5 am, and yeah, I'm whining again

Today Tori decided that 5 am was when she wanted to start her day.

I have had about four good nights of sleep in the last five or six weeks.

I started my day by deciding to "lay down the line" with Charlie at 6:30 am. He took it like a champ, bless him.

I can't get to sleep before 1 am--and last night I went to bed at 10 pm. I spend about three or four hours a night tossing and turning. I've tried getting up and reading, getting up and working, and getting up and watching television. No drugs help. Nothing seems to help. Staying in bed, even though I'm not actually sleeping, makes me feel the least awful the next day.

I'm going out of my mind.

I understand sleep regressions, and that Tori's growing and developing, but I am a wreck and Charlie (who is normally a great sleeper) is slowly becoming a wreck too. I don't know what to do.

This morning I actually threatened to leave the family if I didn't get some damn sleep. I'm so embarrassed to write that, for so many reasons. First of all, because it's not really true in any way, shape, or form (and I try very hard to say what I mean, mean what I say, and not say it mean). Secondly, Charlie's mother did that to him when he was a kid, so it is just plain cruel. But in that moment--after trying to get Tori to go back to sleep, when she would start to sleep while I held her, but woke up each time I put her down, and refused to sleep when I laid down with her (she was basically doing what we've been asking Iraq to do--if I laid down, she stood up)--I meant it. God forgive me, I meant it.

I know many of you have had it worse--that your kids don't sleep well, or are up multiple times a night and have been for months, or are sick and troubled. I know. And I'm an asshole for complaining. But I'm almost 40 years old, and I just can't function without sleep. I could accept the baby changing her sleep pattern so much more easily if I was getting any quality sleep at all.

I'm really going out of my mind.

It's now 8:37, and I'm going to try to take a nap. Wish me luck.

Comments

[Reese]

Oh Cecily... I'm sorry that things have been so hard. Wishing you luck and goodnight. *thinking of you*

[ls]

You are not anything bad for complaining. There is a reason that sleep deprivation is used as a torture technique. And everyone has different thresholds of when they can go to sleep,a ndhow long, and all that other stuff. Please don't feel bad about yourself. My daughter didn't sleep through the night until she was 3 years old, When she was around 8 months old it was waking every 45 minutes ir so. I literally wanted to shake her, scream at her; the line separating me from a monster was so thin it was almost invisible. Slowly it got better, but not through anything we did. She jsut starting getting better. When I finally quit with the night breastfeeding at 34 months...that night she slept 12 hours withuot waking. If she's getting up too early, make her room dark, and pick a clock radio set to classical or something gentle and set it to start playing when you decide is a good time, say 6:30. She will come to associate that sound with you or Charlie coming to get her and not endlessly scream, waiting. Thinking of you and cheering you on from the other side.

[kheatherg]

It's time to call Aunt Sarah!

Find childcare and take some time to sleep and relax AT HOME without going anywhere or doing anything. Take that NEEDED break!!

I've turned red eyes on my hubs before and told him, "Im leaving and going to a hotel and never comming back" and it's about then that he realizes we need to call an aunt, uncle, mom.....somebody, because i need a break and i need some rest.

Also, i cant remember the name of the movie, but i wanna say maybe ashley judd was in it and she did just that. Of course she was a basket case in the movie anyway, but she left and went to a hotel and slept for 3 days..... I cant remember the name....

Either way, time to call Aunt Sarah, you will get rest and Tori can get some constant lovey attention and all is happy.

[Rachel]

I hear ya.Max gets up everyday at 5 30 am. Luckily I am an early riser but if I do not go to bed at 9 pm, well then I am one nutty woman. I wish I had some good stuff to tell you about sleep but I do not.

[jennyg]

Hey There-

So you really need to work out a schedule with Charlie. My husband and I switch off- one of us takes one night, the other the next. That way we don't have consecutive nights of severe sleep deprivation build up- and that is the most important thing to get rid of.

