Sleep training? What sleep training!?

*Disclaimer*
This is yet another post that I write solely to keep as a reminder for myself, in case life like this happens again. And this time, I am prepared.

I feel so compelled to write something about sleep training because a lot of baby newsletters have been reminding me to do so at 4 month. And, this facebook mommy group that I belong to has been talking/heavily discussing/debating about it. Those women and "debates", they have very strong opinions and a lot of judgments (they will deny) and they are sometimes not nice to each other. And in the end, they still say to each other "awww your baby is so cute"!

As a new mom, I thought I was pretty open-minded about taking advice from others, experienced moms, books, self-proclaimed experts, authentic experts and sometimes, strangers on the street. I have always been told, or warned, that sleep is HUGE. Babies need to sleep well so that the household is peaceful, the marriage is sound, and life can continue.

I agree. Not that I have any baby experience before this one, but TB is a pain in the ass if he does not get the sleep, and that's enough lesson for me.

How and/or how long your baby sleeps or not sleeps through the night, and how and/or how long your baby naps or not naps during the day, is really not my eff'ing business. However, books, experts, old moms, new moms and neighbors probably all have told us that sleep is so important to your baby. As a matter of fact, sleep is damn important not only to your baby, but you/me, too. So, the subject of baby and sleep/tots and sleep is always a huge, no, a giant one among parents. This, makes me very aware of how my blueberry sleeps and how to make him sleep better.

A lot of moms love bragging about how their babies "sleep through the night" and I think that's very cute. But mind you, the definition of "sleep through the night" is (only) 5 hours. So if your babies don't do 5-hr stretch, that's really OK. As you may all know, babies are all different. One thing though, is that, some of them fail to share how the babies sleep through the night, and that's a kind of skill that not just the baby needs to learn, the mom/parents, too.

I'd like to share how we "sleep train" my son. Or not sleep train.

During my pregnancy, TB and I read so many books on babies, especially on brain development and sleep - a lot of theories, some case studies, and all confusing. After not remembering how many books (actually I can make a list but that's a waste of time), we kindda know what to do in our head, but not sure if it'd work.

From the very first day coming back home, blueberry has been babied by my mom. She had her ways of soothing babies; she loved holding him until he fell asleep. We always wanted to break that habit but we rather have good night sleep of our own so we let her do what she wanted. And it seemed to be the only way to help him sleep.

The day after my mom left, blueberry seemed to know that his good life ended. Smart kid!

That night, after feeding blueberry, TB had no mercy but put him down on the crib. He said to blueberry, "you are fed and you are changed, not it's time to go to sleep. We love you. Good night." And he turned the light off, walked out of his room.

Blueberry was tossing and turning his head, yiyi-aiai for several minutes, and he fell asleep. Just like that.

Babies understand everything you say to them.

We thought it was only that night, but every night is like that. We thought it was only TB who he listened to, but he would do the same to me (ok, fine, after a couple trials). And voila! He is sleep-trained.

We always have a "going to bed routine". He will take a bath, change into clean clothes, get a good feed, swaddle. If he is sleepy, we put him down while he is still awake but drowsy. If he does not look that sleepy, we read a book or two to him before putting him down in the crib. Once he is in the crib, he will toss and turn for several minutes, sometimes waving arms, and then he will calm himself down and fall asleep. Recently, his soothing method also includes sucking hands.

At week 7/8, I started adopting Gina Ford's method of putting him on a schedule. I use Gina Ford's method because she lay out a daily schedule for me to follow and then tweak to fit our overall schedule and lifestyle. Since then, blueberry has been on a 7-7 schedule.

This 7-7 schedule does not mean he does not wake up in the middle of night. He usually gets up any time from midnight -2am for a diaper change and full feed, and then he falls back to sleep. Starting at 13/14 weeks, he has been able to sleep 12 hours at night without getting up. However, there was the dehydration problem - orange urine acid crystal on the diaper. We fixed that by waking him up for a feed at night for a couple days and let him slowly drop that feed.

We did not drop the feed for him, he did.

Nowadays, his daily routine includes a feed every 3-4 hours, 2-3 naps during the day with a total of 3-3.5 hrs, and lots of play time but not over tiring him, and lots of fresh air outside (for me as well). This seems to be working for him because he looks happy. The only times he fusses, are when he is hungry and when he is tired. He goes to bed at around 6-7pm, wakes up at around 6-7am.

He hit the 4 month sleep regression right on schedule and it lasted for a couple days. He sometimes does things that throw off his schedule, I will try to help him get back to it but adjusting the routine and starting the day at 7am. Every day can be very routine but also very different. Yes, it's testing my patience with him, but I deal.

I am not 100% sure if we are doing this correctly. I know for sure that with this schedule, TB and I are able to enjoy dinner just two of us and a lot of time just hanging out. I think babies with good sleep help maintain parents' loving relationship and marriage.

Again, what works for me does not mean it works for other people. However, read it as another case study. My simple hope is that he keeps this schedule up until he is 18 year old.

One thing I'd like to add is that I see too many parents go with cry-it-out method. I am not judging but I personally do not believe letting babies cry hysterically is the right way to let them fall asleep. I always refer to the Romanian Orphan Study when people talk to me about CIO (oh gawd, I can't believe I am suing an acronym. I am totally not myself anymore.) Crying for too long has bad impact on infant brains which is not good for overall development.

I am not saying you should not use CIO if that's the very last resort. I am just saying I will never let my baby cry like that. Well duh's anyone would be exhausted after that kind of crying....

DearJulie

Mother's Day

I guess it's not until I am a mother that I understand to appreciate my mother. How cliché! But it's so true. Sigh. You must think I am a daughter who is not grateful and all that.

I am. I am much much even more grateful of my mother now.

Mother's Day finally becomes my holiday. Remember DearJulie used to celebrate Children's Day, or Single Awareness Day?! I don't really have a plan but I know ideally how I would like to spend it.

I want to spend it WITHOUT my son.

There are a lot of things I can do:
- Do a DVR marathon to finish all the shows recorded and need to be deleted
- Research for some good books and read them (yeah, didn't even have time to know what books are out)
- A long, non-interrupted, without beeper work-out session
- Go shopping and actually try on things and buy them
- A long massage session, like, 2 hrs
- Clean and decorate my office space
- Catch up on work
- Shred all the junk mail
- Cook a decent meal

However, I really don't think that  24-hr Mother's Day would be sufficient time for me to accomplish all the above. And it is quite unlikely that I can spend it without my son. The other day I said to someone "my son is the extension of me and goes everywhere I go, even the ladies room". Therefore there is no way I can have my ideal Mother's Day but I would take the best possible kind I could get.

My wish for Mother's Day is that Miles will say Mama before he says Dada.

DearJulie