Sleep Training

A 3.5 hour stretch of sleep last night, and I am a new person.

We approached sleeping with no preconceived notions, not rejecting anything along the spectrum of Dr. Sears (co-sleep) to Dr. Ferber (cry it out) outright. During our four days in the hospital after Luca was born, he slept with either Ben or me, because the plastic bassinet on wheels seemed so antiseptic and far from our beds.

At home we already had an Arm's Reach co-sleeper attached like a sidecar to our bed (thanks, ladies from my shower!). The first night, Luca spent about 5 minutes in the co-sleeper - too far away for us to hear him breathing so both of us were craning our heads over to the co-sleeper. So into bed Luca came.

It felt so nice - this sweet baby breathing and moving right next to me. Fearful of crushing Luca in our sleep (really my sleep, since I was still on vidocin due to my c-section), we got an in-bed co-sleeper: The First Years Close & Secure Sleeper. This is really a glorified little box, with 4-inch high plastic sides so you can't roll over on the baby. The sleeper took up a third of our queen bed - Ben complained that his elbow wasn't in the bed - but it was so nice for both of us to be right next to Luca at night.

And, thanks to the advice of our doula, we got separate non-down blankets to minimize risk of suffocating baby.

All great. Sleep started out promising with two hour stretches, and sometimes a 2.5 or 3 hour span in a night. But then Luca started waking up more often, and often wanting to eat more. And he did not want to stay in his glorified box. So I started comfort nursing, and/or one of us would sleep with him on our chest or in our arm. I think the comfort nursing encouraged him to wake up even more often for a snack. The last couple weeks he's had several hour stints of waking up every 30-60 minutes to eat. And, at some point we jettisoned the in-bed co-sleeper, though in its defense I think it was because we thought we would somehow get Luca into the Arm's Reach sidecar co-sleeper.

Even though I used to survive quite well on 4 hours of sleep, honed on startup hours and mid-week bar outings, I am sadly out of practice now. A few times I lost it and wimpered to Ben in exasperation to take crying Luca away upstairs.

So last night, we decided to start sleep training last night. I found this posting on preventing sleep problems from a Dr. David Olson to be very helpful:
http://en.allexperts.com/q/Pediatrics-1429/6-week-old-sleep.htm, and just found a similar but more general description here: http://www.babycenter.com/404_how-do-i-teach-my-baby-to-soothe-himself-to-sleep_1272921.bc

The big ah ha was putting Luca down when he was drowsy but awake versus asleep and then hoping he would not wake up. The other thing was a nighttime routine. My friend, Monica, had told me she implemented this for her daughter who is 6 weeks older than Luca. Ben and I are not routine people, so we were a bit loath to do it at this young age, but I was so sleep deprived desperate yesterday that we decided on a routine over dinner.

Plan hatched, we started at 9:30 pm: bath and "story" with Mrs. Mustard's faces book - thank you, Bart - so appropriate because Luca was crying/pouting. Then breastfeeding, swaddling, and in the sidecar at 10:15 pm. Luca cried a little, and I picked him up and comforted him and put him back into the sidecar. He was asleep in 10 minutes! I could not believe it.

Luca slept until 1:45 am - 3.5 hours! Then he woke up hungry, so another breastfeeding session then back into the sidecar at 2:30 am. This was the hard part, and I appreciate that Ben told me at dinner this sleep training plan would fail at first and we'd have to persevere. Luca kept waking up and crying every 5-20 minutes. I would either pick him up, rub his tummy or jiggle him and talk to him. And the giraffe noise machine was on full throttle - thanks, Naureen. Finally, he went into a deep sleep at 4 am. Frankly, I was able to keep calmly soothing him for an hour and a half because I had gotten 3.5 hours sleep earlier in the night!

Luca woke up again at 6:30 am, we had another feeding, and now he is still sleeping soundly in his sidecar as I sit in bed writing this post.

Hope this works again - maybe even better? - tonight...

Now I'm not sure what to do for naps during the day. We had been using a sling (New Native Carrier) which I love because it's easy to get on quickly, and he's with me all the time. Dr. Sears is a big advocate of slings. But it seems like the womb-like sling isn't preparing Luca for the sidecar at night. I tried priming him with a carseat nap yesterday afternoon, which he initially didn't like but fell asleep after a couple strolls around the house with carseat on the Snap N Go.

Anyone have any advice for daytime naps?

Luca's Birth Story

Our sweet Luca was born on 12 January via c-section. Here is the birth story...

