I have a 11 month old who will not fall asleep on his own lately. I have tried letting him CIO and he cried for over 3 hours and was still awake. I have had to snuggle/rock/hold him to get him to fall asleep. Up until about 3 months ago (when he started crawling) he was falling asleep every night on his own..nap time required a 2-3 min. snuggle, I would lay him down, and he was out. Any suggestions on how to get him to fall asleep on his own would be great!
Here is our nightly routine: dinner, playtime or walk, bath, book & nebulizer treatment, bottle (he needs to drink after his nebulizer or else I would do this earlier), then bed.
i can't say that i've ever heard of a teenager that needs to be rocked to sleep :)
Enjoy the cuddling and rocking while you can. Don't rush these developmental stages, they will only backfire on you and cause more sleep issues later on. Needing to be held/rocked to sleep is only an issue if you make it one.
You let him cry for three hours?! Wow, that's a really long time! Enjoy the snuggling and rocking him to sleep. Besides, I bet it takes less than three hours and doesn't a quiet baby = sanity? Who cares if the way he fell asleep was being rocked. He apparently needs that right now in his life. Before you know it, he won't want anything to do with you and will want you to drop him off around the corner, so no one will see him with his mom. Enjoy this time as much as you can, while it still lasts!
A three-hour CIO is only likely to make his bed a less-appealing place for him to be. Have you considered longer snuggles, a bedtime story, rocking him in a rocker? My grandson was never able to go to sleep without maybe 20 minutes worth of cuddling and rocking until he was about 16 months.
Also, the albuterol is a very strong central nervous system stimulant. While stimulants often have the contradictory effect of making children drowsy, this doesn't always happen. I had to give the stuff up, myself. Ask your doc if you can schedule it earlier in the day.
Hi K. - I have a feeling that the nebulizer is the culprit. Albuterol stimulates the adrenals and it is very very very difficult to fall asleep after a neb. Albuterol makes your heart beat faster and makes you feel shaky and irritable. Even though you are very tired, the medicine makes it very hard to relax enough to sleep - very difficult when your heart is racing! You might consider adjusting the time of his treatment to an earlier time than right before bed- your doc can give you advice on that.
My daughter went through a spell like you are discribing at about the same age. I shortened her nap and it helped a bit. CIO NEVER worked, 3 hrs later she was still going strong. One thing I read helped me,it said Do not pick the baby up after bedtime! And do not talk to him/her. This is reenforcing the behavior you want to change. Do not ignore him either, that makes him insecure and fearful, instead I would go in and pat or rub her back and let her know Mommy was there, then I would just stand beside the crib, then I would sit in the rocking chair as she got calm enough. It took 2 or 3 nights till she was over it. I also would take her in her room durring the day and play with her in her crib because she was then affraid of her crib from letting her cry it out. Soon she got over it and it was easier to get her to sleep. I also used a Bach flower essence called Rescue Remedy which calms stress, I like Bush Essences better than Bach but they are harder to find, a friend of mine sells them and they are not expensive ($10 I believe) if you are interested email her at ____@____.com this helped!
I cannot believe people still consider CIO an ok thing to do with their children! It's awful! How is he when you go for a drive? Try driving with him to sleep at night. It's a good method that usually works.
What is wrong with snuggling with him as you mentioned? He's only 11 months old, a small little baby, so new to the world, needing the love, comfort and security from his mama.
I read something about someone with milk intolerance and think that too. If he needs a nebulize I hope you're not giving him dairy too. It makes mucus and fluid in the lungs, etc www.notmilk.com
I would say try all of the recommendations given from talking to pediatrician about nebulizer (adjusting time or dosage), bedtime, reading a sleep book, etc. I particularly liked The Baby Whisperer by Tracey Hogg. I had a rough time with my second one too due to acid reflux and his milk protein allergy. Then I started reading Baby Whisperer again when he was about 3.5-4 months( I hadn't read it again because I thought I'd remember everything from my first son). It began to help me immediately. Sometimes though, reading helps but you still have questions/thoughts and want live feedback. So, I contacted a friend of mine who's had great success with infant sleeping. And together it really helped. He's now 6 months and has been doing great since he was about 4.5 months. Anyway, my friend's contact info is katiebartley.com. Good luck!
