And I thought being woken up at 4:40 a.m. was bad enough. Mari was up yesterday at 9:48 p.m., as if the previous sleep interval from 7:16 p.m. had been only a nap. She screamed and screamed and refused to feed, only calming down when we let her get up and play for awhile. She didn't fall asleep until 12:35 a.m.
She slept only a total of just over 10 hours out of a 24-hour period yesterday, when really she needs about 12.5 hours to function, 13 to be moderately happy. The nights recently when she slept all the way through the night, she got more than 14 hours of sleep -- a whopping and unprecedented 15.5 hours last Wednesday. I don't know why she suddenly stopped sleeping as well. I feel like I've been doing everything the same way, giving her every opportunity to sleep. It doesn't seem like she's teething or in pain, because she was perfectly happy when we let her get up last night. She just wanted to be up, though plainly it was the last thing she needed. Maybe she got a little too much excitement yesterday, with both her grandma (on my side) and grandpa (on Jon's side) being here and providing her with plenty of attention. That's the only thing I can think of. Sigh...
Showing posts with label amount of sleep. Show all posts
Showing posts with label amount of sleep. Show all posts
Monday, May 10, 2010
Wednesday, May 5, 2010
Day 104: Finally learning to nap?
I'm not sure if I'm doing anything differently, but Mari seems to finally be learning to nap. Lately we have had fewer and fewer 30-45 minute naps, which used to be our curse. I used to always have to try to rush in and put her back to sleep, but that was hit and miss. More than half the time I wouldn't be able to get her back down and she'd be cranky from not having slept enough.
Today, very unusually, she had two naps of more than two hours each. This is well-nigh unheard-of. I don't expect this to become a pattern, but certainly she has been napping for more than an hour at a stretch more consistently. And except for today, when she went down at 7:50, her usual bedtime of about 7:30 and wake time of about 6:30 (well, between 6:00 and 7:00 a.m.) hasn't been affected by her napping better. She's just in a better mood more often. Yay!
What's more, Mari slept ALL the way through the night last night -- 11.5 hours. Double yay!
Today, very unusually, she had two naps of more than two hours each. This is well-nigh unheard-of. I don't expect this to become a pattern, but certainly she has been napping for more than an hour at a stretch more consistently. And except for today, when she went down at 7:50, her usual bedtime of about 7:30 and wake time of about 6:30 (well, between 6:00 and 7:00 a.m.) hasn't been affected by her napping better. She's just in a better mood more often. Yay!
What's more, Mari slept ALL the way through the night last night -- 11.5 hours. Double yay!
Thursday, April 22, 2010
Day 91: Book reviews continued
Continued from this post...
3. Healthy Sleep Habits, Happy Child, by Marc Weissbluth, M.D.
There was a good deal I liked and found useful about this book. However, in my opinion the most fundamental thing about this book -- the recommended "extinction" crying method is overly harsh and unnecessary for most babies.
But let's start with what I did like, most of all the maxim that sleep begets sleep. Here, I have found that Weissbluth is right and Ferber is wrong. Almost always, an earlier bedtime, not a later one, is better for Mari's sleep. She sleeps more and better than when I've tried to keep her up longer or later. Of course, there is a limit, though Weissbluth sometimes seems to imply otherwise. Mari cannot and will not sleep for more than 14 hours in a day at the most, and she averages about 13 hours, though if I recall correctly, Weissbluth recommends 14-15.
Another thing I liked is the emphasis Weissbluth places on baby temperament and his acknowledgment, missing in many other books, that some babies just aren't going to be as good of sleepers as others, and that what works for most babies may not work for a certain percentage -- especially those who were very fussy as younger babies, which Mari certainly was. It was reassuring to me to know that just because some techniques work with other babies and don't seem to work with Mari, it's not necessarily because I'm doing something wrong -- it's because Mari is a different baby.