My husband usually takes the baby downstairs so she can sleep on his shoulder when she won't go down. (I think it makes teething and colds feel better and makes it easier for her to breathe). When it's my turn, he goes and sleeps in an aerobed in another room and I nurse her to sleep. She was sick last night (my night!) and so that was really tough.

You just need to work out this schedule so you can get a sleep block! But also, I know you said you tried drugs, but do try that low dose melatonin if you haven't. It is the only, ONLY thing that helps me, and I am exactly like you and have this AWFUL time getting to sleep.

I think part of it is breastfeeding hormones as well. I find if I feed her it can wake me up too much sometimes, and when I nightweaned her I had all sorts of hot flashes and trouble sleeping. THe good news is that breastfeeding hormones will keep changing and settling down.

The bad news is that, yeah, you have a kid. No more 3am-10am sleeping for you, for a long time (that's my preferred sleep time too :) ) Once we decide to have kids, we can kiss that schedule goodbye for A Long Time! -j

[Whitney]

I know this is probably going to be an unpopular opinion, but it worked for us..........CIO--crying it out. Liked to have killed me at the time but it's the only way my kids ever developed a decent sleep pattern. But, my kids also stopped taking naps around 1 year old, and instead sleep 12 hours straight now.

Either way, I hope you find something that works for you before you lose your mind! Is there any possiblility of either you or Tori leaving the house for a night? Mabye you could at least have one good night of sleep?

[Lesley]

Girl, stop twisting yourself into a pretzel to assure us that you're not "complaining complaining" just complaining! Bwa! The parenting, it can and often is maddening.

When I was having my first baby, now 11, my colleagues had a shower for me and everyone was giving me advice. One of my best friends' advice was "Sometimes, you're going to want to throw the baby out the window..." Gasp! How could he say such a thing?

Know what? That first night home from the hospital when the little thing wouldn't stop screaming--his advice was the most useful!

Hope you get a good night's sleep tonight!

[deezydubya]

I have a different suggestion.

Tinfoil over the windows in her room.

This makes your house look like a bunch of toothless hill people live there, but sometimes it fixes the problem. Once the sun starts coming up at 5 am, I've found that my son wakes up at 5 am. The only cure is tinfoil on the windows to ensure a lightless room.

For some reason, little kids don't appear to understand either daylight savings time or weekends. I can't figure that out!

[Julie O]

I just wanted to express sympathy- I have my-own-head-induced insomnia sometimes and it just sucks.

I assume you've tried Benadryl? If I've had a few bad nights, one tablet is a lifesaver (Living Sober be damned- I think they were talking about not using the hard stuff back then anyway).

[Jess]

Hey,I'm sorry you are going through this. I know that I lose all my sanity when I am sleep deprived.

I won't offer any suggestions. Instead, I wanted to offer how I accidentally did CIO, what the pediatrician said, and what eventually happened.

Our son was younger than Tori is now, but I was exclusively pumping. So when Jack started crying in the middle of the night it took me a little time to go get the bottle of breastmilk, warm it up, etc. Maybe 5 minutes tops. But easier to perform these tasks while he was still in his crib than to do it while he was flailing in my arms.

Because I was also 40 years old then and tremendously sleep deprived (we are talking like 3 hours total for any given 24 hour period for something like 3 months), one night I was extra slow. And by the time I got the bottle back up to Jack's room he was sound asleep. In the morning he was totally happy and normal.

David had been urging me to try CIO, but I'd been reluctant. But at that point I agreed to let Jack cry for 5 minutes before I did anything. (And at a certain point you can tell by the cry if it's a horrible distress call or not).

Well, this really worked. And I realized that I'd been keeping him up at night by giving him a bottle every time he cried instead of letting him slip back to sleep. Everyone was happier.

Also, as a tangent, the pediatrician had advised that while some babies like to get up at 4 or 5 in the morning, this is not what most adults can do on a regular basis. Not even close. He suggested leaving Jack in his crib if he woke up that early. We eventually tried this too (after I'd spent months getting up at 4 and 5 in the morning).

