11 Weeks Old...

Here she is at 11 weeks old... What is new this week...

Well, we decided to try what the doctor ordered as of monday for trying to get Miss Rowan to take adequate naps during the day, and to learn to fall asleep on her own...let's just say we haven't been very successful. I'd say another way of putting it is "the cry it out method"...still not working. On Monday she cried for an hour for her first nap (rule is to put her to bed when she is tired...and she is supposed to nap for an hour to an hour and a half...leave her there for at least an hour whether she is sleeping or crying...obviously don't wake her if she is sleeping at an hour...but she should stay there an hour) so I get her out of bed after her hour of crying, and she stops crying the second I pick her up of course, but she is exhausted because she just cried for an hour. So she falls asleep within minutes in my arms...so I put her back in bed...she sleeps for maybe 30 minutes...so then do I get her up? or keep her in bed for her hour total still...essentially this is how everyday has been...she has yet to sleep for an hour straight...she will now sleep for the first 20-40 minutes and then lay there and cry, and is still tired when we get her up after an hour.

In my mind, this isn't working right. I haven't started the night time part. We are supposed to move her bedtime up to start the routine at 7pm and be in bed by 8pm, but depending on what time she eats during the day, that just doesn't work. We don't have a good daytime schedule yet to make the nighttime part work. Plus, again we are supposed to put her to bed when she looks tired and let her fall asleep on her own, only you don't get her up after an hour of crying, she cries until she falls asleep. Let's just say we haven't done that yet. We are used to her bedtime being between 830pm and 10pm depending on what time she eats. And sometimes she sleeps until 6am, but for the most part we have a feeding during the night around 3 or 4 am.

Now this whole process might not be working because he (the pediatrician) told us to do this in a month (so that would be around 3 months old because we discussed this at her 2 month check up) but I was fed up with her not napping during the day, so we started it on monday. So is she just not old enough to realize what she is supposed to do? Or is this process bogus and I am letting her cry for nothing? She clearly isn't learning anything yet (I know it has only been 3-4 days, but he made it seem like she would learn that fast) So I don't know what to do now, I didn't want to be letting her cry it out when I go back to work and am trying to sleep during the day and she is crying right across the hall. I was hoping to have it handled by then. But it isn't looking good. Rowan is managing to make the process harder than it should be, not everything works for every baby and maybe she is an exception to this idea?

My fellow family and friends with little ones at home can give me their recommendations via email, I am ready for them. She just needs to learn to nap longer during the day so that she isn't crabby in the evening because she is so tired. I do believe in the sleep promotes sleep idea, although despite her lack of napping she does pretty good at night. Sure it would be better if she slept through the night, but that will come with time. I think?

So that is our dilemma these days. Otherwise Rowan is getting bigger and cuter every day. She is a smiley little girl with some chubby cheeks! I can't believe I go back to work in a week and a half, not happy about that. Let's just say I might fall off the face of the earth when I am back to work because I will be back to staying up 3 nights a week, and sleeping during the day with a baby in the house. Could be interesting!!