For the above reasons, I am prepared to believe that there are some babies for whom the extinction crying method Weissbluth advocates may be the only thing that works. However, I also believe that it's highly stressful for babies. It's plain that babies don't like to cry. Their faces turn red, their temperature goes up, they give every indication of being in extreme distress. Babies cry to communicate. Whether it's because they're in pain or because they just want their mothers, for the baby, something is wrong. I believe those needs should be responded to promptly (though not necessarily immediately), unless there's a damn good reason to delay response. In my opinion, a parent should consistently and patiently try every other method possible before resorting to the extinction method.
It's true that babies need to learn to fall asleep and stay asleep on their own. It may be true that for some babies, a certain amount of crying is necessary before they learn. However, just plain ignoring the baby's cries, no matter how long it takes, ignores the possibility the baby may be in pain or discomfort, which if fixed could get him or her to sleep.
I did find Weissbluth makes good points about why it's so important for children to be well-rested. However, I thought he overstated the case. I found myself worrying as I read it that I had already caused Mari irreparable damage by letting her stay up too long in the past. I even wondered if that was the cause of her not doing things such as crawling as fast as some babies (though she is still very much within the normal range). With a little more distance, I found the book was making me worrying too much. More guilt is something parents don't need.
Another issue I have with the book is that it is overly long, repetitive and written in a convoluted manner. However, that may be the editor in me talking.
4. The Baby Sleep Book, by William, Robert, James and Martha Sears
I like Dr. Sears a lot. I find what he says about attachment parenting (I have the book by that name and love it) makes a lot of sense. Though I no longer follow it to the letter (I allow some limited crying alone, I no longer "wear" Mari much at home, we no longer co-sleep), I believe in the philosophy of maintaining a strong bond between parent and baby. I believe the amount of time I spent in earlier months wearing or carrying Mari, co-sleeping, responding immediately to her cries, bonding with her immediately upon birth, and breastfeeding (still going strong there) laid the foundation for us knowing her well and her trusting us. I also found The Birth Book, also by Dr. Sears, to be the best, most balanced resource I read about birth. So certainly I have nothing against Dr. Sears.
However, I did not find The Baby Sleep Book to be terribly helpful. When I tried to follow his suggestion of waiting until Mari had been asleep for 20 minutes before putting her down, I found she was more lightly asleep than when she had been asleep only about 5 minutes. It also delayed my going to sleep myself -- but then, generally, I found the book didn't give enough weight to parents' needs.
Really, I found the whole concept of actively putting her to sleep each and every time problematic. I do believe Ferber's assertion that babies develop sleep associations. If Mari is rocked or nursed to sleep, then put down once deeply asleep, she does indeed tend to wake up when her sleep cycle becomes shallow, probably because she's alarmed that the conditions she associated with going to sleep (rocking, nursing) are no longer present. It was only when I started working to break those sleep associations that Mari started sleeping better.
Basically, the message I took away from The Baby Sleep Book was that if I didn't like Mari waking up constantly, I should just be very, very patient and she would eventually, by the time she was a toddler or preschooler, learn to sleep better and more independently. In the meaning, Jon or I should always carry her until she fell asleep and then sleep with her, even if it meant a more disrupted sleep for everybody. I found this unacceptable.
To be fair, there are bits about other ways of doing things, and a good chapter about night weaning, but I generally found the book to be simplistic, not that informed about sleep and not very respectful of the need to teach a baby to fall asleep and stay asleep on her own. Though just as gentle, I found the No-Cry Sleep Solution to be better about all that.
Next up: The No-Cry Nap Solution, The Baby Whisperer
3. Healthy Sleep Habits, Happy Child, by Marc Weissbluth, M.D.
There was a good deal I liked and found useful about this book. However, in my opinion the most fundamental thing about this book -- the recommended "extinction" crying method is overly harsh and unnecessary for most babies.
But let's start with what I did like, most of all the maxim that sleep begets sleep. Here, I have found that Weissbluth is right and Ferber is wrong. Almost always, an earlier bedtime, not a later one, is better for Mari's sleep. She sleeps more and better than when I've tried to keep her up longer or later. Of course, there is a limit, though Weissbluth sometimes seems to imply otherwise. Mari cannot and will not sleep for more than 14 hours in a day at the most, and she averages about 13 hours, though if I recall correctly, Weissbluth recommends 14-15.
