We should have learned the lesson when we bought our first puppy four years ago, what people tell you is typical, never really works out in your own personal experience.
We bought Leetah as an eight week old puppy at Christmas Time. Neither of us had raised a dog before, and we really had no clue what to expect. She is a golden retriever, and that breed, apparently, is very hyper. People always told us, oh she will calm down, just give it a year. Then it was two, then three, and now people are saying she will calm down at age 5. Meanwhile we still have a hyperactive attention hound for a dog, despite going through several different obedience programs.
So why should we have expected it to be different with our first child? No, Aiden isn't hyper (yet) though he is a Mr. Squirmy. Aiden does not sleep. I mean, almost at all.
When we came home from the hospital we were under the impression that newborns slept about 16 hours a day. Now we knew they didn't sleep through the night or anything like that, but we anticipated a couple of decent 2-3 hour stretches somewhere in there to let us sleep a bit. Not so. Aiden was up at minimum every two hours. Eventually we got to the point where we could put him down around 10pm and he would sleep a solid 3 hours, and that was wonderful, except for the small problem of that when I work, I work nights and don't get home until 11. So already, even if I fall asleep right when I get home (an imposibility to be sure) I'm still only going to get 2 hours before he wakes up.
The 10-1 sleep shift was the only decent sleep Aiden would get all night. After he would eat at 1am (later moving to 4 hours between feedings it became 2am) he would be up for a solid 45 minutes to an hour before finally dozing off again. So now we are at 3am. Once 4am rolls around, our personal snooze alarm, as I labelled him to our doctor, begins going off every 15-20 minutes.
We called the doctor and were given the go ahead to start introducing Rice Cereal into Aiden's nighttime bottles. This is a solid month before most of what I had read suggested introducing a first solid. The nurse said to put in 1/4 teaspoon of rice cereal. I thought she meant per bottle... 4 ounces of formula and 1/4 teaspoon of cereal seemed awful low to me, but what the heck. We put the cereal in the bottle and... what do you know, no change.
I had called the doctor on a Friday, so we had to wait until Monday to call back, the weekend was the usual very little sleep at night, and Monday I was told, no it was supposed to be 1/4 teaspoon per ounce. Now don't I feel like a moron. 1 teaspoon per 4 ounce bottle sounds pretty good. Well, not so much.
Remember Aiden's Acid Reflux? Well, apparently immature tummies with reflux and Rice Cereal don't mix so well. So while the first sleeping session of the night got longer (one night we got a 5 hour sleep out of him!) after that he started really struggling to poop. Great, the fix for his sleep problems is causing constipation. Another call to the doctor's office. Well, try cutting to 1/2 teaspoon, give that a week and if there is no improvement you will need to schedule an appointment. Right.
The second night on the 1/2 teaspoon we thought we had this whole ordeal licked. It was a Thursday night and I had been at work. I got home a little before 11. At this point our feeding schedule was 6-10-2. I came upstairs and there was a bottle of water on the desk, my wife and the baby are both asleep. I have to assume the bottle was meant for 10pm and he has been asleep since before then and I need to feed him when he wakes up, which should be a matter of moments.
11:45 rolls around and I decide I need to find out what time he ate. Gently nudging my wife I ask her when he ate. Well it was almost 7pm, so while we are still past 4 hours, it isn't that big a deal. at midnight I lay down to try to get some sleep and see what he does. 12:51 the monitor wakes me up, it is time to eat.
That night we got 6 hours between bottles and thought everything was wonderful. Well then the constipation kicked in, and boy this child HURTS when he is constipated.
Saturday night Aiden slept maybe 3 hours TOTAL for the night. Monday night I don't know if I slept at all, so Tuesday we called the doctor and set up an appointment for thursday.
Of course what it boils down to is that every child is different and the doctor doesn't have any magic fixes for us. It is going to be a process of trial and error until we find the right combination that works for Aiden.
The Doctor changed us from the Zantac to prilosec for his reflux, jumped up his rice cereal per bottle to a plan to escalate it to eventually 2 teaspoons per bottle, and recommended apple prune juice to stave off constipation.
