Operation Big Boy Bed- Week 2

Week 2 went smoothly. At bed time. Not nap time. We were on vacation this week and I was so nervous to have to put Evan down for a nap each day. For the first few days, he threw a fit at nap time, crying and ultimately falling asleep on the ground for no more than 40 minutes. It was tough. Then around Wednesday he accepted that it was nap time and played in his room for a bit before falling asleep on the floor. He really only napped in his bed twice this week. Yet, I decided not to be picky. Sleep is sleep.

Bed time got easier this week. He only fusses for a minute before finally laying down for the night. I still was feeling guilty that he would fuss/cry/be upset so I tried something new last night and it works! When he gets out of bed to protest at the baby gate, I go to him and walk him back to bed, telling him it's night-night time and he needs to stay in bed. He lays down, I kiss him and walk out. He does it again and I repeat the steps. Then...he falls asleep, no fussing! I don't like for him to fall asleep feeling sad or upset, so this is important to me. It's worked 2 nights in a row so I will keep this routine up. Even if I have to walk him back to his bed 20 times! Originally I was just letting him cry and then he would eventually go back to bed. I didn't feel comfortable with this so changing it up helped us both.

We did have an incident this week. I left the baby gate open because I eventually want to do away with it once Evan understands that he needs to stay in bed. I wanted him to be able to come out when he awoke in the morning. I wanted to see what he would do. So, Wednesday morning he wakes up. At 4:00 am. He discovered the gate was open and came to our room. He stood quietly in the doorway then turned and left. I went to get him and bring him back to bed with us. He laid there and I thought he would fall back to sleep. He did. An hour and a half later....he was tossing and turning, kicking, playing, crawling around...oh dear. Yeah that can't happen again. It was my fault. I was too lazy to put him back in bed and didn't want to make him upset so early in the morning. I know now, he won't learn unless I put him back in bed. Oh, these parenting lessons are fun aren't they?

On to week 3!

Operation Big Boy Bed- 1 Week

So, Evan has been sleeping in his toddler bed for a week now. He's done such a great job. The lingering issue is the crying as soon as we leave the room. It's down to a couple minutes, though, so it's not too bad.

Dad has super powers. I wasn't feeling well the other night and he did the entire bed time routine, even putting him down. I listened for the cries as John left his room and...nothing. He even stayed in bed. What?! How did he do it? I was amazed and even jealous. So, it's me then...maybe I linger too long.

All in all, I've learned so much about my little dude and I am so proud of him for being adaptable. Now, when baby #2 is ready for the crib, it'll be free to use and a distant memory for Evan.

Yay for taking the plunge and facing my fears and friends with great tips!

Here's the whole saga here, here, here and here.

Operation Big Boy Bed- Night 4

He did a great job again! The crying is down to just a couple minutes. I kiss him good night and walk out of the room and he runs to the gate to protest but then it's back to bed. He played for about 20 minutes though. I went in to check on him and he had fallen asleep on the floor by his toys....so I moved him and he stayed in bed the rest of the night. He woke up about 5:00 but then quickly went back to sleep. I'm about to go wake him up for the day.

He's done so well. This experience has taught me to give him more credit. He is adaptable. It's okay for him to be upset and feel out-of-sorts. That's part of life and I don't think I should completely shield him from those feelings. Yet, he got over them quickly and has moved on. I should never have underestimated his ability to adjust to the change. Ah, these parenting lessons are purposeful aren't they?

Operation Big Boy Bed- Night 3

He's doing great!

He was upset for about 10 minutes then played for a bit in his bed and finally fell asleep for the night. I didn't hear from him again until I had to wake him up! I'm so proud of my big guy.

The only issue is the initial "good night" when we leave the room. We use the gate because he's still too young to follow directions and stay in bed. I try to stay in the room with him for a bit. Lights off and glow seahorse on. I try and pat his back to cue him in to the fact that it's night night time. He thinks it's a game though! He jumps around and rolls all over the bed and makes his doggie bark. I eventually have to leave the room because we don't make any progress and he gets upset. He cries at the gate for a few minutes and heads back to bed. It breaks my heart to hear him cry but I can't let him control the situation by coming back right away.