I know this is not for everyone, and certainly all babies and parents and people are different. But for us this worked very well. Everybody in our house was SO MUCH happier. (I'd expected Jack to be pissed at me when I finally went to get him at 7, but he never was. He always had a smile on his face because he was finally sleeping enough.)

[SandyC]

My beloved Brendan was a non sleeper and I am an insomniac. I almost lost it. At one point I was hallucinating. For real. Seeing kittens. Climbing the garage door.

Some where around 12-14 months we did it -- locked him in a safe room and let him cry it out. We warned the neighbors first so no one called the cops. During that first horrible night Joe had to physically restrain me, and later I had to do the same for him. It was horrible, but it worked. And he lived -- whereas he wouldn’t have if I had gone without sleep much longer.

[Tyanne]

I have done the same thing. I'm sure Tori will eventually grow out of this stage she is in. Hopefully soon, so you can rest. Is she teething? I don't know if you have tried it, but some childrens Motrin really helped my kids sleep when they were teething.
And if it is just that she is starting to showing her stubborness, I also had to do the "let them cry it out thing" just about killed me and my husband, but after two or three nights, she was fine. Hopefully this will help a little.

[Cera]

I totally hear you C! Mila is four months old, so CIO is *not* an option here... And I was regularly getting less than 5 hours of sleep. Yesterday, I got up at five, woke hubby at 10, and told him " If I don't go back to sleep I may become suicidal. Its been FOUR MONTHS and I may just die of sleep deprivation ". I slept until 1, yawned for a few hours, climbed back into bed at 3 and slept it out till 5. I took Mila with me to feed her, but when she woke up, off she went to Daddy.

Don't apologize to us, or couch your statements in disclaimers. No matter how bad someone else has it, you are suffering and this is your life, and your blog. Yes be thankful your child isn't ill, but its perfectly normal to bitch and complain that you aren't getting any sleep.

If you feel comfortable, let her CIO for a bit each night. I did it. I didn't like it, but my older one refused to sleep and he was MUCH happier once he was getting enough sleep.

[Tiffany]

Every mama has the right to complain about no sleep. Tell Charlie to take Tori out for a few hours this afternoon and lay down. Even if you don't nap (which you probably will) the down time will do you good.

[c-ann]

I hope this doesn't qualify as ass-vice, and I'm not a mom yet so I have no advice about Tori, but for you...exercise? Can you do something everyday that gets you sweating, like a power walk pushing Tori in the stroller? I swear it helps. I've also heard melatonin works wonders from several insomniacs.

[Celeste]

Baby needs a sleepover or mom and dad need a getaway. Either way, is there someone who can take over for a night? Sometimes kids behave a lot better for somebody else or with a change of venue.

It sounds awful, but it's better to try to break the sleep cycle before you get sick with one of those lovely opportunistic infections that prey on you when your defenses are down. BTDT.

Never did CIO but I'm not sure the time to start it is when you are in such a seriously hurting place. JMHO.

[Angela Vitale]

Before you leave your hard won baby to cio, perhaps try rerading Elizabeth Pantley's book on sleep, The No Cry Sleep Solution. Here's a link: http://www.amazon.com/No-Cry-Sleep-Solution-Gentle-Through/dp/0071381392

http://www.pantley.com/elizabeth/

That's the author's website, she has excerpts. I love her books, especially Hidden Messages.

She also has a toddler version of NCSS which may work well.

In case you are looking at sleep books, Weissbluth's book is interesting for his information on how much sleep children should have, but his "no rocking or feeding" thing is just wrong. I did both with my son, he's now 4 and goes to bed in his own bed all alone no rocking or feeding. He's done this for about 2 years (the feeding ended before that, but at 2 he still wanted a little rocking before going to his bed). We didn't "break" him of the habit, he grew out of the need!

[cursingmama]

I didn't do lack of sleep well at 22 or 25, so don't think it's your age; kids just wear us down. Some people admit to it, others don't.