In late December, I began weekly ultrasounds and fetal monitoring, standard practice for "geriatric" - over 40 - moms. Go geriatric moms! And, they found I had low amniotic fluid and the baby had turned breech. So I began every-few-day visits for fluid check-ins - and tried about 47 baby turning techniques, including moxybustion and hanging from an inversion table.

The baby didn't turn (had he run out of room in his short mom's tummy?!), but my fluid remained low yet stable, so we made it to week 39 for a planed c-section.

After I was able let go of my desire to have a natural, unmedicated, woo woo hypnobirth birth, the project manager in me was rather happy to have a specific date and time for the delivery, and that the delivery would be over in less than an hour. It was fun to pick out the baby's birthdate - 1/12/11. I love palindromes. And, I learned that "2" is my husband's favorite number.

Of course, the baby had his own plan, as usual.... at 4 am on the 12th, my bag of waters released, and I started having surges (contractions in hypnobirth speak). I was in disbelief, since it seemed too coincidental, and thought maybe I just kept peeing on myself (!), but the contractions were very strong and regular. So off we went to St. Luke's and when I was checked, my midwife could feel the baby's bony butt. They arrested my labor with a drug called Terbutaline, so we could go forward with a scheduled instead of emergency c-section.

So, the 12th was truly meant to be the baby's birthday! Dr. Norrell at St. Luke's was amazing throughout the process and with my surgery. She even cut so she would avoid my tattoo.

In the end, Luca came out, bloody and beautiful. I still can't believe he's here!

C-Section Tomorrow

Less than 12 hours before boogie makes his first solo appearance. I'm excited and scared and excited. I made it to 39 weeks, with my low amniotic fluid checked every couple days. And since boogie is still breech, I have a planned c-section tomorrow. It's strange knowing - actually picking - the baby's birth date. A strange output of calendar availability for us and our preferred ob-gyn (Norrell at St. Luke's); and lucky numbers (apparently my husband's favorite number is 2). Boogie is fortunate to get a numeric palindrome - 1/12/11. However, he misses binary - 1/10/11 or 1/11/11 - though I frankly couldn't figure out what either of these meant, if anything.

I have to confess that I'm scared of the c-section surgery. I know that 27% of births in the US are via c-section, so it's a routine procedure, but I am not looking forward to the longer recovery, not being able to go up and down stairs, etc. Moreover, I'm not good at asking for help - learning to ask will be my biggest challenge.

Back to excitement. So excited to meet baby. So excited to know whether he has hair. And what he looks like. And, and, and...

Boogie Baby Prepares to Make His Appearance His Way

This is definitely my husband's child. After several weeks of checkups with a heads down baby, Boogie turned breech at week 36! My husband was breech - he tells me it is a sign of royalty. The only reference I have found is to Kaiser Wilhelm II, who didn't fare too well during his breech birth. So, readers, would love any pointers to information to substantiate or refute my husband's claims to royalty.

To turn the baby, I've been trying everything. Overachieving as usual. Acupuncture (moxybustion), chiropractor (Webster technique), hypnosis, inversion table, shoulder stands. My favorite so far has been lying upside down on an ironing board (head lower than feet) with an iPod and a light at the bottom of my uterus and an ice bag at the top. The theory is the baby will move its head away from the ice and want to go toward the music and light. But he hasn't budged.

I also had an external cephalic version at the doctor on Thursday, which was uncomfortable but not painful. The doctor said his butt is wedged in my pelvis; he's probably there to stay!

So I'll probably deliver via c-section. And early likely. I've been at the doctor every couple days over the last week. My amniotic fluid is on the low side; if it gets too low the baby will be delivered.

The project manager in me has not dealt with this well. Earlier in my pregnancy I had expected to deliver very early, since I was born six weeks early. At some point, I abandoned this expectation and decided I would be a week late, since the majority of first time mothers are a week late. It was decided.

So on Thursday when I was told that if my amniotic fluid was too low on Friday morning, I would have a c-section that day, I was devastated. Three weeks early. The house wasn't ready, we didn't know how the car seat worked, I didn't have any diapers, and I hadn't finished my work transition.

But as I sat on the couch Friday morning before we left for the hospital, I realized I wasn't emotionally ready. It's been such a special time, being joined with this growing being. And I wasn't - I'm still not - ready for us to graduate on to being two separate people. Then I realized I'm going to be unbearable if I'm this sappy at every single life transition this kid has. So tears dried, we went to the hospital, and... my amniotic fluid had held steady. I had drank 2 cups of water each hour from 6 pm to midnight the night before... Baby gets to stay inside me for a little while longer.

We go back Sunday morning for my next check. More water guzzling tonight!