Trouble in Sleepyville

Kinley was a champion sleeper.  At 9 weeks old, she slept through the night.  By 9 months, we could put her in bed awake and she would self soothe and fall to sleep on her own.  And then around 18 months-ish, it all fell apart.  We were back to having to get her to sleep (usually rocking her) before laying her down...and now, we lay on her floor next to her bed until she's asleep.  Ugh.  How did it come to this?

She is two (and a half) and should not need us to lay next to her bed for her to fall asleep.

We did the cry it out method for a while--and while it SUCKED--it worked.  It hasn't been every night since 18-ish months, but there were gaps when she would self soothe to sleep.  Do they still call it self soothing at this age?  So cry it out did work for us.  I think that it took at least five years off of my life--but it did work to our benefit.

At this point in the game, I feel that she's too old for the cry-it-out.  She can talk, she can reason, she can put the guilt trip down.  It wouldn't be so bad if we could go in with her and then thirty minutes later, she would be asleep.  Oh no---we're talking an hour to two hours EACH NIGHT being on her floor next to her bed while she's talking, singing, reading, playing.  I know, I know...we're crazy.  But don't judge.  I've yet to meet a perfect parent.

For a few months around her second birthday, we had it under control.  We had a routine and she did well.  Bath at 7, brush teeth, read books, say prayers, and good night.  We left her room and she was left to fall asleep.

I blame ourselves for the situation that we're in.  We got lazy.  We got tired of the routine and quit.  We kept pushing bed time later and later and eventually just quit it all together.  I think that we were tired of being tied to the apartment every night at 7 to start the routine. Especially now with it staying light out so much later and Richie working longer days.  Starting a bedtime routine at 7 just made us feel robbed of our evenings with her.

So I know the problem is us.  But what can we do about it now?  It's going to be difficult to get it under wraps at this point...especially with her and I being home all summer.  Let's face it, the child sleeps till she wakes up--instead of her 5:50 a.m. wake up call during the school year.  So she's sleeping later.  Nap schedule is not consistent because of the sporadic wake up time and our schedule varying day by day.

Geez, there is no consistency in our child's life.  Yikes.  I guess that it took me typing that all out to realize it.

But we have to fix it.

For our sanity and her well being.  It's just not a good situation.

We are planning to start our bedtime routine again.  I've been researching it online and have found that at this age, it's important to make the child feel like they still have choices in the situation.  So I can let her choose her own jammies (she does anyway--had to move her underwear and jammie drawer to the bottom of the dresser so that she could make her own choices), let her choose three books (you put the limit on how many books but she chooses the ones she wants to read) and put her to bed.  But what I'm unsure about is the end part.....put her to bed.  Do we go back to cry it out?  Is that healthy at this age?  Will it be effective?

I have noticed that on the nights that she falls asleep dramatically (as in, hysterical crying, because we're trying to fix this problem), she wakes several times throughout the night.  If she falls asleep peacefully (with us on her floor) she will sleep {mostly} soundly.

No joke, I sometimes feel as if I have a newborn again.  There are nights that I am up three or four times to put her back to sleep.  I am thinking that it could be night terrors, or something.  I'm really unsure.  And a  friend of mine said that when her 2.5 year old has to cry herself to sleep, she goes somewhere where she can't hear her, to help her sanity.  Well, we live in a tiny apartment.  I can't go anywhere but outside, and that's illegal and super unsafe.

What do you suggest?  Have you had experience with this?  Advice?

This night, she decided to sleep on the floor.
Daddy usually falls asleep there too.

Do we suck it up and let her grow out of it?  We have started taking headphones into her room with us (usually only one of us lays next to her, sometimes both of us) and listen to the Dave Ramsey show on our phones.  It is much better than just laying there staring at the ceiling, just waiting for her to pass out.  Our parent's generation, and older, tell us to cherish these days when she wants held or rocked to sleep.  I get that.  I really, really do.  But I also know that it's not healthy for her--our our marriage--to keep this up.  We DREAD bed time.  Because even if we try to rock her to sleep, which I feel is crazy {for me}, she will think it's play time.

