Well I wanted to hold off on posting until I could give you a full update on the sleeping issue, but because my little boy is one month away from being half a year old.... I have to update!
Food - Robbie has been having rice cereal for 2 days now. Right now he eats 2 Tbsp each serving, he could easily eat more but I don't want his tummy to work too hard to digest it and I hear he can get constipated if he has too much. We've been giving him cereal in hopes that it stays in his tummy longer so that he sleeps for longer periods of time.
Sleep - Monday night I hit rock bottom. I knew that his sleeping habits had to change & the sooner the better as he's starting to get more & more mobile. On Tuesday we tried the pick up/put down method... what a crock! It sounds so easy in the book but it's so hard (physically and emotionally) You're suppose to pick up once he starts crying & then put him back down as soon as he settles, no swaying, no rocking, nothing! So, needless to say, my back started acting up. As well, it's so hard to hold your child while he cries and to know that all he wants is to nurse and this fussy baby will be happy again. I crumbled within 10mins and nursed him. That night he was up a hand full of times before midnight. Once midnight hit he was over tired & wouldn't take to the breast. Colin turned on the light and tried giving him gripe water (for gas), formula, changing his diaper... nothing worked! So I said just leave him, there's nothing physically wrong with him... lone behold, he simmered down and FELL ASLEEP on his own! What was the trick? The lights! It makes perfect sense and I don't know why I didn't clue in... he's sooo much easier to put down for naps and that's because of the daylight! That was officially our turning point.
Last night we did our normal routine (with the addition to cereal) and left the lamp on... he cried & cried. So we gave the Ferber technique a shot, you go and check on the baby briefly. It's all about timing it, once he starts crying wait 5 mins, then 10mins, 15mins and 20mins and then keep checking up on him every 20mins after that. It's to let the baby know that crying doesn't amount to us picking him up but it lets him know that we're there. He cried for an hour last night and put himself to sleep (YAY!) He woke up an hour afterwards (he's been doing that for over a week now) and we let him cry, it took about 10mins and he was asleep again! He did wake up about 10-20mins afterwards so I went in and fed him, I made sure he didn't fall asleep on the boob as I want to continue with this technique... he was quiet when I put him down & played with a stuffed animal until he fell asleep. He woke up once last night (YAY AGAIN!) at 1am, I gave him both boobs & put him back in his crib, he didn't even let out a peep. I was so happy that he was letting dad get a full nights sleep! He woke up at 6 this morning =D
So here we are the following day and I've just put him down for his first nap. I put him to bed at 7:38 and he fussed for a little bit and then was out at 7:54! I'm trying to not get too excited over this.... but I'm almost looking forward to bed time now!
On a side note, look at how well he sits up!
There's a new video that's in the process of being uploaded as well as pictures.
Enjoy!
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