If you’ve been reading my blog for a while you’ll know that the one thing I struggle with the most with having a baby is sleep. Getting enough sleep myself, getting N to get enough sleep, and everything in between.
As first time parents, we didn’t know any better. We still don’t. We’re still figuring every new phase out and going with the flow. We do what we feel is best and we cross our fingers that it is.
But I’ve realised now that there are a few decisions we made back then that led to most of N’s bad sleep associations and habits. At that time, naturally, we thought we were doing what’s best for her. But it turns out we led her into sleepless, restless nights instead.
When N was a newborn, up till she was 6months+, she slept with us in a co-sleeper (we had a Tutti Bambini). In her early newborn months, it was so easy to put her to sleep. She was an independent sleeper and it felt like all she did was sleep! But hey, that’s what newborns do right?
Then she learned to flip over. Then get on her fours. And then came her notorious sleep regression phase and all went downhill from there. But I’m not going to blame the regression (although I really, really want to). I want to discuss the few habits we made that contributed to the countless sleepless nights since then.
Rushing To Every Stir
And I mean, R U S H. I remember not even allowing the TV volume to be higher than 10 bars because we needed to listen for her every sound. We would literally camp in front of the TV and watch Survivor.. by reading the subs because it was too soft to hear anything. Omg, ridiculous. I cannot believe H put up with me.
And then every now and then we’d hear her stir and wake up. Then it’s like the olympics began in our home. We’d R U N to the room, trying to be as silent as possible, to quickly shush her back to sleep before she could fully wake up.
Therein lied the problem. We never allowed her to fully wake up, and go back to sleep on her own. We never gave her that chance to learn to self-soothe and settle herself back down. We got her used to the fact that if her sleep were interrupted, we’d be there to help her transition back into sleep.
Rocking, Patting, Singing
I cannot remember how and when this started. Must have been one of those long tiring draggy nights that left me/us so exasperated and desperate that we fell into the trap called rocking. Biggest mistake.
That one innocent night led to another and another and soon she even needed to be rocked during her naps! It was terrible and back-breaking and just downright exhausting. I remember telling myself at one point that I would do many things, sacrifice and accept many things, in the name of motherhood but dear God this rocking and patting needs to stop.
It also didn’t help that N was the lightest sleeper on planet Earth, then coupled with the fact that we’re on the second floor, because she would wake very easily. Imagine having spent 20mins rocking and pacing and patting then successfully lowering her down into her cot only to have motorcycles roar outside her window, waking her right back up.
Her eyes would open as wide as my own, I swear.
One day I finally decided that it had to end and I forced myself to endure the difficult period in which I train her to fall asleep without needing motion. It took about a month or at least 3 weeks before she was finally able to fall asleep with just me holding her while sitting on the chair in her nursery without much fighting and tears. I no longer have to rock her, not even have to stand. Sometimes I don’t need to pat her, even. I just hum her lullaby and she knows what to do. I can even silently use my phone while she drifts off! Alhamdulillah for this progress. I am really thankful.
Being Too Strict
I know this sounds weird, but I might have taken the “routine” part a bit too far. I was so rigid with her nap times, nap environment, bed time, etc that it costed us in the end.
Honestly, part of this was because I got really confused with what I read online about making sure every nap time/bed time is the same. Same timing, same set of winding-down activities, same atmosphere. So I did that – picked a time, sorted out a routine and stuck to it. But what happened then was she grew to only be able to sleep in that environment, and no where else!
I used to draw her curtains even for nap time. Then, she couldn’t sleep elsewhere where it was bright. So I stopped drawing them and got her used to napping in the daytime shine. She got to it pretty ok.
Our latest issue is that she’s so used to only sleeping in her cot that in any other room, house or area, she finds it extra difficult. I don’t even put her down for naps in her play yard or in other rooms in the house – she literally only sleeps in her cot. Now that she’s a little older it’s getting easier, but she really did at one point refuse to sleep in any other environment.
Needing Company
When we moved N into her own room, we had separation issues. Not her, me. I had spent 6 months or so sleeping with my baby next to me, just an arm’s stretch away, where I can watch her all night. And then suddenly she now sleeps in her own room? Far away from me? I couldn’t deal.
I also couldn’t deal with getting up 93043092 times every night (she was going through a regression) and having to slump and walk over instead of just reaching out for her.
So what did I do? I moved into her room. Yup.
What did that do? Get her used to sleeping with me around. She would get up, and look out of her cot just to see if I was there. Cute, but so contradictory to what we were planning to do – train her to sleep independently.
And then Life forced us to change again when our air-conditioning units broke down and during #Covid19 when we couldn’t (or rather didn’t feel comfortable with) getting repairmen to come over and fix them. So she and I moved back into the master bedroom where there was a larger ceiling fan, more cooling than her room.
Thankfully we transitioned her back into her room when we bought an extra standing fan which we now place right in front of her cot to cool her down while she sleeps. Poor baby. And I, now, am ok with her sleeping in the other room because it really does allow me to rest better.
So there you have it! 4 mistakes we made that led to her bad sleep habits and associations, causing us to lose sleep ourselves. I’m still waiting for the day (night) that she sleeps through but honestly, I don’t see it coming any time soon.
And yes, we did try sleep training her for a little bit. But we weren’t consistent with it and neither of us felt comfortable letting her cry it out so we tossed that idea out the window and accepted that we won’t be sleeping peacefully for a couple more months ahead.