Check with the Internationla Chiropractic Pedatric Assn- maybe he has put something out of place crawling, and adjusted properly, he'll go back to previous routine.
And why the nebulizer?
best, k
It is most likely behavioral. You must break that pattern and then he will change, when you do. I would seriously think about the drugs you are putting in him with the nebulizer unless it is only saline. Drugs can disrupt sleep and if he does have problems breathing, he has allergies that need to be addressed. Check out NAET.com to find a practitioner in your area. So often allergies will make kids nuts enough to behave badly. First thing to try is letting him find a way to self regulate all by himself. it's hard but we have all done it and they are no worse for the wear.
The Baby Whisperer is a great resource, but at this age, I would recommend "Sleeping Through The Night" by Dr. Jodi Mindell. It will help you through all stages of sleep problems up to tween years. She does recommend the cry it out method which worked for us. The older the baby gets, however, the harder it is to do it this way. Good Luck!
Its his nebulizer.
these meds, make one hyper.
I have Asthma, I am adult, and it does that to me too.
Can't he take it at another time of day?
Or adjust his dosage... but ask your Pediatrician first. Always.
Next, at each age juncture or per teething or per growth-spurts and cognitive/developmental changes, a baby's sleep does get tweaked. Sleep is NOT finite nor non-changing. Even adults, college kids, teens, elderly have changing sleep patterns.
Crying for 3 hours... is realllll long. It affects the child. Negatively.
all the best,
Susan
I'm a HUGE fan of The Sleep Lady - K. West - and her Sleep Shuffle technique. It's not a CIO technique, although it may involve some crying - but you're in the room with your child.....her book "Good Night, Sleep Tight" is great and is an easy read. The book is split up into sections for different issues, so you need to read the first chapter or two about the technique, then the relevant chapter for your situation. It's easy to implement and it works, but you do have to be persistent. My husband and I made all the mistakes in the world with our first child to get her to sleep, then I found this book and it changed our lives, literally. I now have two girls, 3 and 5, and they are truly the best sleepers of every family I know and I tell everyone about this book. In fact, I publish articles online and I wrote an article about this book and my experiences with my daughter's sleep issues. If you'd like to read it, here's a link:
http://hubpages.com/hub/sleep-training-good-night-sleep-t...
Good luck and best wishes!
My boys are sensitive to the medication we give to them in the nebulizer. I can't give it to them too close to bedtime because it just winds them up. They bounce all over for a while. It could be that your baby is just sensitive to the meds. My 1st & 2nd kids were good sleepers. My 3rd and youngest (now 2) is a terrible sleeper. We had to try everything, including CIO. What we concluded.... he is the strongest willed out of all three of our boys!! And when he wants something, he REALLY wants it :) Jake could easily CIO for 3 hours - the whole time we went in every 10 minutes, lay him back down, and told him night night. As it stands for right now, we lay him down, put on his radio with slow country on, (we tried classical but the piano seems to wind him up instead of wind him down!) He will most times lay down, and we can hear him talking to himself. But about 25% of the time, we have to go in, lay him back down and tell him night night every 10 minutes for sometimes an hour. He is getting better. Instead of having a CIO night every night like it started out, now its reducing a little at a time. We can usually tell what kind of night it's going to be within in the first 10 minutes :) My husband and I take turns going back in and tucking him in. Just pick one thing and keep it consistent. We actually kept track on paper of how long he cried each night before falling asleep because it was so hard to see if it was actually working. But a few minutes at a time each night and after a week or so we could tell it was working. So if it helps, keep it consistent, and keep track so you can watch the progress.
Best of luck to you!
Jen
Mom of 3 boys ages 6, 4, and 2
Can you get a copy of "No Cry Sleep Solution" by Elizabeth Pantley. It really helps.
