Sleeping/napping habits

You might not like my advice – it’s normal and you CAN get up with both. It’s not easy, I won’t pretend it is, but I’ve been up at night with multiple children for years now. My spacing between most babies is 13-16 mos, so both are usually up. When baby 8 arrives this summer I’ll yet again have 3 children UNDER age 3 and my oldest will have just turned 12. I’ll be up a lot. I have had a few sleep better at night early, but not many. Everyone is an individual.

Okay, now some practical help. First, I would guess that if the 19 month old is waking more there are a few factors going on:

– he hears the baby cry at night and it wakes him. Possible solution: Get a white noise machine and use it every night. We have 3, one in each bedroom. It helps cover night noises and light sleepers don’t wake as often. We even take one to the hospital for our 1yo’s many surgeries so he can sleep better with all the alarms on his equipment/monitors and people coming in and out for checks while in the hospital.

– he could be teething and the pain waking him more often. Possible solution, try some tylenol before bed to see if he sleeps better. (Remember, I’m not a doctor, this is just what we do).

– He misses mom time during the day and is seeking it at night. Again, normal with a new baby in the house. Possible Solution: Snuggle him more often during the day as possible.

– He is not getting enough energy out during the day due to weather or being inside more with new baby and told to play quietly so much of the time because baby is napping, etc. Possible solution: Wear him out with active play during the day!

Practical Advice Part 2: My absolute favorite books on sleep and helping children to sleep better are by Elizabeth Pantley. The No Cry Sleep Solution, The No Cry Sleep Solution for Toddlers and Preschoolers, The No Cry Nap Solution. Check your library or buy them – I love them and they’ve helped tons. The first thing they have you do is keep a sleep log of when and how long your child sleeps, when they wake, how long they’re up at night for each waking, how they go to sleep, etc. I think those forms are even free on her website if you want. I have found that sometimes MY PERCEPTION of how much/how often/how long a child is up at night is off. Or of how little sleep they are getting. It’s usually more than I realize. Once you have a real picture of what your child’s sleep habits are you can work on improving. Her books give tons of possible solutions to try for different things. Really helpful as there is no one way to encourage a child to sleep that will work for all children.

Also, she has tons of ideas for helping a child go to sleep that moves them from total dependence on mommy (similar to what your older child sounds like) to less need for mommy. Very helpful when you’ve got another little one who needs you!

((HUGS)) New baby time is exhausting no matter how you get through it. Rest when and where you can and soak up these snuggles because believe it or not they all learn to sleep without mom eventually and you’ll miss the night time quiet and snuggles.

My suggestion is to let them cry it out. I have 4 kids and all 4 have slept through the night since between 6-12 weeks old. It helped that all 4 were 10 lbs+ at birth, but we would have worked on this early on regardless. Mine are 3,5,9, and 12 now and all are well adjusted without being scarred from learning to fall asleep on their own. Often times kids will wake out of habit, too. In our case, I knew they weren’t hungry or sick, but continuing to wake from habit. At most it took 5 nights for one of mine to learn to fall asleep on his own. He cried maybe 45 m the first night. He, at 3, needs less sleep than the others needed at that age and he has a harder time falling asleep so I give him some books and he looks at them for awhile and then he just goes to sleep.

I could not continue to get up multiple times per night myself as I have trouble sleeping and it takes me hours sometimes to go back to sleep when awakened. That’s fine when it’s short term due to illness, but I would be unable to function well without reasonable amount of sleep. I am always willing to comfort and pray with a child due to bad dreams and such, but I am not willing to interrupt my sleep if its simply a habit as it very often is.

5 nights of crying was worth it for us. Our kids are loved, snuggled, happy kids who learned to sleep at young ages. I am not worried that crying themselves to sleep a few nights stressed or damaged them in any way. It is certainly a personal family decision that isn’t an absolute, but it has to work for the family and not just the child.

Just another perspective.

Christie

ETA – if one of mine begins waking each night, I try to determine why. Dd5 did this for about a week and always said she was having bad dreams. We prayed and comforted and visited the restroom. She always really needed to go. Now we make sure she goes before bed (for some reason she began to forget) and no more waking. I’m not addressing times out of ordinary like teething, illness, occasional bad dreams, but rather the nightly habit of needing help falling asleep.

With my oldest we tried crying it out several times to no avail. He is very strong willed and it just didn’t work until he was older. But, yours is old enough to do this now.

With the next one, he only cried a few days, and has slept well ever since. He didn’t suffer from anything mentally. In fact, he was a very very happy baby!

Also, when my oldest was 1 then 2 and then 3!! He still got up and down every night! We tried it all rewards, spankings-not right away, priviledges taken away when old enough to understand, putting him back time after time..and nothing would ever ever help! Finally, due to new baby and health reasons my dh said just bring him to bed w/ us/him!! I know NOT what you want to do..but he eventually outgrew it! Thank goodness! I think it depends on the child!

He still has a very hard time falling asleep at 10!

Good luck!

Sleep is so important and has only helped hinder my health!!