I know that she has full control...she has full control in every aspect of our life.  And we are aware of that.  But slightly unsure what to do to take it back.

Any ideas or advice is welcomed and appreciated!

How do you do it?

Today is one of those days where I seriously question my ability to be a mom of more than one. 

Breathe.

I just keep reminding myself to breathe.

To you moms out there...you know that sickening, deep-down, weird feeling you get when you just *know* that not all is well with your baby?  She's fussy.  She seems uncomfortable.  She doesn't want to play.  She doesn't want held.  She doesn't want to nap.  She doesn't want to watch her favorite shows.  She doesn't want to eat.  She doesn't want anything.

And then she has a -down both legs blow out- and you realize, ahhhh!  Maybe her tummy hurts?

But even that doesn't make sense because then she eats a big lunch.

I'm filled with worry for her today because something just doesn't seem right in her world. 

I am so thankful that she was finally able to close those sweet blue eyes and get some rest.  For her sanity and mine.  I pray and pray and pray that she'll wake up all renewed and refreshed.

But how do you moms of more than one do it?  How can your mind and heart handle so much worry?  I sometimes worry that I won't be able to handle it. 

I so wish I could go back to bed and wake up with a do-over.

Kinley's Weekend

Remember when I said that Spring had found Chicago?!  Well, it must have gotten lost again.  This weekend we dealt with temps in the 40s and icky rain.  It was not a very pretty weekend.  At.all.  And we didn't get to take our morning walks, since I'm a weather weanie and I didn't want to freeze Kage.  She would have thought I was nuts out walking in that weather.

So we stayed in both mornings.  I think that she enjoys the walks more than I do.  She gets so bored when we stay in.  It kind of breaks our hearts when we see her off by herself playing.  Her dad always says "look, she has no friends."  And that statement just kills me.  But then I'm like, well, it is 8:00 on a Sunday night.  Even if she had a million friends, they wouldn't be here right now.  But it does make me sad to see her all alone playing in her room.

The realization that I am done (D.O.N.E.) with having children sets in.  I know that I don't want any more and I'm for sure about it.  I just feel sad for her.  There will be so many nights (and days) of her playing all by herself.  I feel like a creep.  But think of how much more I can give her by it being only her.  I know, I know...those of you that grew up as only children tell me that it's just not the same.

But I'm 32, having another child at this age doesn't seem appealing.  If I had started in my early 20s, that would be different.  I feel much too old for starting again with another baby.  Kids are tough!

Maybe it's more specific to say that toddlers are tough.  Whew.  She exhausts me.  And dare I say that the "terrific twos" have arrived early?  She is pushing every boundary she comes to....  and she is very familiar with the time-out.  We have a 'spot' that she has to stay in for one-minute (thank you Super Nanny).  It doesn't phase her.  She used to fa-reak out when we put her there but last night, she visited her 'spot' twice and sat there patiently. 

She looks so darned cute in time-out.  I know I shouldn't take pictures but
I couldn't resist.

The first time-out was for standing on the couch and trying to hang from the mini blinds.  The second, was for climbing onto the coffee table and running across.  Both times we did the whole "Kinley, 1.  Kinley, 2.  Kinley, 3." method.  She just laughs at us when we get to 2. 

After the second time-out, she got right back up on the coffee table.  So this obviously is not working for her.  We'll be discussing it with her pediatrician at her 18 month appointment.  Seeing how much she pushes us now, makes me wonder how fun this will be when she's 13!

Since the weather was so yuck on Sunday, we decided to take Kin to the local children's museum.  It is a very nice museum with tons of hands on, interactive stuff, but OMG was it packed yesterday.  And kids are rude!  And parents are rude!  When your school-aged child knocks down a toddler trying to beat her to an activity, you'd think the parent would say something to their child--or at least apologize to the toddler's parents.  But nope.  They just watched it happen and said nothing.  I almost kicked the child in the shin.  No joke.  But, despite the crowd.  We still had a really fun time.

