Then, completely out of nowhere, last Saturday night, she refused to be put down in her bed. Refused. We're talking screaming bloody murder and practically clawing her way out of the crib tent we've put on top of her crib. And it has been a battle every time I try to put her down, naps and nighttime. My heart is literally breaking for her as she lays (stands?) in her crib and screams. Of course, we first checked that she wasn't in pain, no fever, no ear infections (seemingly), no teeth erupting (that we can see), no signs of a stomachache. And it doesn't seem to be a physical discomfort. She starts screaming as soon as she realizes I'm about to change her into her pj's and put her in her crib.
Now it could be her crib tent, but the thing is we've installed it about two weeks prior to these freak-outs starting. It could be that she thinks that papa and mama are having fun doing something exciting without her while she sleeps (but wouldn't that be the case just on the weekends?) It could be just severe severe separation anxiety, because she's constantly attached to me these days and follows me everywhere (but then again, this theory would've made sense maybe right after we came back from Europe?) Our latest theory is that it sometimes takes us a while to get her when she wakes up in the morning and she cries, so maybe she came to associate being in her crib awake with us "abandoning" her (yeah, I know, parents of the year award right here, huh? it takes us both a little bit of time to realize what's going on in the mornings)
What we're trying to do now is create a different, more clearly defined bedtime (and naptime) routine: bath, quiet cuddle time, pjs, book with mama or papa, and then bed. All the while reminding her that we're about to do the next thing as soon as we're done with the current step of the process. We also talk to her right before putting her to bed about all the things we will do once she wakes up, but that she must first sleep and get some rest before we can do all those things. We're also going to try our hardest to get her out of her crib in the mornings the minute we hear something (funny thing is I used to be really good about this when she was teeny tiny)
Ugh, this turned more into a rant than a post, but I'm really just trying to sort this out and come up with a solution. If you made it this far, you are truly a hero (as I tend to ramble on when I'm frustrated), so for that here are two completely gratuitous and fun pictures of my little sleep monster:
3 comments:
How about bedtime stories,
when she is actually in her bed,not before PJ.
or give her a hand to hold when she
is in bed.
It worked magic with her dad
long time ago.
It was time consuming but
rewarding in the end.
Grandpa.
Znayu exactly what you are going through. Our little one (will be 22 months on October 5) is doing exactly the same thing. She just started screaming and crying before bed time a few weeks ago. She never did that before. Two weeks ago she started climbing out of her crib and we put her bed to a toddler bed (where she never went to bed adn feld her freedom) and that toddler bed was turned back to her old crib and we put a crib tent on top. Its a battle to put her down for the night. As soon as you say "nado idti spat'" she starts her tantrums and screams and screams to the point where she is caughing and trying to catch some air. When she does fall asleep, she sleeps through the night, but as soon as she is up she screams "to get her out and tantrum starts". We did not change our bed routine, but we shifted her bed tiem by 30 min up, so she is all calm by the time she is ready for bed. Its helping because I know we only have 30 or 40 min window for her to fall asleep and if we miss that window she needs to wait for another cycle. I think it will pass, but as soon as this stage will pass, we start new daycare on Sept 1 and I dont even want to think about it.
- Polina
Thank you both,
We can't exactly hold her hand as we have the crib tent going all the way down to her mattress. And I'm hoping it's only a stage, it is breaking my heart to hear her cry like that.
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