Saturday, January 27, 2007

Reflections on good naps, poor sleep, and slight sickness

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copyright 2007 by Ms. Huis Herself
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This week Pumpkin has been GREAT about taking naps. We're talking 1 1/2 - 2 1/2 hours each afternoon, with no fussing going down. I had been feeling really good about this, because she needs at least some nap or she's a bear by about 5pm. And when she does nap, it's NEVER less than an hour.

But the weeks before then were tough with no nap, naps that started too late, and/or ran too late, and/or made her not tired enough to sleep well at night. So I decided I needed to be better about making naptime and the leadup to it more consistent and earlier.

And it seems to be working well - no fussing when we go up, love reading stories together in the big girl bed, no hassle when I leave her alone to go to sleep, and she's been falling asleep within 10-15 minutes of when I leave the room, which for her is superb. And even if her naps have been running long, she's still up and about well before Mr. Kluges comes home, with time to play and then wind-down before bedtime.

Now, since her nap were so long, and since Mr. Kluges has been a bit under the weather, I figured part of the success might be due to the fact that she's fighting off some kind of bug and needed the extra sleep.

Yeah, she was. And she came down with a bit of a fever Thursday night... which was LONG. Much crying, needing Mommy, wanting Mommy to stay with her in her room, etc. And of course that equals not much sleep for Mommy.

And last night? Yeah, same thing.. combined with a super big poop that must have woken her up (or she woke up to do) and caused her to cry and yell for us to come and change her. This was followed by extensive neediness and distress and wanting Mommy to sleep in her bed, or in the extra bed in the room (yay for the extra bed, 'cuz she's a wiggly thing), or "My tummy's rumbly for a cereal bar!" or "Where's my flashlight?" or whatever.

*sigh*

So again with the not much sleep for Mommy between the hours of 1:30 and about 4:30 or 5 am, other than brief catnaps caught in her bed, the extra bed, or (for brief, brief periods of time) back in my own bed.

(But once she was finally back to sleep, and I stumbled back to our own bed in the early hours of the morning, I woke up Mr. Kluges, told him he got to get up with her in the morning, and put in earplugs. 'Cuz a Mommy with no sleep is a dreadful thing.)

And today? Today, do you think she'd nap?

Not on your life.

*sigh*

Oh well, at least she's well enough that we're not cancelling the dinner date we have with another couple down in Kinsale... and I'm guessing/hoping she'll go to sleep pretty early and easily for our babysitter.


(Now, I'll just try to not think about how sleep deprived I'm going to be come May...)

2 comments:

Syl said...

Don't worry, you get through it. You don't know how, you just do.

Her Bad Mother said...

WonderBaby has always resisted naps. Now, at 14+ months, she's starting to abandon them entirely. So I feel your pain.