Admission for the three of us was $26 and the family yearly membership is $100.  So they said that when/if we want the annual membership, we could apply that day's admission to the yearly price.  Nice.  Most likely, we'll do the annual.  I can see myself taking her several times this summer.  I'm sure it's not nearly as full during the week days.

Running through the mirrored tunnel.

While playing in the 'baby zone' of the museum, we met another family that had a 16 month old daughter.  She wanted to play with Kinley so badly.  She kept bringing her toys to share.  This is when I realized that Kinley was a 'mean kid.'  She was being so rude to this little girl.  At first she was ignoring her efforts to share the toys.  Then, she would grab them from her really rough.  And then she would grab them and then throw the toy.  I was so embarrassed that she was acting so mean.  I could tell that the other parents noticed it as well.  I always said that I would not have a 'mean kid' and here she is right in front of my eyes.  I felt like such a bad parent.

But what can I do?  I always tell her 'nice hands' or 'be a sweet girl' and things like that.  Ugh.  So much re-training to do, I guess.

I wonder sometimes if she's not around other children enough to know how to play.  But then she does go to 'day care' and plays with two other children.  But they are both boys....so maybe they play rough like that as well?  Maybe I need to find her other girls to play with....  I'll need to work on that.

She's got nothin' but time

It's probably pretty obvious that school has taken over about 99% of my free time.  Hence the lack of blog time.  While I am staying on top of things, mostly, I find that my confidence in my work has gone down so much.  When I was in school before, I would hammer out an assignment in no time and submit it without thinking twice. Now, I finish it and then spend the next several hours going over it a million times just discounting every word I had just typed.  Where is my confidence?!  I guess Dr. Laura was/is right. 

So I'm sitting here, with both of my math methods assignments done...yet I'm so full of doubt that I can't click that "Submit" button.  Ugh.

And to help matters, Kinley is now walking.  And getting into *everything*!

She thinks that she's helping me....scratch that, she really doesn't care if she's helping or not.  But is it the age?  Ugh!!!!!!!  She is in to *everything*.  And when I tell her no, she turns around, smiles and then goes about her business.  No concern in the world.  She runs the household.

Where did we fail?  Can we get the control back?

Our nights have been completely dreadful the past month.  She stays up until she feels like going to bed and then gets up two or three times during the night.  This causes us to be complete crabs to each other and anyone else that we come into contact with.  And really, we just don't need the crankiness in our lives right now.  We have enough drama.

Last night we decided to start a new routine.  Dr. Laura and I talked about establishing a schedule for Kinley to help me get back into control of myself and my time and my life, basically.  So we decided that 8:00 would be bath time.  From the bath, we would spend time in her room.  Reading (yeah right, the child will not sit for a story, anyone else have that problem?), playing with her stuffed animals or puzzles.  Then at 8:45 it's time to nurse and go to sleep.  Last night, she was asleep by 9 and got up at 4 and 5.  But she went back down both times and got up at 7:30. 

Problem being, on Tuesday and Thursday, we're up at 4:30 getting ready for school/work/daycare.  Her getting us up at 4 is not cool.

I'm kind of hoping to push bath to 7:00 and then bed by 8:00 but I'm not sure we can do that. 

It's all trial and error, I guess.

What routines work for you?

This is so helpful when I'm trying to study.  *So* helpful.