My son wasn't a crib escape artist so I could always throw some toys in and let him play while I napped in the next room. My daughter was a total escape artist and I just had to nap when she did - if I could convince my son it was a good idea. No matter what I did, I was tired and felt like a total failure. I'm just thankful I was a WAHM then - can't imagine what would've gone on if I had to go somewhere to work. GAH!

[christy]

I understand your frustration, and I am sorry that you have to experience this now. I had a very similiar situation a few months back, so I'll share what worked for me. Our daughters are the same age, but mine (Porgie) sleeps a lot worse than Tori. Porgie was waking me up multiple times per night, my husband's snoring was waking me up, the Dog's snoring was waking me up, the cat meowing was waking me up, etc. On an average night, I was getting about 2 hours of sleep. I honestly think that I was so overtired, that I just couldn't sleep. And I was blaming it one everyone else.

One day, I reached my breaking point. I was angry with my daughter, my husband, and entire life. I told my husband that I was moving out of the bedroom and that he had to deal with Porgie. I started sleeping in our guest room in the basement (far away from all the noise). At first, I was still miserable. I kept waking up in the silence. But over time, I started sleeping again. After a few weeks, I moved back into the bedroom, and I even starting getting up with Porgie at night. I think I just need to get caught up on my sleep.

Sleep deprivation will kick your ass. Please try to distance yourself from all noises and distraction.

[Martha]

I am so sorry. Having the baby not sleep is difficult enough. I can't imagine struggling with insomnia on top of it!
My assvice, do what you want with it...
We did have success with cry it out with my son. He slept through the night for the first time the first night we tried it! It was a horrendous week and there were times I left hubby inside and went outside to escape the screaming. But, it worked and the night before he was waking every 45 minutes during the night at 8 months old. It was horrid. I must confess it's been even more difficult to let Abby cry. I never thought I'd be a sexist mom! Perhaps it's more because she's my last baby rather than her being a girl.
I don't know how you feel about cry it out, I do have mixed feelings. But, there came a point where my mental health hung in the balance and the kid NEEDED to sleep so I could sleep!
You are not alone!

[Stephanie]

Never, ever think you're an asshole for having completely normal and sane "Momotions". I use that term for the completely irrational, howl at the moon emotions that define the roller coaster ride of motherhood. EVERY SINGLE solitary mother in the world has contemplated leaving - sometimes just for a good night's sleep and sometimes forever. It doesn't mean we will and it doesn't mean we're bad mother's. Sleep deprivation is a devilish beast that alters the way we think and process emotions.

I'm afraid I have no good suggestions other than getting a trusted babysitter for the night so you and your husband can rent a hotel room and crash out.

Hugs!

On a totally unrelated note, I remember you blogging ages ago about good baby/kids books. I found one on the weekend that is amazing!! It's called "If the World Were a Village". I highly recommend it! It's geared more towards older kids but it's a great way to start a conversation with babies and toddlers about different races, cultures and religions.

[Meira]

Well, I have a guest room if you and Charlie want to take turns having 'sleep vacations'. And I own NoCrySS, Healthy Sleep Happy Children and the Ferber book if you want to research those options . . .

[SusieJ]

I've got a futon.

Seriously.

My regret of j not sleeping through the night for TEN FREAKING MONTHS? Not going away for a night by myself to get some rest because I was at the end of my rope by the end of it.

As for sleep, I find yoga works for me, and J got me a program from http://www.pzizz.com/ for my iPod to listen to and help me fall asleep.

[Sunny]

Just wanted to say, BTDT. My nephew drove my sister and I nuts. One night she stormed into his room (we were both awake and frustrated with him), flipped on the light, and SCREAMED "GO TO SLEEP!!!". Of course she terrified him, and I the awesome aunt was able to swoop in and comfort & protect him from his evil mother.

Eh, she snapped...she's human. Hang in there, I think my nephew was about the same age as Tori when he started the night time crap.

As for the sleep, ugh, I have a hard time getting more than 3-4 hours without waking up. It sucks.