Sleep training for cats

My bloody cat kept me awake all night. I could kill her. It's like someone sitting with a pin and pricking you in the back or head every hour.

Susan asked what we did to get the kids sleeping through the night. Well, we worked on the day routine. EASY - Eat, activity, sleep, you time x4.
I concentrate on 3 solid meals and 4 bottles per day. So if need be I will wake them up before I go to bed for a bottle.

At first they screamed blue murder at nap time and bedtime. we would take turns to be in the room, calming (not picking up) and reading. We must have read about 50 books! After 5 days of being back from the UK they slept through the night for the first time but resisted naps in the day. Now, they are napping in the day and still sleeping through the night without too much resistance.

TO be honest, I think our wonderful nanny had more to do with this than I. I kept getting panic or anxiety attacks when they screamed. How crap is that!!!

Now, if I can just get my damn cat to stop waking me up I shall enjoy a full nights sleep.

Sleep is sweet

They are still doing it. The whole night long. They go down at 5 or 6 pm and the next thing I know its 5am and the yelling starts. I can even get them to stay in bed till 5.30 to 6am. Seriously.
Since I am sleeping longer stretches my depression is starting to lift although the anxiety is still hanging on. I figure if I can get to the gym regularly that too will bugger off.

We were supposed to go to a kid's event today. We got all the way downtown to see that there were steep steps leading up to the venue. WTF??? We bailed and by the time we got home # 1 son was ready to go to bed - I lay him down and he just went straight to sleep.
# 1 daughter was a little more  reticent so I took her to my bed and we slept all cuddled up for an hour or so. She sweats like a sumo wrestler on a race course so we both need to have a bath tonight but it's so worth it. She is the best cuddle.

Here's a question for you. She makes these smacking sounds with her mouth. I don't think its hunger since she does it straight after food. Anyone else had this? I'm wondering what she is asking for.

zzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzz

The little buggers did it!!! They went to bed at 6pm and woke up at 5.30am. I was so grateful I kept kissing them and hugging them!!

I am reading the Ferber book and it says that kids/infants should wake up happy. Mine do not in any way. they wake up crying. I shall read further but what do yours do?

Sleep training twins...again.. help me decide what to do please!

Looks like the sleep training is going to have to resume. They are doing OK but each of them wakes in the night and Mimi won't settle till she gets fed again, usually at midnight.

So, what the f**k do I do now?

When I read other blogs and they have sleeping through the night babies I wonder why I am so weak, that I don't go the whole hog and do the night screaming thing. My neighbour told me she let her kid cry for 2 hours one night, then 30 mins the next and voila! sleeping through the night. I let my guys cry from 10 -  20 mins then in I go. They go back to sleep if the binky is replaced, or they repositioned.

Should I let them cry it out 'old style'?

Teeth!!

We discovered that Mimi has two teeth today - two! Explains all the not sleeping crap, thats for sure. Teeth. My little girl has teeth. Damn me that is amazing. She is such a mellow kid considering that two bottom teeth pushed through her gum.

I have to get some toothbrushes.

Ha!

There and back - feeling the strain.

I flew to California and back in 24 hours all so I wouldn't be away from my kids for more than one night. I got home at 1am and Mimi was AWAKE. I did the whole sleep training thing (secretly delighted that I got to watch her giggling and smiling away). I stumble to bed about 1.45am. Then at 2.20 she screams. She's hungry and wet. We haven't night fed in ages ... months.
I feed her a little bit.
Then at 3 Pip wakes up soaking wet.
At 4.40 they were both awake.
I gave up trying to sleep.

DH got up at 5.50 to help out. I went to bed and slept until 12. Whoops. I had a 9 am meeting!

I am hoping tonight they both sleep all night long.

Yeah, right.

This is hard core motherhood. 

Twin sleep training update

They are four and a half months old. Their last feed is around 6-7pm. They have been napping from 4 - 6pm but it looks like they are getting earlier in their naps - 7am-9am, 11am- 1pm, 2pm-3pm and then grouchy little buggers until 6pm. So far they wake up if they lose the damn binky or if they have maneuvered their way into a crib corner and can't get out. I like to call this turtle alert!  Mimi can roll so I leave her to work it out. Pip, not so much yet so I help him by setting him back at the start line again - opposite corner of the crib. They haven't really needed to cry it out so far. Don't get me wrong - there are tears and screaming - but it lasts a few moments. We stick to our routine and it seems to work.

Supremo important part of routine: bath, bottle, book and bed at 6 - 7pm.  This is one of my favourite things in the world. DH reads and usually interjects his own brand of humor. We read from Ladybird books - the originals - which are somewhat macabre if truth be told. The hero usually gets either eaten or kills some kind of foe in a brutal way. Hey! we live in NYC, gotta toughen these kids up for playschool.

Ah play school. I think you guys call it pre school. I call it exorbitant. HOWMUCH!!!!  I am hoping they learn from master musicians at this 6 month old music and movement class for that amount of money.

Ahh the witching hour has begun. I hear ya babies - hard not to when you are blowing a gasket!!

Sleep sleep sleep

I was asked what approach we are taking. It's a mixture of things but it looks like this:

1. We watched for natural sleep times (theirs is 5pm) So we bathe, bottle and bed form 5-6pm
2. Put down drowsy but awake (we try to read to them every night but if they are tired we put them down)
3. Compassionate crying - they cried for about three days when we first put them down. We would go in and soothe until they were fast asleep.
4. Nap times in the crib (so they get used to sleeping in their cribs)
5. Focused feed at 10pm (this is as of this week coz we are getting to the last step ...
6. Extinguish sleeping: crying it out basically. These guys wake up coz they want their binky or roll over etc. We leave them to cry for 45 mins and then go in, soothe them in place (i.e. in the crib) and leave again.
7. Once they sleep from 10pm - 6am, start moving the focus feed back by ten mins a night until you hit 12 hours.

Step 6 starts tonight. I am totally dreading it. It feels like my heart is being ripped out when they scream but from everything I have read (baby books through to medical journals) it is not harmful and it's quick.
Ideally we should have a full night (10-6am) by the end of this week.

Hot damn, that is an exciting idea.