Mommy-911

I'm pulling the mommy 911 card.  For my sanity, I need advice.  I'm about to lose my mind over here!  For the past 3 days or so...or since she's been over the virus, we're having major nap issues.  I nurse her to sleep (I know, I'm not supposed to) for her naps and everything is just as it always has been, until I go to lay her down.  She jumps right back up and screams.  She WON'T nap.  I know that she's tired because when she gets up, she's a crank.  Bad.  I tried to let her cry it out and she screams (at the top of her lungs, and how that is different than the bottom of her lungs is beyond me) and she won't stop.  I let it go for 45 minutes!  4-5!  I've tried going in every 3 minutes.  I've tried going in every 1 minute.  I've tried going in every 5 minutes.  NOTHING WORKS.  My child is wearing me out. 

What do I do?  She needs the nap.  If she doesn't nap, she cranks all day long and then tries to go to bed at 6.  That's not going to work in this house.  I'm going to video her tantrum for you....

My "instinct" is that she's not in pain.  My "instinct" is that she is trying to win this napping game.  For ten months she has won.  EVERY.SINGLE.TIME.  I give in.  Well, now it's not cool anymore.  Now it's getting to the point where Richie and I dread nap/bed time because we know that she will fight us (and win).

If I go and get her up, she will not let me put her down.  I'll be stuck with her on my hip for about an hour.  She'll freak if I try to make her play or if I try to put her back down for a nap. 

My baby didn't do this....at about 9.5 months she turned into this napping monster.  What is going on?! 

HELP!!!!!

Edited to add:  I couldn't even finish my post, her crying literally gives me cramps.  My uterus craves to help her when she's like that.  That's got to be the explanation.  Her crying got so hard that I thought she would hyperventilate.  So she won.  Again.  And as soon as I picked her up, she sighed like she was saying "good to see ya, ma!"  And now she's on my lap, singing, and trying to stop me from telling you the awful truth about this little beast that we call Kinley.  She keeps typing keys and making me have to fix it.  Grrr.  I'm going to go rock my baby.

Edited again to add:  Well, at 12:45 a.m. she was up screaming her head off again.  We did the in and out thing for 45 minutes and not once did she let up.  At 1:30 I gave in and get her out and rocked her in her room.  At 1:50, I gave in again and let her nurse.  At 2:00, I was back in bed.  I dread the day today.  I know she's going to do the screaming thing at every nap opportunity.

Life Lessons::Mommy Mistakes

Hindsight is always 20/20.  Always.  Well, for me anyway.

Since typing out the Kinley story, I wanted to use the rest of my "mommy break" to sort through so many things in my head.  I've learned so many mommy mistakes that I have made and want to really sort through things to hopefully learn from them and not let them happen again.  I know I will expect to make a million mistakes and wrong decisions during the years of raising Kinley.  But what good is a mistake or wrong decision if you don't learn and grow from it?

Mommy Mistake #1:  Being selfish.  When I made the decision to take Kinley to the marathon on Sunday...I was driven by my own selfishness to be at that finish line.  We have all been looking forward to seeing Paul run this race.  It is a HUGE thing to run a marathon and we wanted nothing more than to be there to support him.  I knew that Richie would be going.  It is his brother and he should be the one to go, I should be the one to stay home with the sick baby.  When we made the decision to take her to the city, she was down to 99 with her fever.  And she had been down to 99 for a couple of hours.  But...she was medicated.  Deep down, I KNEW it was the wrong decision.  But I wanted to go.  I was being selfish and it was at my daughter's expense.  I'm the worst mother ever.

Mommy Mistake #2:  Letting panic rule the situation.  When we took her temp and it was 104.5, I became blinded by panic.  I couldn't see the forest through the trees.  My mind was seriously spinning and I was holding my baby and feeling like a rabid dog ready to attack anyone that tried to take her or tell me how to "fix her."  I just wanted the clouds to part and the answer of what to do to be behind them.  Immediately, Richie and I started fighting.  He wanted me to dunk her in the fountain and I wanted to follow Dr. Natalie's advice to never bring a fever down too fast by using cold water.  Buckingham Fountain is cold water.  He ripped her out of my arms and said that if I wasn't going to do something about it, he would.  That is when I lost my mind.  How could someone (my husband!) say that I wasn't doing something about it.  I just needed time to process.  Now mind you, all of this happened in the span of about 5-10 minutes.  I was wracking my brain trying to think of Dr. Natalie's last name or the name of her practice.  I was blank.  I did what I knew I could, and called the fired doctor.  In his defense, he responded to the page within 2-3 minutes.  Richie and I both let panic rule the situation and we instantly turned on each other in a time of crisis. 