Another thing I liked is the emphasis Weissbluth places on baby temperament and his acknowledgment, missing in many other books, that some babies just aren't going to be as good of sleepers as others, and that what works for most babies may not work for a certain percentage -- especially those who were very fussy as younger babies, which Mari certainly was. It was reassuring to me to know that just because some techniques work with other babies and don't seem to work with Mari, it's not necessarily because I'm doing something wrong -- it's because Mari is a different baby.
For the above reasons, I am prepared to believe that there are some babies for whom the extinction crying method Weissbluth advocates may be the only thing that works. However, I also believe that it's highly stressful for babies. It's plain that babies don't like to cry. Their faces turn red, their temperature goes up, they give every indication of being in extreme distress. Babies cry to communicate. Whether it's because they're in pain or because they just want their mothers, for the baby, something is wrong. I believe those needs should be responded to promptly (though not necessarily immediately), unless there's a damn good reason to delay response. In my opinion, a parent should consistently and patiently try every other method possible before resorting to the extinction method.
It's true that babies need to learn to fall asleep and stay asleep on their own. It may be true that for some babies, a certain amount of crying is necessary before they learn. However, just plain ignoring the baby's cries, no matter how long it takes, ignores the possibility the baby may be in pain or discomfort, which if fixed could get him or her to sleep.
I did find Weissbluth makes good points about why it's so important for children to be well-rested. However, I thought he overstated the case. I found myself worrying as I read it that I had already caused Mari irreparable damage by letting her stay up too long in the past. I even wondered if that was the cause of her not doing things such as crawling as fast as some babies (though she is still very much within the normal range). With a little more distance, I found the book was making me worrying too much. More guilt is something parents don't need.
Another issue I have with the book is that it is overly long, repetitive and written in a convoluted manner. However, that may be the editor in me talking.
4. The Baby Sleep Book, by William, Robert, James and Martha Sears
I like Dr. Sears a lot. I find what he says about attachment parenting (I have the book by that name and love it) makes a lot of sense. Though I no longer follow it to the letter (I allow some limited crying alone, I no longer "wear" Mari much at home, we no longer co-sleep), I believe in the philosophy of maintaining a strong bond between parent and baby. I believe the amount of time I spent in earlier months wearing or carrying Mari, co-sleeping, responding immediately to her cries, bonding with her immediately upon birth, and breastfeeding (still going strong there) laid the foundation for us knowing her well and her trusting us. I also found The Birth Book, also by Dr. Sears, to be the best, most balanced resource I read about birth. So certainly I have nothing against Dr. Sears.
However, I did not find The Baby Sleep Book to be terribly helpful. When I tried to follow his suggestion of waiting until Mari had been asleep for 20 minutes before putting her down, I found she was more lightly asleep than when she had been asleep only about 5 minutes. It also delayed my going to sleep myself -- but then, generally, I found the book didn't give enough weight to parents' needs.
Really, I found the whole concept of actively putting her to sleep each and every time problematic. I do believe Ferber's assertion that babies develop sleep associations. If Mari is rocked or nursed to sleep, then put down once deeply asleep, she does indeed tend to wake up when her sleep cycle becomes shallow, probably because she's alarmed that the conditions she associated with going to sleep (rocking, nursing) are no longer present. It was only when I started working to break those sleep associations that Mari started sleeping better.
Basically, the message I took away from The Baby Sleep Book was that if I didn't like Mari waking up constantly, I should just be very, very patient and she would eventually, by the time she was a toddler or preschooler, learn to sleep better and more independently. In the meaning, Jon or I should always carry her until she fell asleep and then sleep with her, even if it meant a more disrupted sleep for everybody. I found this unacceptable.
To be fair, there are bits about other ways of doing things, and a good chapter about night weaning, but I generally found the book to be simplistic, not that informed about sleep and not very respectful of the need to teach a baby to fall asleep and stay asleep on her own. Though just as gentle, I found the No-Cry Sleep Solution to be better about all that.
