Nighttime Chaos

I had all intentions of writing an update on the big birthday coming up but then last night happened, so I will write about the rough night now and tomorrow we'll get back to the fun party stuff!

Yes I realize I did a whole blog entry on how he made it two weeks straight with sleeping through the night, it has not been so easy since. It is so inconsistent, he will sleep al night for three nights then the next night he will be up for an hour and the only way to get him to sleep and for us to keep our sanity is by bringing him in bed with us. While I don't really mind that he's there, I know this can't be a daily thing. We are less then two weeks away from Jacks 1st birthday and we still haven't figured out this sleeping thing. We do the same routine every night but the results are never the same. Last night was what I hope will turn out to be a turning point, a huge difficult step in the right direction.

Every night I dread hearing the screams from Jacks room. It used to be a quick fix, small bottle and he'd be back out like a light. No more, he's been getting up and its been a huge struggle to get him back to sleep. This has been getting crazy frustrating for me and Steve. It was understandable a few months ago when he was that much younger but now its different, especially since we've had a taste of quite nights.

Jack did not have any great naps yesterday so I kind of figured he would be over tired and it would be a rough night.Last night I tried something that absolutely killed me but I hope it was a good thing. Steve got up with him initially and tried to calm him without the bottle and I took over a bit after that. So I made progress, no bottle, just rocked and hummed to get him to fall asleep. The problem always comes in when you have to put him back down in his crib. He has this great talent and being so still and seemingly asleep in your arms and then you lay him down and he pops right up crying. After several unsuccessful attempts at the rocking and singing thing I gave in to the method I said I could never do. I let him cry.

I laid him in his crib and he immediately pops up crying so instead of picking him up and stood by the side of the crib and rubbed his back as he screamed. Every once in a while I would try to lay him back down to see if he would just give in. This went on for 45 minutes, he is a stubborn relentless Italian boy. The back rubbing didn't seem to be helping at all but I could tell that he was starting to get worn out. I sat in his rocking chair and with a knot in my stomach and my heart aching to just pick him up and hold him in my arms... especially difficult because he stood there crying and reaching his hand out for me. Ugh, that was so difficult!! Makes me want to cry! I knew I couldn't give in after all that time and that he needs to learn to self soothe so that he can sleep better and get a full nights rest with no struggles. After a few more minutes I got up and tried again to lay him down.... ahhhh he stayed laying and let me just rub his back and he finally gave in and fell asleep.... granted he woke up three times very briefly within the next 15 minutes but the difference is he let me just lay him down and rub his back to fall back to asleep... a huge huge feat in our book! This is the first time we got Jack to fall asleep without a bottle or in our arms.... we are finally making progress.... hopefully!!

So we'll see how tonight goes, I am going to go into figuring there will be a struggle but I pray that he will get the hang of it and in the end will sleep that much better. Its so difficult to do something that in that moment is so hard and saddening but I know that he needs this so I will stick to it.

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