Friday, September 14, 2012

Sleep Deprivation

Sleep has been difficult to come by ever since I was pregnant with Peach - about 4.5 years ago!  That is a long time to have sleepless nights.  The reason?  Well, there was about 18 months or so of puking my guts out when I was pregnant (2 kids x 9 months each).  Then, once they were born, the sleep situation got even worse.  It has always been changing as our kids grew - but it has always been rough.

Putting the kids to bed can sometimes be a 4 hour ordeal.  They have frequent awakenings during the night.  Something has to give.  This week DH has been out of town.  He is a more of a softy than I am when it comes to our kids and would have a tough time with Pen crying.  I read this article and decided this was a good week to get Pen (my now 17 month old) sleeping in her own space.  One quote from that article:  "By the age of 1, they should be sleeping 12 overnight hours in a row,"   Ha!!!  I must surely be doing something wrong!!!

It was hard at first.  She cried in her pack and play.  I stayed nearby so she could see me.  Eventually, she fell asleep by herself!  Each day she put up less and less of a fuss.  If we keep this up, I may have a little time to myself in the evenings.  I still have to lose the nighttime wake-ups.  Perhaps that will be next week?  Ha!  It is never that easy.  ...but a 17 month old should be able to sleep through the night.  It is not like she is a few weeks old and has a tiny tummy.  Part of me feels selfish for doing a little sleep training.  I try and justify it by saying that I am a better mom if I get time to myself and enough sleep.  I only half believe that justification...