Tuesday, August 11, 2009

it's 1:00am - do you know what your child is doing? mine wants to play...

So Jack has a new habit forming that I really don't appreciate! I've been telling everyone how good he does at night time. For the past month or more he would fall asleep anywhere from 7:30pm - 8:30pm; we still wake him to feed every 3 hours or so, but he would always go right back to sleep (heck, most of the time he was basically eating in his sleep - eyes closed and all)!

Well the past 2-3 nights after Chris feeds him at 12:30am he is like wide-eyed and ready to play! It's horrible! He isn't fussy, he is actually really, overly happy. He just smiles at you and talks and almost giggles. It's so hard b/c its so cute, but I try not to even look at his face b/c I don't want to encourage this behavior - at least not at 1:00am! He will usually stay awake until somewhere between 2:00am - 2:30am...grr...

So last night I broke down and said, "I'm going to rock him!" See we don't rock him or hold him until he falls asleep - never have, never wanted to, still don't want to. He has put himself to sleep (with the few occassions of maybe not feeling well or something) since he was probably a month old. We just wrap him up, give him his pacifier (which may need to be replaced every once in awhile) and he hangs out content until he falls asleep. But I'm affraid that I may have to start rocking him if he continues on this path of late night playtime! Any thoughts? Should I rock or not rock? I rocked him last night and within 5 minutes he was asleep and I could put him to bed, which was fine. I'm just concerned that even consistently rocking him at this one time of night could totally throw all our work out the window and he will start to refuse to go to sleep on his own all the time...

I'm thinking of maybe trying to keep him awake longer after we get home from daycare and then after his 6:30pm feeding - hoping that he will be more tired and not wake up so much at his 12:30am feeding.

Oh...Baby Jack why can't your little digestive system catch up so you can eat more (volume) at once and start sleeping longer stretches in the night?....Maybe by 3-4 months we will get you all figured out!

On a happier note, we have successfully (so far) increased his formula intake to 3.5 ounces every 3 hours, so I'm hoping in the next 4 weeks or so we can slowly increase him to 4 ounces every 3 hours and then hopefully eliminate at least one night time feeding!

A quick note about the Reflux situation: I think I mentioned this, but we started out trying Zantac - didn't work, took the edge off of his pain but just wasn't strong enough; then we tried Prilosec - seemed to work great for about 7 days, then slowly started wearing off and his symptoms were starting to return; now we are on Prevacid - so far so good, but it's only been 7 days and the doctor said 1 to 2 weeks for full impact - but he has been doing pretty good. I could tell he was having some issues late in the week last week and over the weekend, but yesterday was really good. He is still refluxing, but it doesn't seem to be causing him pain, which is my main concern!

Whoa - this got long! Sorry!

xoxo

4 comments:

Tj and Chelse said...

Well, my opinion is NOT to rock him! But you probably already knew that. :-) It may be a little early but you could maybe start thinking about moving him to his own room. It is scary but I PROMISE you will be so happy once you do. You won't realize how much noise he makes until he is gone. I didn't really start sleeping good until Tylee was in her own room...but I think she was closer to 5 months old. Or! If you can, just swaddle him, lay him down, and let him play! You'll learn to go back to sleep. Promise.

Sara said...

I say rock him! I love rocking Wyatt and watching fall asleep. I do agree with Chelse on the moving him to his room. Wyatt loves his room and his crib. In fact, he sleeps the best when he's in it. He's slept there since we brought him home from the hospital because we didn't want to start the habit of letting him sleep with us or in our room. We traded that habit for rocking him to sleep before bed. To me that doesn't seem like a bad trade-off. Whatever you choose will be the best for you and baby Jack!! :)

Audrey said...

You do whatever works for you BUT I say rock him! How old is he again?!? He's a baby and practically a newborn at that. Babies want AND need to be held. Seriously, close your eyes and imagine his point of view. He needs you. Watch out though because pretty soon he'll be 6 and headed to kindergarten. (Who, for the record, does not want to be rocked anymore.)

Heather said...

I have always rocked Max. (I love it as much as he does) Some nights he needs it to fall asleep, but more and more, I rock him for a few minutes after his bottle and put him down still awake and he goes to bed on his own.

I agree with maybe putting him in hiw own room. I sleep SO much better and so does Max. We are both light sleepers.

Good luck! Max went through that and it is no fun!