The One Where I Complain About Sleep

Hadley has never been a great sleeper.  I honestly don’t think there’s really anything we could have done differently; I think it’s just in her DNA.  We have tried all the tips & tricks (cry-it-out does not work with her personality – she cries so hard that she gags herself, and would go for hours if I let her).  She goes down great -  for both naps and going to bed at night it usually doesn’t take more than 5-10 minutes for her to be out.  We go through our routines and put her down awake and she goes right to sleep (most of the time).  It’s the staying asleep that we struggle with. 

When she was younger, it was naps that were the bane of my existence.  (This is probably because I didn’t expect her to sleep through the night at a young age, but I did expect her to nap a lot – she didn’t.)  We went through a phase of napping for 37 minutes at a time.  That’s right – I timed them.  Which made it worse for me because each time I knew like clock-work she would be up after 37 minutes.  I was going out of my mind.  Then, she slowly started napping better, and now we are in a pretty decent routine of two naps a day for about an hour and a half each. 

So now, what do I do?  Instead of being thankful for the napping consistency, now I start over-analyzing her nighttime sleep.  Confession: I have an app on my phone where I track her nursing, diapers, sleep and medicine (if we do baby tylenol or advil for teething, or her Zantac when she was younger for her reflux).  The other day, I decided to look back at her sleeping habits and see how many times she has slept through the night (meaning 11-12 hours straight).  63 times.  Out of about 405 days of life so far.  Approximately 15% of the time.  And then I looked at how often those days are consecutive and realized that she has NEVER slept that long for more than 5 days in a row (which only happened once), and typically only does it for 3 days in a row, and then we have some type of disruption.  Whether it’s teething, bad dreams, hunger, or just needing some cuddles (highly doubtful seeing as how she does NOT enjoy cuddling), I have no idea.  All I know is that being woken up by the sound of your screaming child is one of the worst things in the entire world.  The other night, I don’t think I ever fell into a deep sleep for more than about 5 minutes because every.single.time I did, Hadley woke up crying. 

I know she’s not the only child out there who isn’t a great sleeper, but I can’t help but feel like we did something wrong by her!  I also know that it could be worse and she could never sleep through the night, so I should be thankful for the nights that I do get to sleep soundly.  Easier said than done.  In trying to figure out how to “end” this post, I’m realizing I don’t really have a point to all of this, but simply needed to complain.  So, thanks for listening!  I promise to share some cute pictures and have some more positive posts soon!

p.s. I am almost done with our bedroom makeover!  I’m co-hosting my sister’s shower this weekend, and once we get back from that I should be able to wrap it up and take some fabulous “after” pictures for you!