Wednesday, February 13, 2013

Sleep Diaries: One Step Back

I think the saying goes "You don't realize what you got until its gone".

Except what I am talking about is the opposite of that. You don't realize how bad something was until it gets better.

And then worse again.

Where did I leave off? Last time I posted he had been sleeping well, up every 4 hours or so, easy bedtimes, besides some issues with a stuffy nose. I know it has not been that long. Two weeks with better sleep maybe? Maybe three.

Then, the last 2-3 nights, waking more. Longer bedtimes.

February 11th - He took awhile to go down. Overnight I totally failed at night weaning. I was tired and not paying attention until it was too late. As in, I got up because he woke up, and fed him, then looked at the clock and realized it had only been 2 hours. He was up and eating every 2-3 hrs. Total regression.

February 12th - Bedtime was longer again, but not horrible. He at again at 10:30pm, which is normal. Then he got up at 1am. I was very conscious of night weaning and did not want to feed him. 1-2am I slept in his chair occasionally getting up to comfort him while he whined and did not quite go all the way back to sleep. 2am DH took over. Changed hid diaper and again tried to put him down. 2:30 I fed him and he went down finally. I hope its worth it in the long run.

February 13th - Bedtime was not fun tonight. He would NOT let me leave the room. A week ago, I could leave the room right after I put him in the crib without hiding it, and he would self soothe to sleep. Tonight he could seem very asleep and wake up screaming at the slightest sound of me leaving.

The overnight issues, plus the poor bedtime tonight, made me realize something. It sucks. It is draining. I don't know how to say this without sounding foolish...

When Benjamin's sleep was bad, my basic schedule was to put him down for bed, and then come downstairs and veg out on the computer for 2 hours, and then go to bed myself. I did not do any housework. I did not do anything creative. I did not do anything productive online. I did not interact with DH more than minimally. I really did not want to call people or do anything. In the last few weeks that changed. I was doing more house work, getting things done, doing stuff with DH more, spending less time senselessly browsing the interwebs, I was just generally in a better mood. I did not associate this with the better sleep.

Until tonight, when he would not go down. And then  remembered/realized just how DRAINING a bedtime fight is. It just sucked the life out of me tonight and I have been vegging on the computer ever since.

So, Benjamin, if you could please go back to sleeping decently, and not fighting bedtime, so I can go back to being not totally emotionally and physically drained in the evenings, that would be great.

Thanks.

(PS: on the positive side, since I finally managed to sneak out of his room at 7:50pm, he has not been awake again. Maybe tonight will go OK? *crosses fingers*)

1 comment:

Allison said...

If anyone can commiserate, it's me. I get it. ((HUGS))

And I actually have noticed that when bedtime takes forever N tends to sleep longer. Sometimes. There's honestly nothing consistent with my kid. It's maddening. Argh.

I hope last night went well!