Sleep: yours, mine, and ours
Amber has been waking in the middle of the night again for food. She has a cold so it's covered under acceptable use. But I really wish she wouldn't. This is the second cold in two weeks and we only had a few days of all-night sleep (until 4:30 or 5 am) between colds.
Peter has been waking up basically every night. We've trained him to be quiet and go to Daddy's side of the bed and get Daddy. Jon goes into Peter's room and then does whatever he does with him. This is acceptable to me, but not to Jon.
We talked about what we could do about it tonight.
I had not realized until I heard myself talking the intensity of my emotions on this subject. I cannot go back to dealing with Peter (and Amber) in the middle of the night every night. If once in a while, even as often as once or twice a week, he has a bad dream and needs some comfort in the middle of the night, then yes of course I can comfort him and put him back to bed. But not every night. Not any more. Getting a complete uninterrupted night of sleep matters so much. I cannot do this any more.
Jon is coming to that point too, which is why he brought it up tonight. I suggested we try a different sleep doctor. He was unsatisfied with the results of the last one and is understandably reluctant to try again. I find that I feel we should just lock Peter in his room all night and other uncharitable thoughts. No it's not good for him, but we need the sleep. Perhaps we should look into a night nanny instead. Or re-do the sleep associations section of the Ferber book, with limit setting thrown in. But I still feel it's the fears chapter that is Peter's problem. The end of that chapter says something like, "and if all this doesn't work, you may need professional help." I think we are at that point again. Somebody needs professional help. We all need sleep.
I could help Jon out if Amber was sleeping through again. So perhaps the way about it is to work on Amber getting over her cold and go from there. When we get her out of our room into her own room perhaps we can better share responsibilities for Peter.
--Beth
Peter has been waking up basically every night. We've trained him to be quiet and go to Daddy's side of the bed and get Daddy. Jon goes into Peter's room and then does whatever he does with him. This is acceptable to me, but not to Jon.
We talked about what we could do about it tonight.
I had not realized until I heard myself talking the intensity of my emotions on this subject. I cannot go back to dealing with Peter (and Amber) in the middle of the night every night. If once in a while, even as often as once or twice a week, he has a bad dream and needs some comfort in the middle of the night, then yes of course I can comfort him and put him back to bed. But not every night. Not any more. Getting a complete uninterrupted night of sleep matters so much. I cannot do this any more.
Jon is coming to that point too, which is why he brought it up tonight. I suggested we try a different sleep doctor. He was unsatisfied with the results of the last one and is understandably reluctant to try again. I find that I feel we should just lock Peter in his room all night and other uncharitable thoughts. No it's not good for him, but we need the sleep. Perhaps we should look into a night nanny instead. Or re-do the sleep associations section of the Ferber book, with limit setting thrown in. But I still feel it's the fears chapter that is Peter's problem. The end of that chapter says something like, "and if all this doesn't work, you may need professional help." I think we are at that point again. Somebody needs professional help. We all need sleep.
I could help Jon out if Amber was sleeping through again. So perhaps the way about it is to work on Amber getting over her cold and go from there. When we get her out of our room into her own room perhaps we can better share responsibilities for Peter.
--Beth