He'll continue to play in his bed for up to 40 minutes! Now, this is after our bedtime routine of bath and reading. He suddenly gets this burst of energy that is hard to simmer down. I really hope that the initial crying stops soon because my heart can't take it. I don't want him to go to bed feeling sad or lonely. I know he's okay though because I can hear him playing in bed before he finally konks out. He makes his doggie bark and makes silly sounds. He's a riot.

Some friends are also doing the transition to a toddler bed or big boy bed and it's so nice to know I'm not alone in it. Parenting is hard enough and then you throw in these parental enforced changes like bed transitions or bottle phase outs or pre-school enrollments and things just get tough for us morally, emotionally and mentally. Having a support team behind you like friends and family to urge us and encourage us is so helpful especially when they've been down the road before.

Thanks everyone!

Operation Big Boy Bed- Night 2

It went really well. I can't rave enough about my kid and his ability to adapt. He was upset for about 10 minutes, went back to his bed and went to sleep. I didn't hear a peep from him until 7:30 this morning! I am so proud of him. I didn't want to expect that night 2 would be as good as night 1 so I just kept thinking we could be up all night. I was pleasantly surprised. He didn't even fall out of bed. I'm surprised because he moves a lot.

He woke up at 7:30 and I heard him playing. I didn't go in right away, I waited until he called for us. It bought me and extra 30 minutes of rest. When he did call out, I went and made a big deal out of him sleeping so well in his big boy bed. Again, he was all smiles.

Naps. Hmmm...it's a different thing. Yesterday he went down late in the day and had no trouble. Dad laid him in his bed covered him and walked out. He fell right to sleep for an hour and a half. Today though...well, I'm listening to him cry, I've tried a few times to go in and lay him down and pat his back but as soon as I leave he gets upset. It's been about 20 minutes and he's still putting up a fight. Can't win 'em all I suppose.

I'm still so happy that this transition is going well. The crib will be a distant memory for Evan when baby #2 starts to use it.

Operation Big Boy Bed- Night 1

It's about 9:00. Evan cried for 10 minutes then fell asleep in his new toddler bed. Slept of for 45 minutes and is crying again. I patted his back and he went to sleep but as soon as I left the room he was at it again. This is going to be a long night.

We decided to start the transition now because we don't want to buy another crib or try to transition after the baby is here. I don't want to spark up any jealousy or possessive issues or make things harder than they need to be. We got Evan a toddler bed from Amazon since I wasn't pleased with the crappy choices in the store. It's a great frame and matches our current furniture, too. We had to buy another crib mattress since that's what fits the toddler bed but the bed holds up to 50 pounds so he can use it for a while.

I'm hoping things won't be awful for too long since he is good at taking naps on his mat at school. We had to use a gate on his bedroom door. I had a terrible nightmare that Evan came out of his room in the middle of the night and the dogs mistook him for an intruder. It was a sign. It'll prevent the dogs from going in to his room and bugging him. Also, I can picture Evan getting up before us and playing in the cat box. Not cool. Plus, since he is too young to follow directions well (stay in your room) this will help him understand that night-night time means you stay in your room.

I'm hoping by Monday night, things will settle down. We'll see!

Update: He did sooo good. Much better than I anticipated. I thought we'd be up the whole night. He was up at 9:00 and again at 2:30. At 9:00 I patted his back and he went back to sleep. I wasn't so lucky at 2:30. I tried to pat his back for 45 minutes but he wasn't going back to sleep. I kissed him and said "night-night," and left the room. He cried and I stood around the corner feeling horrible. He cried for a couple of minutes and walked back to his bed. He slept until 7:30! I heard him get up and play a little before yelling for us. I made sure to make a big deal about him doing such a good job. I went in with a big smile and gave lots of hugs and kisses while telling him how proud I am of him. He was all smiles.

Bedtime

My boy is nearly 14 months. Tonight is the 3rd night without the bedtime bottle. I'm pleased to report that it's gone pretty well. He didn't cry for it or whine at all. He does seem to stay awake in his crib a bit longer before dozing off. Right now he's playing with his musical elephant, I can hear it through the baby monitor.

