Not sick in bed any more

[ailbhe]

Today we brought a flask of soup and a loaf of fresh bread to the friend who had a new baby two weeks ago. It was much appreciated. She really is in stunningly good shape. Two weeks postpartum I couldn't carry Linnea up or down stairs. This woman can take her baby shopping.

We also had a chat about uterine replicators and how they could solve The Abortion Debate. It made me wonder - what do female ski instructors or parachutists do, when they're pregnant? I'm sure that they're not supposed to keep skiing or jumping, at least, not in the first or third trimesters.

Later, Rob and I caught sight of part of a "documentary" made by the guy who ate nothing but McDonalds food for a week. He and his girlfriend were living on US minimum wage for a week. I was shocked by the amount of food she threw out when she was chopping vegetables. Huge amounts of perfectly good broccoli stalks! I don't think she had ever actually been hungry-poor before. And I think that people who are used to being poor might do better than people who aren't, under those circumstances, ie knowing it will all be over in a month and you get a decent standard of living back.

I think Linnea is reacting to the milk now too. She's unusually smelly and not eating properly.

We really need to break her natural rhythms. Sleeping from midnight to ten am isn't convenient for us. It's a lot more sleep than she was doing before, but we need it to start and end earlier. Any ideas?

Comments

[helenprev.livejournal.com]

When I wanted to get Freya going to bed in the early evening instead of midnight (though she was a lot younger that Linnea is now), someone said to me 'well of course you just put them to bed quarter of an hour earlier for a few days, then quarter of an hour earlier again.. etc etc.' and we did that and it worked. Long, tedious process though!

[ailbhe]

Ah, you see, we tried that, and it doesn't work. Linnea *will not* be put to bed unless she is already almost entirely asleep. Even when I was nursing her to sleep in her bed as the end of a regular bedtime routine, it just meant I nursed her for an extra 15 minutes. For a week.

*cries*

[sidheag.livejournal.com]

I don't know/remember what your bedtime routine is now - from the above it doesn't sound as though you're still nursing her to sleep (did you wean, actually? sorry, I forget), so maybe this is irrelevant, but...

I remember being amazed at how easily Colin took to being left in his room completely awake. I would have said he was the same - had to be almost asleep before I could leave (usually, we'd nurse until then). One night I wanted to go out after he was asleep, so I told him I'd lie with him a little bit and then go away to see H, C & T's mummy. He said something like "Mummy go H, Colin sleep. Goodbye, Mummy". And that was that, I left! You could have knocked me down with a feather. It's not always been as simple as that of course - the novelty saved us on that occasion I think! - but we can now usually leave him completely awake. Key things seem to be:

- to talk to him about it, tell him what I'm going to do after I go away;

- to offer a choice "would you like me to say goodnight now, or shall I lie down with you for a little bit?";

- to let him control a bit, e.g. if after the little bit I get up and he grabs me and says "stay little bit" I stay another little bit; what I usually do is to say "what would you like me to count to?", he says "ten" (or "twenty" or whatever), I count slowly to ten, then give him a kiss, a cuddle, another kiss if he wants it, etc.... This is the opposite of the usually advised "just leave" approach, but I take the view that provided we're making definite progress towards me leaving, I don't mind if there are several stages in it;

- to tell him I'm confident he can go to sleep by himself (in just those words, with no "because you're such a big boy"!)

If I've got to the point where I need to leave (because otherwise I'd be going back over the progress towards leaving) and he still needs someone, then I tell him I'll go and see if Daddy's got time to stay with him for a bit, and then I go and get DH, and he lies down with Colin till he's asleep. This happens seldom enough that it seems to be fine.

If he starts playing, that's fine, but then I leave: I'll just say "you can play for a bit if you like, but then I want to go and get on with (whatever); if you want me to stay for a bit, you need to lie down and go to sleep". Just occasionally he will choose to play by himself. I remember one occasion when he later cried, but normally he does manage to go to sleep at some point.

Don't know whether any of this would work for Linnea, but I really was very surprised at how flexible Colin could be, so possibly you might be too. (And have you read How to Talk so Kids will Listen and Listen so Kids will Talk? If not, I recommend it: much of the above was lifted straight from it.)

The McDonald's guy

[griffen.livejournal.com]

It was a month, not a week. And you and I have discussed the spuriousness of Spurlock's "research" already, haven't we?

