Sleeping like a baby, part 2

Thankfully, a lot has changed in 16 days since I last wrote this post.

I’m writing this from the comfort (if it can be called that) of a CPM Machine while A home sick from school with a fever and a cold should be napping. Instead, she’s been hanging out in her crib singing and playing for the last 20 minutes. Two months ago, she would have been screaming.

Once A was feeling better and was on whole milk bottles during the day, we started re-implementing the Express Sleep Plan with the ultimate goal of her waking up and needing comfort one or less times a night.

We were making very good progress. Until on November 24, she realized she could throw all of the blankets and all of the pacifiers out of her crib when she was mad. I’m sure it made her feel temporarily in control, but once she realized all of her comfort items were now out of her reach, she became even more upset.

Starting on November 25, we limited comfort nursing to once a night. I would still go in if she cried for more than 10 minutes (or threw all of the blankets out). Within about two nights, she make the transition.

But then she started throwing out her blankets and pacifiers even more. That’s when we added a total of five pacifiers and three blankets to her crib at night. The only catch was keeping her distracted enough at bedtime not to throw them out for us to retrieve. By December 3, we had significant progress.

Which was great, because I underwent surgery on December 4. J and I were concerned with not only how she would do with mommy out of commission for a bit, but mostly with how the nights would go. Luckily, we had started transitioning the nighttime routine to be mostly J centered. Turns out that night she slept straight through the night!

Since then she’s averaged waking up just once a night, even though she’s had a terrible head and chest cold.

We know sleep will always be a work in progress with A and we will always have to monitor her sleep and schedule, but knowing we have a plan that works makes us confident. Even when she isn’t feeling well, we can make sure she gets the rest she needs.