put him down (playing Angry Birds on the iTouch helped this phase go by quicker!). We’d hold our breath hoping he wouldn’t wake up as we put him into crib, turn on the white noise, and tiptoe out of the room.
:30-1:00 -Try to relax and have some "mommy-time", but really spend the entire half hour worried that he'll wake up any minute.
1:00 – exactly 40 minutes after falling asleep for a nap, Zain would wake up.
Because his naps were always so short, they weren’t fully restorative which meant that an hour would pass and he’d be tired again = repeat above cycle!! Our entire lives basically revolved around this 2-2.5 hour cycle. He was exhausted, we were exhausted, and because his periods of wakefulness were so short, we hardly had any time to really do much with him beyond a bit of play or a short walk. Even his periods of wakefulness were punctuated with a “ready, set, go!” feeling because they were so precious and so short.
That was before we came to the very difficult decision that it was time to do things differently. As much as we were tired of doing squats in the dark every two hours, we would have kept doing it if it meant he well-rested. But he wasn’t. Fortunately his night sleep was pretty good, so we kept pushing his bedtime earlier to compensate for his poor napping. Pretty soon he was going to bed for the night at 6pm, and we realized that things had to change.
The solution we decided to try was called the “SleepEasy Solution” – it was recommended by a few different friends who tried it and who found it to be the miracle they were looking for. Basically it involves setting up very consistent naptime and bedtime routines and doing the exact same thing every time. The idea is to create new sleep associations for him to replace the old ones. For example, before naptime we listen to the same lullaby, read the same book, etc. Then once the routine is done you put your baby in the crib AWAKE (“Wait a minute – did they say awake?? This isn’t going to work!”) and walk out of the room. If they cry then you “check-in” – first you wait 5 minutes then go in the room and talk to them soothingly for 30 seconds and then walk out again. Next time wait 10 minutes, then 15 minutes, then every 15 minutes until they fall asleep.
Skeptically we proceeded. Our first purchase was a video monitor – if I had to listen to my baby cry, I wanted to get a visual – make sure he was okay and not in any danger. We weren’t sure if this would make it harder or easier, but we both agree now in retrospect that we probably couldn’t have done it without it – it just gave us peace of mind. Our second purchase – chocolate ice cream. If we were going to have to listen to him cry till he learned to soothe himself, we’d need something to soothe ourselves in the meantime!!
They suggest starting at bedtime (rather than naptime), so despite the fact that his night sleep was actually pretty decent, we followed their advice and started in the evening. I did the routine, put him in the crib, gave him a kiss, and walked out. I heard his whimpers begin as I reached the door and my heart began to break. With chin-up I went downstairs where Jen was waiting – eyes glued to the monitor and ice-cream in hand. That first night was TOUGH. And I mean TOUGH. He cried on and off for about 45 minutes. Finally he remembered how he soothes himself – by singing and moaning – and he started doing it!! We knew sleep was near. 53 minutes after I put him in the crib he was fast asleep! We couldn’t believe our eyes!
Things got rapidly better after this. The next night he only took 9 minutes to fall asleep, and by the third night he was down to 3 minutes. Naps went equally well. The amazing thing is that his naps suddenly became 1.5-2 hours long!!! We couldn’t believe this! He seemed so rested and happy when he woke up and was able to stay awake for over 2 hours at a time!!
Now, almost 2 weeks later our boy is a champ! Most of the time he’ll fall asleep with no crying at all - just sing to himself until he falls asleep. Sometimes he’ll be fast asleep by the time we get to his room door to walk out! Other times he’ll fuss or cry on and off for 5-10 minutes before falling asleep. We’re so proud of him for learning different ways to soothe himself! And we love watching him on the monitor as he sings himself to sleep – it is truly the sweetest thing (we'll post a video of this soon!). Most of his naps last between 1-2 hours. There are of course bad days where for whatever reason he takes shorter naps or takes a bit longer to fall asleep – but we figure that’s just par for the course, and usually the next day he’s back to his new normal again.
The best thing is that we now have plenty of time to enjoy him. He stays awake 2-2.5 hours between naps which leaves us plenty of time to explore new ways to play together, enjoy the outdoors, or just lie around and cuddle! We were worried about his attachment and trust being ruined by this process, but in fact the opposite has occurred – because we have so much more time and energy to play together, our attachment and bonding has actually increased! The other great thing is that we have some “mommy-time” during the day! Sometimes so much that we’re not even sure what to do with it! Needless to say, laundry and exercise no longer need to wait until after he goes to bed at night, and we’re managing to find time to cook healthy meals and keep the house tidy (and write long, rambling blog posts)!
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