It Only Took Two Years!

Well, technically it took 25 months, but it finally happened. We can now go through our bedtime ritual with Adam and then leave him in his room fully conscious and he'll fall asleep on his own! It has been the routine for about a week now and I'm hopeful it's going to stick.

When it comes to Adam sleeping, we have tried just about every trick, tool, gadget, aid, piece of advice you could imagine. I have read no fewer than 6 books devoted to getting your kid to sleep more. The thing is, he sleeps more at 2 than he did at 1 month (when babies are supposed to be sleeping 16 or more hours a day).

Here's a few sleep things we tried with Adam. I'll describe them in chronological order (that is, the order in which we tried them).

Co-Sleeping
I tried sleeping with Adam next to me (co-sleeping as they now call it) in his first few weeks of life but he was a nonstop wriggler. His little arms would flail about all night punching me in the face and he didn't seem to like being too close. So I kicked him out of our bed and into the pack n' play next to us.

To the pack n' play! To the crib!
Every time he would move about in the pack n' play it would jiggle for a few seconds afterward and made these tiny scratchy noises. Well, he flailed every few seconds so the thing was constantly jiggling, constantly keeping me awake. So I moved him farther down the hall into his own crib in his own bedroom.

Adam Meets the Straight Jacket
After about a month of being outside the womb, his nervous system started to mature causing him to constantly startle himself. I would literally have to hold his hands down to get him to sleep. I felt like I was wrestling him. Once you laid him down he would startle himself awake again. Normal blankets didn't work for swaddling him so we had to find something stronger. That's when I found the Miracle Blanket, which does the job of pinning your darling angel's arms down for you so they can't startle themselves awake. It really did work miracles for him. It didnt' turn him into the fantastic sleeper all the other moms in the world seemed to be blessed with, but he did eek out a few decent naps a week.

God Forbid, CIO
Still, it was a 50/50 shot that he would wake up and not go back to sleep once you laid him down. So we got frustrated and tried the Cry It Out routine a few times. He would cry hours upon hours if you let him. I could not.

The Wonder From Down Under
Don't ask me how, but I eventually came across this contraption called the Amby Bed. By this time I think Adam was about 7 months old and I was so exhausted that I was willing to try just about anything. It's a hammock that is suspended from a frame (that comes with it). When the baby starts to move around it gently bounces and sways lulling your baby back to sleep. Plus, it swaddles them while they are on their back so they feel secure. Get this. The first night we put him in it, he slept 11 hours straight! After that, he caught on to the fact that it would make him sleep so he was a little more difficult to get to sleep, but we reached a turning point with the hammock and you could put him in it semi-awake rather than waiting the full 45 minutes until he was in "deep sleep", or stage 3 of sleep (infants take this long to reach stage 3; adults take less than 20).

More Black Eyes
After about 11 months Adam decided he needed to sleep on his tummy. He would get terribly frustrated at not being able to roll over in the hammock, which the Amby bed prevents. So we tried the crib, which he detested, of course. So he spent a few weeks in bed with us again. However, after waking up with his foot in my mouth, fist in my eye, and fingers tangled in my hair on several occasions, I had to boot him out again.

Cribs
Back into the crib he went. He did a little better after he learned to get himself onto his tummy in his sleep. But we still had to go into his room several times a night. A few times I even fell asleep in his crib WITH him.



After this, I decided it was time to make things easier on everyone. I bought Adam a twin-size mattress and put it on the floor against the wall in his bedroom. This way, he could climb in and out as he wished. Roll around all he wanted. And if we fell asleep with him trying to get him back to sleep, we wouldn't wake up with leg cramps and crib rails embedded on our foreheads. One of the best decisions I've ever made.

For many months, Adam's twin bed was, admittedly, his and DH's bed. The queen bed was mine (it's not called a queen bed for nothin'!). Now it is, properly, mine and DH's bed again. Natasha does join us in the middle of the night after she wakes up to eat at 4 am, but she's not like Adam, practicing to be an NHL enforcer in her sleep. She's pretty still all night long. Adam taught us a lot of tricks that I have used on her. She's definitely easier to get to sleep, but knowing so many tricks certainly has helped.

So tonight, after Adam had his bath, watched his 1/2 hour of tv (these days it's usually Little Einsteins, but tonight it was Dora), he got his one book read to him in his new bed (a really cool upgraded bed - it's a bunk bed but he doesn't know that there's anything on top yet) while his "stars" were on (it's a spinning lantern). We said goodnight to him and left him alone listening to his sleep tunes CD I made for him.

Wonders never cease to exist! Only two more years and maybe the second kid will be going to sleep on her own (and sleeping through the night).