Marley has slept at least six hours at a time at night for almost two weeks now. It works out really well... at about 10 pm we give her a bath and I feed her. She falls asleep during the feeding or shortly after and sleeps until about 5 am. Then I change her and feed her again until she falls asleep. Then she will usually wake up around 8 am. It works out great! I have also found that the night time feedings go a whole lot better if she is in bed with me. So, she sleeps in our bed about 75% of the night. Sometimes if I wake up before she does I will be move her to the cradle, but she sleeps much better with us.
I am reading a book right now called "The Happiest Baby on the Block" and it has really been helping. It talks about how babies should actually have a "fourth trimester" during their first 3 months out of the womb. They should be held, swaddled most of the time, rocked and swung, and they should have something to suck on. I have been doing it for a few days, and I really have noticed her crying a lot less. It makes me feel good to be able to soothe her so quickly. It says that it is impossible to spoil a baby for its first 3 or 4 months of life, so we should be holding her as much as possible. I think I am going to look into getting a different sling that holds Marley higher up, instead of on my hip.
Hurricane Ike came through this past weekend. Marley slept through most the drama that happened her and we were only without power for about 24 hours. Sleeping that night was miserable for me, but Marley slept about 8 hours! She had no idea what was going on.
We also started back to work last Wednesday. Since Marley has started sleeping better at night, I am a lot more pleasant and happy at work. I would still rather be at home relaxing with her, but at least she gets to come with me. I am working from 8:30 - 5:00 on Monday, Wednesday, Friday, and from 1:00 - 5:00 on Tuesdays and Thursdays. Marley is really good and sleeps through most of it. It she's not sleeping, she's either eating or awake and in a good mood. Most of the people that come in want to see her and tell me how great she is!
School is sucking. It is really hard to remember (and want) to do it! If I spend a bunch of time working on it, I feel like I am missing something with Marley. I know in reality that not much will happen in the hour I am doing school, but I still want to be with her. Not starring at the computer.
Oh, and I had my six weeks check-up yesterday and everything was normal. Now I have to start exercising... yay.
1 comment:
Dear Jillian,
Thank you so much for mentioning "The Happiest Baby on the Block". Dr. Karp's work has helped countless parents calm their baby's "fussies" and instantly boost their sleep.
Besides the book, Dr. Karp strongly recommends "The Happiest Baby" DVD. It is the easiest way for busy moms – dads and grandparents - to learn to do the 5 S's perfectly!
Also, do you know about our "Super-Soothing" Sleep Sounds CD? It has specially engineered white noise that can calm crying babies and - when played all night - can instantly boost sleep by 1-3 hours. Dr. Karp recommends it to help sleep for at least the first year (it's so comforting to little kids....like an auditory "teddy bear"). Parents love this CD because it’s super easy to control the volume and wean babies off of (whenever you want), it keeps babies calm on car rides, and helps them sleep when spending the night at grandma's.
I hope this helps!
All Best Wishes,
Suzana
Suzana@thehappiestbaby.com
(www.happiestbaby.com )
PS – If you have a spare moment, we would so appreciate you leaving a short review on Amazon. It really helps new parents when they can read about the experiences of seasoned parents...like you!
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