No Cry Sleep Solution. I am crying.

 We were doing really well.  Baby was sleeping 6 hour stretches.  I was getting up once at 1:30 AM to nurse and again when Jack got up at around 5ish.  We'd go back to bed and sleep til around 7:30.  Things were great.  She was spending the first stretch in her crib and sometimes when we felt like a cuddle, she'd come into bed with us for the morning leg.

Then I noticed that she was taking shorter naps.  I thought I was being smart when I ordered Elizabeth Pantely's No Cry Sleep Solutions.

SELF-FULFILLED PROPHECY???

Bad Idea.  Baby Girl stopped sleeping.  It was crazy.  Last week she just turned from being Good-sleeper-make-Mama-feel-smug Baby to Won't-sleep-more-than-an-hour-at-a-time Baby.

I am tired.  I need my sleep.  I know all moms are reading this and sympathizing (or feeling smug...yeah, yeah I was there).  I really need my sleep.  I don't stay up late.  My Vata self needs to be in bed by 11:00 pm and get at least seven hours.  I would host parties in high school and college and go to bed with a houseful of people.

I LOVE to sleep.  I LOVE my bed.  When I don't sleep, I get crabby.  The monkeys in my head begin to act up and I start hating things. I get forgetful.  I don't eat well  and on and on and on.

Yesterday, I completed the logs that are recommended in the book.  I found that Baby is napping 3 hours of the recommended 4-5 for her age.  Last night she slept 10 hours out of the 12 that she was in bed...BUT she woke up every hour and a half. She is lucky.  She sleeps.  I am awake nursing, rocking, shushing.

The problem is not SLEEPING, Pantely says.  It is staying asleep. How right she is.  Baby sleeps one sleep cycle, and is awake and then needs help going back to sleep.  According to Pantely, I might be responding to her too quickly and actually keeping her from sleeping.

Today we have implemented a new nap plan and will start a new, improved nighttime sleep ritual.  I am trying to get her down for three good naps.  The first, I wear her down in the sling.  Then I transfer her to the sling.  She slept for 10 minutes in the sling and another 20 in her crib.  Jack (he was home.  Car troubles.) put her down again for another 40 minutes.  Hmmm.  Then for her noontime nap we read stories and lay down together.  Jack napped.  Baby napped.  My arm fell asleep.  She slept for 1 hour.  It is already 3:30pm and she has only slept for 2 hours and 10 minutes of her allotted 5-6 hours.  Oh boy.  Now comes the gamble for the early evening nap.  Do we risk it and throw bedtime off??  ARGGHHHH!!!!!  I don't know.  I just don't know.