Mommy Mistake #3:  The ambulance ride.  Upon arriving at the medical tent...her fever came back down to the 102-103 range.  The cool cloths and the Motrin was beginning to work.  Mommy instinct said to save the time of the ambulance (and the bill) and find a cab.  She would be okay to last the run for a few blocks to get a cab.  I ignored that instinct and listened to the MD in the tent and let the ambulance paramedics strap my baby to the stretcher and off we went.

Mommy Mistake #4:  Psycho Mommy wins again.  If I could have had a non-panicked mind at that very moment, I would have been able to reason with the situation.  She was dressed in a long-sleeved onesie, shorts, socks & shoes.  It was warm.  I was hot.  How much of that 104.5 was due to the heat and her being dressed?  If I could have stripped her down, gave her the motrin, sat under a shady tree and calmed her down....I could have brought the fever down to a manageable range.  I could have gotten back to the train and back home.  Crisis averted.  I would have saved the panic, the fight with my husband, the money, the time.  Why couldn't I find that place within myself to look at the situation from a calmer place? 

Mommy Mistake #5:  Pity Party, table for one.  Since the whole fever in the park incident....I've placed myself in a position of me vs. him.  Him=Richie.  Am I keeping score or what?  I am sitting on the pity pot because I feel that I'm putting in all the time and effort and what is he doing?  I'm up with her from 5:30 in the morning till 9:30 at night.  Holding her through naps, ignoring my own needs to eat/drink/pee/shower, holding her down while they shove a catheter inside her, holding her down while they xray her and she screams because she's terrified of the machine, holding her down while they draw blood from her arm, holding her down while they give her a shot in the muscle in her thigh, holding her while she cries for 4 hours because she's been through so much and just wants a break herself.....  He is the worker of the family.  He "goes" to work to pay for our nice life.  My job is to be the mom...which is all encompassing.  So why am I so angry with him?  Last night I just wanted a break.  I was starting to feel sick.  I was achey and had a head ache and was falling asleep sitting up.  I needed a break.  Our tire is still losing air so we had a tire appointment (previously made, before the illness got bad).  I told him to cancel it and we'll deal with the tire another time.  He wanted to just get it done.  He left to fix the tire, I stayed with our sick baby.  There is no break when you're the mom.  I don't get to leave the house to go to work and leave it behind me.  I don't get to go to fix the tire and get some fresh air or listen to the radio.  It's amazing how lack of sleep and intense stress can make the smallest things seem like mountains.  I understand his side too though (I just can't grasp it in the heat of being pissed off as he walks out the door and leaves me with the sick baby on my chest) that he's having to leave to provide for his family and knowing that not going to work is costing us one day of pay.  He has to leave behind a baby girl, that his world revolves around, and worry all day about her being sick and not being there to make it okay.  I get it.  But like I already said, it's hard to reason like that when I'm sitting there feeling like crap and seeing him get to shower, get dressed and go out the door.  I'm talking in circles.
One thing I have learned from this whole me vs. him thing, is that we need to decide where we stand on how we're raising Kinley and the decisions we have made for her care and learn to STICK TO THEM.  When we are faced with an emergency, like we were at the park, we will hopefully avoid the whole "to dunk or not to dunk" fight.  Is it even possible to think that we could come to common grounds on the plan for her care like that?  I'm not so sure.

I wish that guys/dads felt the need to self-evaluate.  Wouldn't that make things so much nicer!?  Maybe that is why moms/women are what we are!  We constantly self-evaluate and seek to improve.