Six-day-old Emma, asleep (because it’s daytime)
There are some areas of parenting in which I do well. Staying calm is a big one. It takes a LOT for my kids to upset me.
Getting kids to sleep is not a strength. When friends ask me about getting kids to sleep, I just laugh.
It started out with Emma. She was born with night and day flipped. I knew this before she arrived, because she would kick, kick, kick all night and then sleep all day. It took three months to get her to sleep more than 15 minutes at a time. We tried everything. She wanted to sleep during the daytime.
Emma slept through the night for the first time on Mike’s birthday, when she was nearly six months old. We were at a family reunion, and the excitement of seeing cousins kept her awake during the daytime and wore her out enough to sleep. Then it took a LONG time for her to sleep through the night again. When she was ten months old, we tried sleep training – the proper way, where you go in every few minutes to reassure your baby. Emma screamed for an hour the first night, and two hours the second night. The third night she cried and then threw up. We gave up on sleep training.
Emma was four years old when she finally stopped waking up at night. When she stopped, she stopped – no more waking up, no more crying. Overnight. Johnny turns four in December, and still wakes up every night. I’m hoping four will be as magical for him as it was for Emma. He is pretty easy though – he runs into our room, jumps in our bed, and sleeps the rest of the night. Lily thinks our room is her room, and so long as we agree to that she sleeps through the night. When we put her in her room, not so much.
I do know how to put kids to bed. I started working on it once while Mike was out of town, and by the end of his (probably one-week) trip, I had the kids in bed right at 7pm thanks to candlelit dinners and other calming measures. When he’s out of town, they always go to bed by 7. When he’s home, they know they can push it out a little, and so they do – but they are all asleep by 8pm most nights.
This month, BSM Media and SleepBuddy decided to help us out. They sent us the SleepBuddy – a nifty little nightlight with a clock built in, so that it turns on and off when you tell it to. The light comes with a book and rewards chart. The kids enjoyed the story explaining how the SleepBuddy works, and they love the light. I like that the light is bright enough that Johnny (usually) doesn’t start crying because “I can’t see myself” yet dim enough for Emma to fall asleep. You are supposed to leave the room as soon as the light turns on, after which your kids will quietly fall asleep. In our house, we stay in there until the kids fall asleep, because we haven’t gotten the easier method to work for us yet.
I love that the SleepBuddy provides a visual cue to the kids that it is time to quiet down and fall asleep. This is especially useful in New England, where the sun stays up for hours on end in the summer and sets very early in the winter. So that half the year I want them going to bed in broad daylight, and the other half they can stay up long past sunset. Seeing the light turn on is a way to cue the kids to calm down without having to say a word.
I also love that the kids have a visual cue that tells them when they can get up. We tried using a regular clock, but the kids didn’t seem to grasp the concept of 7am, even with a clock with different-colored numbers for each hour. Knowing they can leave their room when the light turns off is a beautifully simple cue. For once, Mike and I get to sleep until 7(!), even though Emma still gets up by 6 at the latest. With the SleepBuddy light, she is willing to stay in her room and read, play, or draw. You can also set the SleepBuddy to turn on for nap time or quiet time, but those are parenting concepts I have yet to grasp strongly enough to get it to work for me.
If you’re like me and your kids just don’t seem to be able to put themselves to bed, remember that it’s not all negative. Last week when the power was out, my kids and I were all in one room at my sister’s (Mike was out of town, of course). Getting them to sleep was easy, since all three of them prefer sleeping in my room over sleeping in their own beds. And I often enjoy the quiet time in their room as they fall asleep as an opportunity to slow down and reflect upon the day. Of course I celebrated when Emma started going to bed and staying there without any trouble – and I’ll celebrate again when Johnny and Lily make the same milestone. In the meantime, I’ll take the extra hugs.
Do your kids sleep through the night? Do you have any excellent sleep advice to give? I’m all ears =)
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MaryAnne is a craft loving educator, musician, photographer, and writer who lives in Silicon Valley with her husband Mike and their four children.