Next up: The No-Cry Nap Solution, The Baby Whisperer
Thursday, March 11, 2010
Day 50: Why does every damn book say something different?
I'm not very far into Solve Your Child's Sleep Problems (Dr. Richard Ferber) yet, but already I've noticed how much different books differ in what they say even on basic facts about sleep.
Let's take the amount of sleep a six-month-old should get.
According to the No-Cry Sleep Solution: 2 naps a day, 3-4 naptime hours, 10-11 nighttime sleep hours, 14-15 hours total. (According to the No-Cry Nap Solution, by the same author just a few years later, six-month olds should get 2-3 naps, not necessarily just two.)
According to Healthy Sleep Habits, Happy Child, from 4-11 months, a baby needs an average of 14.25 hours of total sleep, including about 3.5 hours of nap sleep and 11 hours of nighttime sleep. The vast majority of six-month-olds take only two naps.
According to Solve Your Child's Sleep Problems, a six-month-old only needs an average of 12.5 hours of total sleep, including 9.25 hours of night sleep and 3.25 hours of nap sleep broken into two or three chunks.
That's a pretty big difference in the recommendations, especially with the last one. Also, HSHHC says a baby about this age should be starting the morning nap around 9 AM and the early-afternoon nap around 1 PM. But SYCSP recommends the first nap start between 9:30 and and 10:30 AM, and the afternoon one between 2 and 3 PM.
What am I supposed to do with all these conflicting recommendations?
Today: Mari had tremendous difficulty going down for her naps, especially the morning one. I started extra early trying to get her down in the morning, since I thought maybe she's been overtired the last several mornings, which was why she fussed so much before going down for her nap. So I tried from 8 AM to 10 AM to get her down. She did nothing but fuss. Finally Jon was able to get her down at about 10:40 and she only slept for 35 minutes. In the afternoon, I tried to get her back on track by putting her down at 1 PM. She didn't go down until about 2:15, though this time she slept an hour and 50 minutes. She skipped her evening nap and was down for the night by about 7:15. So maybe there's something to Dr. Ferber's recommended naptimes, though I hesitate to draw conclusions from just one day.
Let's take the amount of sleep a six-month-old should get.
According to the No-Cry Sleep Solution: 2 naps a day, 3-4 naptime hours, 10-11 nighttime sleep hours, 14-15 hours total. (According to the No-Cry Nap Solution, by the same author just a few years later, six-month olds should get 2-3 naps, not necessarily just two.)
According to Healthy Sleep Habits, Happy Child, from 4-11 months, a baby needs an average of 14.25 hours of total sleep, including about 3.5 hours of nap sleep and 11 hours of nighttime sleep. The vast majority of six-month-olds take only two naps.
According to Solve Your Child's Sleep Problems, a six-month-old only needs an average of 12.5 hours of total sleep, including 9.25 hours of night sleep and 3.25 hours of nap sleep broken into two or three chunks.
That's a pretty big difference in the recommendations, especially with the last one. Also, HSHHC says a baby about this age should be starting the morning nap around 9 AM and the early-afternoon nap around 1 PM. But SYCSP recommends the first nap start between 9:30 and and 10:30 AM, and the afternoon one between 2 and 3 PM.
What am I supposed to do with all these conflicting recommendations?
Today: Mari had tremendous difficulty going down for her naps, especially the morning one. I started extra early trying to get her down in the morning, since I thought maybe she's been overtired the last several mornings, which was why she fussed so much before going down for her nap. So I tried from 8 AM to 10 AM to get her down. She did nothing but fuss. Finally Jon was able to get her down at about 10:40 and she only slept for 35 minutes. In the afternoon, I tried to get her back on track by putting her down at 1 PM. She didn't go down until about 2:15, though this time she slept an hour and 50 minutes. She skipped her evening nap and was down for the night by about 7:15. So maybe there's something to Dr. Ferber's recommended naptimes, though I hesitate to draw conclusions from just one day.
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