I hope everyone is well. We are both really well, except my stupid upper back and neck which is still giving me hell
There's been lots of chatting about day sleeps, cat napping and crying so I thought I'd put in my two cents worth and tell you where we are out now and what we are doing.
Izzy is sleeping roughly 10 hours a night, straight through most of the time. She's woken at 3am for a feed 4 nights in the past 2 weeks and after our meeting with the maternal health nurse today, it looks like she's just trying to increase my supply - will elaborate on that later. Other than those random 3am feeds, she is sleeping straight through generally from 7pm-5am or 8pm - 6am. It's brilliant.
Day sleeps are fantastic for us now too. Izzy generally sleeps for 3 hours in the morning then has another couple of hours in the afternoon. If we are out in the afternoon (I'm avoiding going out in the mornings now as her routine is working well), she tends to sleep in the car or pram - generally another 1-2 hours all up. I learnt quite a lot from our day stay at sleep school (and regained my confidence with knowing her cries) and I'm using a lot of the techinques we learnt there to settle Izzy during the day. It's working beautifully.
We work on a 1.5-2 hour awake time schedule when we are at home and out. Izzy wakes up around 6ish say, has a feed (generally takes about 45 minutes) then it's play time - a mixture of play gym, rocker, reading a book with me, tummy time and chatting. I check her for tired signs around 1.5 hours after she's woken and start getting her ready for bed. I swaddle her and pop her dummy in and give her a quick cuddle and rock in our rocking chair in her nursery. After a few minutes I pop her in her hammock and gently rock and bounce her to sleep. Sometimes there is no fuss and she goes straight to sleep, other times I have to spend 10 minutes rocking her and putting her dummy back in. She often protests but I now know it's just her tired protesting cry and it doesn't last long at all. I don't leave the room until she has nodded off. If she stirs during her nap (ie cries) I go in and bounce/rock the hammock or give her the dummy if I think she needs it. I only get her up if she is really unsettled or if she is due for a feed and appears ready to get up. I repeat the whole process after her next feed.
When we are out I work on the same schedule. It doens't work quite as well while we're out as there is more going on (ie more for her to sticky beak at!) and she is interrupted ie in and out of the car, pram, shops, etc. I still stick to it though and often she will nod off in the car or the pram. I always take my Bubba Moe sling with me everywhere as if she won't settle in the pram, I pop her in the sling and she nods off without fail if she's due for a sleep.
Today we had to see the health nurse at 9.30am so I put her to bed at 7.45am and transferred her to the pram at 9.15 and walked to our appointment. So she got almost 2 hours sleep. When we got back I gave her a quick feed (she had been awake for 1.5 hours), swaddled her and popped her into bed. She was asleep straight away and has been down for 1.5 hours now.
Bedtime is always around 7 (well that is our goal) so I alter the time frame and feeds later in the day to fit with that. Izzy gets a bit grumpy around 5ish as she knows it's wind down time to bed. If she's grumpy we take her for a walk and that keeps her happy. Around 6 we give her a bath then I feed her straight after that. We pop her in her Grobag then give her a formula top up (she'll have anywhere from 30ml to 160ml as my supply is low around then) then put her in the cot for the night. She goes down without any fuss.
So that's how we do it and it really does work well. The sling is my saviour if she won't settle while we are out and about - highly recommend one of these if you don't have one already. If you can afford a hammock, I highly recommend them too. It works a treat.
I hope that helps someone! One thing I did learn about catnapping at sleep school is often babies can be resettled after a catnap as they are often just coming out of their sleep cycle and need a little help to nod back off again. That definitely works for Izzy when she stirs after 45 minutes.
CC/CIO - I'm not a fan of it at all. Babies only cry to communicate with us and if we don't respond to their cries, then how are they supposed to trust us? Another thing I learnt at sleep school was that most babies need help to get to sleep and they will stir at the end of their sleep cycle, just like adults. The only difference with adults is that we know how to get back to sleep, babies have to learn that. Also remember, as adults we have restless nights when we struggle to sleep or we may sleep lightly, so we have to expect that babies will be the same, IYKWIM.
I'm thrilled with the routine Izzy has gotten herself into (I haven't forced it at all, it's all her own doing) and feel so much more relaxed now as I can predict her a little more and plan our days a little better.
Oh, before I stop babbling, Izzy was weighed and measured today. She hasn't gained much weight (she's only 4.74kg but has grown 9cm since birth though) so I need to try to sneak in a couple more feeds during the day when she's awake. That's the downside of a good day sleeper! LOL. I'm going to give her more formula top ups too from now on and I'm thinking of weaning once my last lot of medication runs out for my supply and vasospasm (in my nipples). Breastfeeding has been a hard slog and I'm ready to switch to formula if she doesn't gain much within the next couple of weeks.
Well I'm off now to jump on the Wii Fit before missy wakes up! Ciao!
PS: Losec has done wonders for Izzy's silent reflux too. I seriously have a different baby these days!
PPS: I posted my birth story in the 'Birth Stories' thread for anyone interested in reading it.
Last edited by Taurean; December 3rd, 2009 at 02:36 PM.
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