My lovely daughter still does not sleep well through the night. Her four week old brother sleeps better then her. Everything I read about this tells me that it's time to stop rocking her to sleep or staying by her bed until she falls asleep, it says that when she learns to put herself to sleep, she will sleep through the night. All fine and good, except Natalie does fall asleep by herself and still doesn't sleep through the night. She just has this burning desire to alert us anytime she is awake. She may want a drink but she just wants to touch base. We are now desperate and trying all kinds of things to help her. Here are some recent, funny (now that's it's morning) really irritating conversations with her in the middle of the night.
We gave her a flashlight (she can't sleep with a nightlight on) so she can find her drink two inches from her on the nightstand without our assistance. We played with the flashlight and talked about it all day. She was excited. "Remember", we told her, "you don't have to wake up mommy and daddy if you need a drink, just turn on your light and get it."
11:30 PM. Blood curdling scream from Natalie, "Mommy! Mommy! Mommy!"
I go sprinting any there.
"Hey Mommy, I woke up, turned on my light and got a drink, all by myself. I didn't even wake you up."
I said, "yep that's great, now let's see if you can do this all night and just count how many times you wake up. You can tell mommy in the morning how many times you got a drink by yourself."
A few nights later:
2:10 am. Blood curdling scream from Natalie: "Daddy! Daddy! Daddy!
He goes in and she can't find her flashlight. Chris explains again that we are tired and we are sleeping. He gets her light and says, "please let daddy sleep, daddy is tired."
3 something am: "Mommy! Mommy!" (only two Mommy's I had just finished feeding Micah)
"Natalie what do you want?"
"Well, Mommy, I yelled for you cause Daddy wants to sleep."
Okay, new plan. STICKERS. She gets two stickers every time she goes all night without yelling for us. She can use these stickers to earn all kinds of things, ice cream, more stickers, an extra tv show, a doll, or her current ultimate desire: a jump rope. She must save 20 stickers for it. First night of stickers, home girl slept all night and didn't wake us up. We praised her and praised her and gave her the two stickers. Next night, she slept all night. Throughout the day she earns stickers for other things too and yesterday she cashed in ten stickers for the doll. We explained she starts over now and can earn them all again. She seemed cool with this.
Last night:
"Mommy! Mommy! Mommy! Mommy! Mommy! Mommy!" (I'm dragging in her room.)
"I need help finding the flashlight."
"Natalie it's right there, remember you won't get a sticker now okay?"
"that's okay, Mommy, I just want the light."
It's been three years, two months, and twenty-three days.
We are NEVER going to sleep again.
Any ideas?
4 comments:
Stick with the stickers-it worked for her Momma! Just remind some today that you sure wish she had earned some stickers so she could...
Love you all,
KK
i am in tears laughing!!! i have nothing - nothing for ya! (okay, maybe we can offer a sleep over at our house for natalie) sorry we suck - emma is hard core about her sleep :)
Going through it seems to take forever but on the other side you will feel like you blinked and all this was over. Keep with what you've started. Remember this is a little girl who knows to her core Mommy and Daddy will always come. She knows she is loved. We put family pics next to our girls bed so she could see us without being with us=) You will not always be this tired. It does get more manageable.
I have two ideas.
First there is always Boot camp, if she wants to wake up in the middle of the night its ok there because they wake you up all the time. give her a taste of her own medicine.
Number two cheaper solution i was always told Duct tape fixes everything. It is also just as effective.
hope these ideas help im routing for Duct tape. lol
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