Re: The McDonald's guy

[ailbhe]

I typed "week" twice, knowing all along it was a month. Huh. And yes, we have. I was sort of amused by how shocked he was at the evil plight of poor people.

[jentifred.livejournal.com]

I say we get your daughter and mine together and they might train each other to a reasonable hour. I am TIRED of waking up at 5am.

[biascut.livejournal.com]

Ha - Linnea and I have exactly the same sleeping patterns. It's not very convenient for me, either!

[clanwilliam.livejournal.com]

Not very kind and rather torturous for you both, but would waking her up earlier help?

[ailbhe]

We tried it before and we're trying it again. Last time, it led to a month of her sleeping 8 hours a night. She's up to 10-11 hours out of 24 now, so any drop and we're stopping the changing.

sleep

[tiggsybabes.livejournal.com]

A tiring issue here too :/ Kate used to be fab at going to bed 7pm to 6am until I was unwell with pregnancy sickness & Andy took over her bedtime routine. He started putting her to bed when it suited him, with no routine & i still haven't got her back properly. My PND last year didn't help either as I used to go to bed as soon as Andy got in from work, so again he was doing it all.

Holly again just went into the routine of 7pm bedtime. We signal her though & she waves goodnight to everyone & is put in her cot with some milk (yes, I know it's bad for their teeth, but they are brushed twice a day, so I console myself with that) & say "night, night, see you in the morning) We did the same with Kate & it just worked. Holly, however, doesn't sleep through v regularly & tends to wake up again at 10ish on a v regular basis.

So, I think all I'm saying is that I have no ideas.

Is Linnea able to understand the idesa of a reward system?

[oldbloke.livejournal.com]

I dunno - we've _always_ put Jack to bed at 7pm+teeth/wash/change time.
How you move them from a pattern they're used to I have no idea. I wonder what Tanya Byron would say?

When Jack was 2 weeks old we drove up to Lancaster to show him to his uncle. A great opportunity to get him up to 100mph at an early age - he has to start young if he's going to be F1 champion one day!

[k425.livejournal.com]

That's not true though. After he started nursery he started staying up till we went to bed at ten pm. He was still getting up at 6 because we had to go to work.

We changed that pattern over the Christmas break by making bed-time fixed at 7pm and then either nursing him to sleep or lying on the bed with him till he went to sleep.

In July last year, when he was about 20mo, he was still trying to run around at 8.30, so Dave came down to cook dinner and I went up and told him it was bedtime. I gave him a kiss and left the room. We did controlled crying - the previous attempts we'd abandoned because he got hysterical within 30 secs. This time he chuntered for a bit, then started to cry in tired, cross way. I went up, settled him, cuddled him and said goodnight. He was quiet for a bit, then chuntered, then started to cry, still in a tired cross way. I did the same again. The third time, I was heading up the stairs while he was crying and he fell asleep.

I couldn't have done that if he was still getting hysterical with the crying, because it hurts me too much to hear it.

Ailbhe, is Linnea safe to stay in her room to play on her own, if she's not going to sleep? I think if I were in your shoes I'd do a combination of waking her up every day at the same time, while bringing bed-time 15 mins earlier each evening and if she's not ready to sleep either letting her play quietly on her own in her room, or doing controlled crying, or lying down with her for a while until she's ready to sleep.

[oldbloke.livejournal.com]

After he started nursery he started staying up till we went to bed at ten pm

Crikey, I'd forgotten that!

[sashajwolf.livejournal.com]

Ailbhe, is Linnea safe to stay in her room to play on her own, if she's not going to sleep? I think if I were in your shoes I'd do a combination of waking her up every day at the same time, while bringing bed-time 15 mins earlier each evening and if she's not ready to sleep either letting her play quietly on her own in her room, or doing controlled crying, or lying down with her for a while until she's ready to sleep.

This is probably what I'd do, too (minus the last suggestion - I'm a firm believer in setting clear boundaries on this sort of issue, and for me, one of those is that a child does not get to monopolise my attention as a 'reward' for behaviour that I am trying to discourage.)

[ai731.livejournal.com]

I'm amazed they could afford to *buy* broccoli on US minimum wage. IME (when I was a starving student in the US) fresh fruit was totally out of my budget range and out-of-season green vegetables were a once-weekly luxury.