I've had to come to grips with something that took me far too long to accept. My child is not a snuggler. He WAS a snuggler from 0 to say 6 months. Since then he's squirmed and wriggled when I've tried to rock him before bed. In the end I just lay him in bed and he falls asleep within 15 minutes without a fight. I'm glad that he's independent and can soothe himself in many cases BUT....that leaves this mama just a bit sad that he doesn't want to snuggle. I'll survive.

Each night I would try to rock him, even for a couple of minutes, but he wasn't interested. Although some pretty heart-warming moments happened during those attempts. Sometimes he'll cover my face in kisses and I can see his grin in the dark. Sometimes he'll play with my hair or necklace or even nuzzle my cheek with his head. I soak up those moments. Then I have to put him in his crib because he gets too rambunctious.

This is just another way he is showing me his personality and his individuality. My little guy is growing up so fast.

My Life As a Mama- The Early Weeks

I'm excited to finally write this post. I actually have some energy and our little one went to sleep at 9:30 which means I get some free time!

The first few days home from the hospital were an emotional roller coaster for me. I admit I had the baby blues. I was so happy to have Evan home with us to begin settling into our new life as a family and our new roles. I would cry with tears of happiness just staring at my little guy. Then the next minute I would start sobbing because I suddenly felt like I wasn't capable of being responsible for another person or that I couldn't handle the immense pressure of this new responsibility. I felt overwhelmed. I would cry a couple times a day and sometimes they were gut wrenching sobs that I couldn't control. It was obvious that I was having trouble settling into my new role as Evan's mama. Luckily John was able to take 2 weeks off from work to help.

Feeding- I am breastfeeding E so there is that added dependency that I had trouble with as well. In the early weeks, E wanted to nurse almost constantly. Let me tell you, the books, magazine articles and other breastfeeding mom's made it sound so simple to do....it is NOT that easy. It was SO painful the first 2 weeks that I thought I couldn't make it. I would scream because my nipples were so sensitive. At first we had a bad latch and that caused one nipple to be cracked and bruised. Each time I had to nurse I would cry from the pain. This was really important for me to do and felt like I was failing. I wanted to provide Evan with the best possible start to life that I could. After all the research I did, I knew this was the healthiest thing to feed him and I knew I wanted that special bond that forms through breastfeeding. So, I forged on. Each time I nursed I would say, "Nope I can't do this anymore, that's it, I'm done." One side hurt so badly I avoided nursing on it and ended getting engorged which brought with it a fever, headache and aches all over, like the flu. The only way to fix was to nurse on that side. It was excruciating. Yet, I kept going, with the support of my mom and John. E and I eventually got the hang of it, I toughened up and it didn't hurt as bad.

Sleep- I'm sorry, what does that mean? Is that english? Now, I knew I wouldn't be getting much sleep, but what I didn't know was what that would do to me. John and I both felt like zombies. We both had dark circles around our eyes and just looked run down. The sleep deprivation made me have even worse mood swings. It made me feel dizzy, helpless and hopeless. I had a hard time keeping track of the days. Evan would sleep during the day off and on and would scream, and I do mean scream, ALL night long. If he did sleep, it was for a short time and would only be on our chests, no where else. Eventually he slept in his bouncy chair. He would not and will not have anything to do with his bassinet. Because John took 2 weeks off from work, we were handling the situation together which, I think, helped me hang on to the last shred of my sanity. BUT when John went back to work it was just me dealing with it and it made me crazy. We have come a long way now. We have a bed time routine, supplement with formula twice at night (so he sleeps for a few hours straight rather than one hour), and mom and dad have their sanity back. He is also sleeping in his crib! People told me to sleep when Evan sleeps.

This is the face we saw most during those "dark days."

Sadly, I was wondering when I was going to start enjoying the experience. I felt awful feeling that way but it was SOOO hard for me those first few weeks (I call them the "dark days"). I am proud and relieved to report that we have moved beyond the "dark days" and we are enjoying being a family and watching our baby grow and change. He gives me smiles that melt my heart and they help to erase the terrible time I had the first month. I can't stop staring at him!

This isn't a smile, but he's not crying and I love that.