well, still waiting for the computer…should be another day or two….but right now, i need HELP! Who can tell me the title of that parenting book…you know the one that is undeniably right….that if you follow will for sure work for your child and will have the correct answer every time? What was the name of that book again?
Fiona has yet to sleep through the night….we have never tried any “tactics” to get her to sleep through the night because I’ve always thought she was a pretty good sleeper in comparison to a lot of my friends…but recently a couple of things have changed. Now when she gets up in the middle of the night she stays up for 2 or more hours! And it feels like it’s time for her to be putting herself back to sleep…which i know, we’re supposed to teach her…right? isn’t that what the books say? Until now my ace in the hole has been to nurse her…in fact, I have to nurse her or she gets very mad….but of course, at 11 months she doesn’t need to nurse in the middle of the night…she just likes to….PLUS she has started to bite me at the end of nursing…and i mean BITE me….she is finally starting to get a tooth and I don’t want to be on the receiving end of that bite now let alone when that tooth comes in.
So…here was the plan…no more nursing in the middle of the night…only right before bed and in the morning…and try to nurse her less during the day unless she asks for it (she takes a bottle when i’m gone anyway) Night one (saturday) Fi woke up at 1 a.m. and when she realized that nursing wasn’t in the picture she cried for 3 hours…we left her in her crib to cry and would go in there every bit to hold her and but her back down…finally she quieted down and after a long time i snuck back in to cover her up but she was still awake and saw me and started screaming…finally after a few hours she fell asleep in my arms and slept till 9 a.m. a new record. Sunday night same…she woke up at 3 and I went in and held her …no nursing…she relaxed in my arms but WOULD NOT fall asleep….i suppose at that time i should have laid her back down into bed and let her cry….yes? i don’t know!! after several attempts to put her back in her crib i caved and nursed her (this was two hours later and just a couple hours before i had to get up to go to work) and she fell right to sleep.
I am unsure of what to do here? Do I just keep nursing her at night and she will wean herself from it? Or is the nursing what’s prompting her to get up in the middle of the night still? At 11 months were your kids putting themselves to sleep? And back to sleep? Sleeping all night? Nursing through the night?
I know that consistency is the key and I failed that test on the second night…sigh….
So if you can just point me in the direction of the book mentioned above…i would really appreciate it ….
ugh.. there IS no answer I’m afraid. I am trying to remember when I quit night nursing all together. My philosophy has always been whatever gets the FAMILY the most sleep. If she will go right back to sleep after night nursing.. or won’t scream.. then do it. She will outgrow it… it will get to the point where you can try again (or she will just sleep through it). I nursed J/L at 2am just last week….. it still happens VERY randomly. I will always try to let them go back to sleep on their own when they wake up during the night, but if there is an all out scream fest and it is clear to me taht going back to sleep is not going to happen I just nurse them and they go right to sleep… I do this more for me b/c I want to go back to sleep. Eventually (I’m not sure when, but after 12 months for sure) they stopped waking up that way. They might whimper a bit (still do sometimes), but will/would usually go back to sleep. That’s my two cents anyway. She’s not gonig to be waking up to nurse when she’s 5…
Chose your battles.. YOU need to sleep.. that is just as important as her getting sleep!
This does actually bring up the “ponderism” of why do people say they ’slept like a baby’ after a good night’s sleep when babies rarely sleep through the night?
Seriously. Who’s in charge of this stuff?