Thursday, August 19, 2010

SLEEP (or a lack thereof)

Help! Seriously I'm on the verge of losing my mind.

This little guy won't sleep.

I've talked about this issue before, but it's only gotten worse. During the day Ryan will only sleep in the Baby Bjorn (as long as I'm moving), or in his carseat (sometimes). I would say he averages 1.5 hours of naptime per day.

Nights are even harder. I used to sit in bed and nurse Ryan around 9pm until he fell asleep. I'd gently place him in his bassinet beside me, and he'd sleep for at least a few hours before waking up to eat again. Now he won't even fall asleep.

I nurse him and he just wiggles around, wide awake. I try singing to him, rocking him, giving him a pacifier, letting him cry. Nothing works! Finally he will fall asleep if I lay down in bed next to him and nurse him that way. But by this time it's usually close to 11pm. Problem is, he will always wake up if I try to move him once he's asleep. So for the last 3-4 weeks he has been sleeping in bed next to me. He wakes up every 1-2 hours and I simply nurse him back to sleep. But Ryan is a very restless sleeper, kicking and punching me all night long. By morning I often have a headache and bloodshot eyes. I'm not getting any sleep. What to do??

He did sleep through the night 3 times around my birthday last month, so I know he's capable of doing it. But ever since then things have just gotten progressively worse. I feel like I've done something wrong along the way and now I'm stuck with a bad sleeper forever. What should I be doing differently? Help!

1 comment:

  1. I just sent you a super long e-mail. :)

    That picture of Ryan is absolutely adorable!

    ReplyDelete