Tuesday, April 08, 2008

Sleep Surprise

I know I hinted that I might write a Pumpkin retrospective, but I'm feeling very tired this week, and just don't have the mental capacity to do it. I'm tired even though Pumpkin slept from 8-ish until 3 a.m last night. Hubby and I were surprised by the number on the clock when she first cried out, since she'd just had a couple truly awful nights, including one screaming gas episode that reminded me of her newborn days before I figured out that I shouldn't eat dairy. She had a similarly great night a couple of weeks ago, too, right before she started having all of her tummy trouble. This, of course, leads to the almost certainly false hope that she will start doing this sort of thing regularly if we can just keep her healthy. In fact, she still has a bit of a congested cough and runny nose (no doubt a cold she picked up at day care), so maybe she doesn't even have to be completely healthy.... Hope springs eternal.

I don't actually expect this to be part of a new trend. I have had my hopes crushed before.

She is also eating enthusiastically again (although crackers remain her only reliable finger food). I have finally learned not to worry too much when she stops eating when she gets sick. She always starts up again once she feels better. If all goes well with her shots this week, we may even try dairy again this weekend.

She may not be eating finger foods like day care would like, but she has excelled in her progress towards their other "big girl" goal of going down to one nap per day. She has moved her morning nap to ~11 a.m., drops her afternoon nap almost everyday now, and doesn't even fall asleep in the car on the way home. The downside is that she is a bit fussier in the evenings, but the upside is that she goes down for the night much easier. This transition was far easier than I had feared. We just slowly moved her nap 15-30 minutes later every weekend. This created the result we expected: a slightly cranky baby when she was ready for a nap but not getting one, and an afternoon nap that got harder and harder to convince her to take, until we finally just gave up on the afternoon nap altogether. If only her night time sleep routine was as straightforward to change....

3 comments:

  1. I'm glad you are getting a good night here and there! I hope things do get permanetely better soon. You know, until the next sleep regression.

    Your transition to the one nap a day has given me hope. Maybe we'll just bite the bullet and do it.

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  2. I'm sorry your having so much struggles with daycare. I really wish that daycare, in general would just allow kids to develop at their own pace (they'll do it when they're ready, for Pete's sake). This pressure to meet milestones in a specific timeline is ridiculous.

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  3. In defense of my day care center... they gave us lots of warning on the need to change her nap schedule, so that turned out to be far less traumatic than I'd feared. And they aren't pushing too hard on the finger food thing. I just feel pressure because I want Pumpkin to get to move up to the bigger baby room, where she'll have more room to play and get to go outside to play every day. She LOVES playing outside. I'm not sure if they'll move her up without her mastering more finger foods or not. I suspect I'll find out, because she really shows no interest in most finger foods!

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