Although Aiden slept like a pro in Hawaii, he did get used to sleeping in the same room with us. When we returned, a combination of jet lag and a subsequent cold made us slow to get him back to his firm bedtime routine. This resulted in one of us sitting on the rocking chair in Aiden’s room while he fell asleep about 50% of the time. Sometimes we could get away with a few Shh’s from the door. Mostly not.
As a toddler, though, Aiden likes to push his limits. The nights where he “needed” help were increasing, as was the time it took for him to fall asleep. He was yelling again for ‘more books’, even though we had a set rule on the number of books already. He’d ask for Mommy not Daddy and cuddles not just having us in the room. He tried to engage in arguments and we were losing focus on trying to minimize interaction. We kept putting off sleep training again because we were tired ourselves.
Finally, though, we put our foot down. After reading a few things online, I decided to make a Sleep Chart to help Aiden remember his sleep rules.
I let Aiden help me pick out some of the pictures and tried to make the steps simple. We modified his sleep routine to give him more choice and control, such as allowing him to turn off the lights and put on his night light. I made the steps after his books more drawn out (even though they are fast) so that he would have some distraction from wanting to read more.
We review the chart several times during the process of going to bed: it’s taped up in our bedroom (where he has his bath) and his bedroom near the rocker where he reads before bed. We encourage him to name each step. He’s very proud to point to the pictures and name the steps.
The first night was B-A-D. Aiden was super mad about the process, trying everything he could think of to stall – asking for water or Kleenex, but mostly for Mommy to sit in the chair. I kept calm and told him I would come every 10 minutes to rub his back, but that the “chart says sleepy time”.
After the first night, I put in one last sentence on lying down and trying to fall asleep, since his first night he refused to lie down for 1 hour. We talked about what would happen if he had trouble falling asleep (that he would get periodic visits only). Last night, he threw his blanky out once and tried to ask me to sit in the chair, but one reminder of “chart says sleepy time” and he went to sleep.
Last night, Aiden did better, but not perfect. He was a little wired going into bed (a surefire recipe for disaster normally), and though he didn’t escalate and start talking then crying and yelling, he did stay up for 45 minutes mumbling. He got frustrated at this point and needed a couple of reminders to go to sleep – he tried a few stall tactics at this point, but we did manage to calm him down quickly. Tonight should *hopefully* be even better.
As a bonus, the chart had the immediate effect of making bath time fun for Aiden again – he was putting up a fuss almost every night about it, but now he is eager to jump in. Go figure!
We arrived back from Hawaii on Sunday morning and are still getting our bearings. The trip was amazing and I have many many posts to share of our wonderful adventures. The only mar on the vacation was the airplane, and only because it involved sleep.
THE GOOD MOMENTS…
THE BAD MOMENTS… Visualize me, tears streaming down my face from incredible pain, putting up with a child squirming and whining every 2 minutes. For 4 hours.
The only direct flights available to us were at night. On the way there, it was earlier in the night and Aiden was able to play, be with other people, and sit in his car seat. It then took more than an hour of struggle, but he slept. Some in his car seat, more in my arms. But it wasn’t the whole trip, thankfully. On the return, not so much. Flying red eye, he fell asleep at the airport (go me!) and slept in my arms until I tried to buckle him in to his car seat. He slept about 30 minutes in his car seat, total, the rest of it wriggling to get comfortable in my arms. He was very unhappy.
Here is what I’ve learned from this whole experience…
Never ever fly Red-eye with a child. NEVER do it. If your child can sleep anywhere, no matter the position, you’re lucky. Mine is fussy about lying a particular way and that’s without the disruption of lights, announcements, other kids…
They cluster families together, probably to keep them contained from other passengers. Result – the kids keep each other up. If it’s a daytime flight, they play and that’s fine.
Naps are easier to miss in the long run than night sleep. That takes days to catch up on.
Even if you have 3 other adults to help, your child will only want Mommy when it’s time to sleep. So much for help!
Toddlers are actually pretty easy to amuse when awake. Don’t stress over that. There are beverages, snacks, tv’s, iPhones, books and other people to smile at.
The safest place for a child on an airplane is a car seat… but, does your child actually like the car seat? If the answer is no, don’t take it.
If safety is still a concern for your family, there is the CARES system. We should have done this instead.
An extra seat is still a good option, even for those under 2. Most don’t do it, but I think if our car seat hadn’t been in the seat, Aiden would have had a more comfortable place to sleep, draped across my lap and on the seat.
I don’t do well on airplanes with all my injuries to begin with, but having to hold Aiden made my pain so much worse. I could barely lift my arm for 24 hours after the return flight and am still very high on my pain threshold after the chiropractor and a massage. UGH
I’ve always hated that phrase: “sleeping like a baby.” You mean, barely sleeping? But now, I see it… And not because Aiden sleeps well. Because, even at nearly 2 years old, he’s my baby again when he sleeps.
He’s my baby when he sucks his thumb and curls up on his blanky. When his little lips part and he twitches a smile. When he melts onto my shoulder after falling asleep in the car. He’s my baby always, but most in these moments.
Sleep. It’s a big topic for any parent, and definitely for this parent. At some points, I even grew sick of myself any all my talking and thinking about sleep. But when you’re not getting enough of it, it really does dominate your life. You get cranky. Your child gets cranky. It’s all a mess.
Thankfully, it’s much better now, and here’s how we did it…
After our original sleep training success, we hit many sleep regressions. A trip through the archives on sleep topics will show you that we tried many things to get back ‘on track’. Sometimes it worked, sometimes not. It was harder with each regression. It got to the point where, if Aiden had a ‘bad’ night, the ‘only’ thing that would calm him down was my presence and nursing. He wouldn’t accept one without the other. I’d tried in the past.
Once his grasp of language was strong enough, I was able to communicate to Aiden what was going to happen at night. Instead of nursing when he was upset, I would sit by his crib until he fell asleep. I would touch him if he needed it, shh him if he needed it, pick him up for a quick cuddle if he was frantic, and tell him to lie down if he stood up. If he seemed to try to engage me (laugh, etc), I’d leave the room for a few minutes. At first I started with just bedtime, then focused on the wakes.
It was hard work. Aiden is a mama’s boy, so the point of this “Gradual Withdrawal” method, and my customization of it, was to get him used to having less and less of me to get to sleep. He had the skills to get to sleep and return to sleep, but he was stubbornly not using them.
It took a few weeks, but things got better most of the time. But I was, as you’d expect, exhausted from all that sitting in the room. My knees were killing me. I’d not made it to the point where I could always leave the room after a quick Shh either. Continue reading →
A few weeks ago, Ianiv went in to wake Aiden from an overly-long nap. Aiden wasn’t so keen to wake up, but once he was up, he was up. How is it that kids have the ability to go from sleeping to wide awake in a fraction of a second??