Wow – you have a patience of an angel. Anna was waking up at night to nurse until 20 months – every single night. However, like Emma, once she quit, she quit. We always had her in a separate room, and I mastered leaving the room with her barely awake but very sleepy when she was about 6 months old. She is really good on getting herself back to sleep on her own when she wakes up at night – all she needs is her favorite blanket and her water bottle. If one of them is missing in action, reinforcements (i.e. parents) are summoned, so we are making double sure all ingredients are in place when she goes to bed :)
The daylight savings time has my kids messed up. Now they are waking up super early! Typically I don’t have many problems getting them to bed. We always go through our same routine of bath, story, teeth, prayers, etc. Every once and awhile though, if they are worried about something or scared, I have to stay in their rooms to help them fall asleep.
As for the time one of my friends placed taped over the minutes on her young kids’ clocks so that only the hour number would show. Once the time said 7 her kids could get up!
The tape idea is genius – so simple and so effective!
God knew that I’m an unbearable brat when I don’t get enough sleep… which is why he gave me sleepers! Christian was 9lbs 4 oz, and the nurses told me I had to wake her up every two hours to feed her or her blood sugar would drop and she would be too weak to eat, and end up in the hospital. So I did. For two weeks. I couldn’t do it anymore. My husband told me to just try letting her sleep until she woke up (since she was always so sleepy in the middle of the night anyway; I had such a hard time waking her up to eat). So I did. At two weeks old, we put her to bed at 10 pm, and woke her up at 6 the next morning.
The boys were nowhere near as sleepy as she was, but they both started sleeping through the night around 5-6 weeks old. When I couldn’t wake them up to eat in the middle of the night, I just let them sleep.
I used the book, “On Becoming Babywise,” with all three. Not exactly to-the-letter, but it helped us.
I actually cope with sleep deprivation pretty well. Maybe that’s my problem…
I’ll have to look into that book if we have another baby. I think I’m probably too late for the ones we have =)
I wish I had some great advice for bigger guys. Princess is having that problem right now
Abby slept through the night (8 hours) at 8 weeks old! She has always been a great night sleeper. So much so that now that she’s 7, she is afraid of spending the night somewhere else. She says she misses her bed. She won’t even spend the night at my Mom’s house :(
That’s amazing that she slept so well so young! My brother’s kids sleep great, too, and they have the same problem with being away from their own beds.
I had 3 kids in my bed too…but I have to admit….I LOVE IT!
So for me it’s perfect…I love that my kids can crawl in bed next to me if they need to.
When I am putting them to bed…I read the scriptures and a book that we are reading. I usually read the book first, because by the time I am done reading the scriptures…they are all sleeping! :)
I do think I’ll miss the kids crawling in when they outgrow it.
We consider it an unearned gift from God that our kids sleep through the night (barring illness) from about 10 months old. I think it helps that until that time they only go to sleep on my back or beside me in bed, and I don’t try for a daytime sleep on their own until they’re nearly two. I have no idea why this system works so well for us when many parents struggle with sleep for years, but I am thankful.
I’m intrigued by your method of always holding or staying nearby a sleeping child until they are 10 months old….
Sounds like a really neat idea to use the light as a cue. I guess I will have to agree with Elisa that it’s an unearned gift from God that our kids have always been good sleepers. Joshua was a big baby (9 lbs. 12 oz.) and was sleeping 5 hours a night by the time he was a month old. He’s always been a good sleeper. Emma Grace wasn’t as easy but we did do sleep training with her. Now she loves sleep. I often have to wake her up on the weekends so she doesn’t sleep too late. I honestly don’t know exactly what worked so well but I do feel so very blessed!
Johnny and Lily were both 8’14”, so they should have slept well. They did better than Emma, but nothing like 5 hours!
Oops! I messed up the link I added. Sorry! Please delete my first entry.
Done =)
Last night I had three children in my bed!!!!!!!! I don’t have the skill!!!!!!!!
It’s nice to know I’m not alone…