Ugh. Seriously. It leaves me so exhausted. I'm so tired of it. I really don't know what to do.
Will Vienna ever not have sleep issues? I mean...if it's not one thing its the other. Now that she sleeps through the night she's decided that naps are no good. I don't even know how long this has been going on for...I don't remember when it started. At first I thought it was just her teeth...she's been a teething machine for the past 2+ months. She's currently working on 2 of her molars...but I know when her teeth are bothering her, and this isn't teeth.
I've considered only putting her down for one nap a day...and tried, but that's no good either. She's so tired in the morning, her morning nap is hardly ever an issue...she conks right out usually around 9:00am and sleeps for about an hour, give or take. If I don't lay her down she's done by eleven o'clock and if I stretch it until noon or even 1 (unlikely) she only sleeps for an hour and that's it, and is crabby for the rest of the day.
So we try, and try, and try...for an afternoon nap. Most days she ends up taking it, just after a two hour struggle. She can be so tired before I try laying her down...but as soon as she knows its nap time she fights it. I've tried keeping her up longer and laying her down at a later time...but it's still a fight. I feel like I've tried everything...
Nap time begins with a little cuddling/rocking and song, I usually hold her until she's sleepy and lay her in her crib and will rub her back or face until she falls asleep. This process (in the morning) usually only take 10mins. Its a different story in the afternoon, she fights me the whole time I rock her...if I lay her down and try to rub her back she fights me. I've tried napping with her and laying with her but that's not effective either. I've tried crying...which makes it only worse. It gets to point where I feel like tossing her in her crib and hiding in my room underneath the blankets and crying, or freaking out myself. I'm not proud of the thought...I'm just being honest.
In the end she is usually so exhausted that I rock her (for the umpteenth time) and she passes out. Why can't she just do that in the beginning? She's so tired from the start, is all that middle stuff really necessary? Everyday I go into nap time optimistically and think, okay...I know she's tired, maybe if I just spend extra time in the beginning rocking her, or, laying with her until she's 100% sleeping, or etc. No matter how committed, or how much patience or how invested I am in her during nap time, nothing works.
My body is physically sore from rocking a 20 lb child all afternoon. I'm emotionally spent. And I feel so guilty that we go through this everyday...I feel like I'm scarring her for life or something. My mother told me I fought my naps when I was little...so I should, of all people, understand her. I understand the feeling of not being able to relax, it's difficult for me to sleep for that very reason, turning my mind off enough to rest. I understand the feeling of missing out, she's so go-go-go that I wonder if she thinks she's missing out on what's going on while she's in her room. I understand that...but yet, I don't know what to do about it.
Today, for instance, I tried from 1:45 until 3:45 when she finally fell asleep. In the end I'm resorting to venting my frustrations out on a blog post...
I would given anything for a big, comfy rocking chair.
And a piece of chocolate.
3 comments:
Keep in mind that the transition to one nap a day is NEVER easy. She might not be ready, but she seems like the right age...I don't know how long you tried the one nap a day thing, but it's usually a week or two process until they get it. They get confused and that's why they take shorter naps at first, but if you kept at it for a couple of weeks it SHOULD turn into a longer one nap every day. Should. Sorry to say that nothing is a guarantee when it comes to the kiddos :)
I agree with Heidi on the change taking awhile from two naps a day to one. You have to throw every thought of a schedule out the window and go with the flow. If you want her one nap a day to start at 1PM eventually, it's going to take a little while to get there you may have to settle for 11AM or noon for awhile until she learns how to stay up a little longer. Every day will be different until she gets it. Some days she might be able to make it til 11AM, somedays not, somedays longer. Somedays she may still even need to take two naps even after doing one for 3-4 days. It takes awhile :( Good luck!
I really feel for you and just want to offer a bit of encouragement (though it might not sound like that). My oldest fights sleep too, and the reality is that he doesn't need as much as the kids next door. Every sleep transition for him has been disruptive for about 2 weeks: sleeping through the night, going from 2 naps to 1 and getting rid of the 1 nap all-together. During those transitions he was a cranky, tired baby/toddler, and sometimes still is. But both times I wished I would have settled in for the 2 week disruption sooner and just done the transition. It was important for me to insist that he not fall asleep in the car during those transitions, too, though I was not always successful at that!
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