So now we have a specialized formula and medicine to combat reflux, rice cereal to thicken up this thin unfilling formula so he feels more full, and prune juice to combat the constipation caused by the rice cereal that is supposed to fix the sleeping problem. Anyone else confused yet?
This problem still isn't nipped. Each night brings a different experience for us. One night he actually went 5 hours between feedings for three straight feedings. The next night he was up from 3:30am on.
We know eventually he will sleep, and that will be a wonderful day in our household. Until then, I am going to need some concealer to hide the bags under my eyes when we take family portraits.
Other fun facts from the 3rd month:
-Mommy is back at work. This makes things a little strange for Aiden, as in order for Daddy to get in the hours he works he has to pack Aiden up into the car, drive to work, take Aiden up to Mommies office and drop him off. Mommy (is supposed to) immediately leave work and packs Aiden back up into her car to take him home. That's a lot of packing up. Fortunately it only happens a couple of times a week.
-Aiden is smiling regularly now, and even may be making a good giggle or two from time to time.
-Although he isn't sleeping much more than previously, Aiden is crying less overall.
We bought Leetah as an eight week old puppy at Christmas Time. Neither of us had raised a dog before, and we really had no clue what to expect. She is a golden retriever, and that breed, apparently, is very hyper. People always told us, oh she will calm down, just give it a year. Then it was two, then three, and now people are saying she will calm down at age 5. Meanwhile we still have a hyperactive attention hound for a dog, despite going through several different obedience programs.
So why should we have expected it to be different with our first child? No, Aiden isn't hyper (yet) though he is a Mr. Squirmy. Aiden does not sleep. I mean, almost at all.
When we came home from the hospital we were under the impression that newborns slept about 16 hours a day. Now we knew they didn't sleep through the night or anything like that, but we anticipated a couple of decent 2-3 hour stretches somewhere in there to let us sleep a bit. Not so. Aiden was up at minimum every two hours. Eventually we got to the point where we could put him down around 10pm and he would sleep a solid 3 hours, and that was wonderful, except for the small problem of that when I work, I work nights and don't get home until 11. So already, even if I fall asleep right when I get home (an imposibility to be sure) I'm still only going to get 2 hours before he wakes up.
The 10-1 sleep shift was the only decent sleep Aiden would get all night. After he would eat at 1am (later moving to 4 hours between feedings it became 2am) he would be up for a solid 45 minutes to an hour before finally dozing off again. So now we are at 3am. Once 4am rolls around, our personal snooze alarm, as I labelled him to our doctor, begins going off every 15-20 minutes.
We called the doctor and were given the go ahead to start introducing Rice Cereal into Aiden's nighttime bottles. This is a solid month before most of what I had read suggested introducing a first solid. The nurse said to put in 1/4 teaspoon of rice cereal. I thought she meant per bottle... 4 ounces of formula and 1/4 teaspoon of cereal seemed awful low to me, but what the heck. We put the cereal in the bottle and... what do you know, no change.
I had called the doctor on a Friday, so we had to wait until Monday to call back, the weekend was the usual very little sleep at night, and Monday I was told, no it was supposed to be 1/4 teaspoon per ounce. Now don't I feel like a moron. 1 teaspoon per 4 ounce bottle sounds pretty good. Well, not so much.
Remember Aiden's Acid Reflux? Well, apparently immature tummies with reflux and Rice Cereal don't mix so well. So while the first sleeping session of the night got longer (one night we got a 5 hour sleep out of him!) after that he started really struggling to poop. Great, the fix for his sleep problems is causing constipation. Another call to the doctor's office. Well, try cutting to 1/2 teaspoon, give that a week and if there is no improvement you will need to schedule an appointment. Right.
The second night on the 1/2 teaspoon we thought we had this whole ordeal licked. It was a Thursday night and I had been at work. I got home a little before 11. At this point our feeding schedule was 6-10-2. I came upstairs and there was a bottle of water on the desk, my wife and the baby are both asleep. I have to assume the bottle was meant for 10pm and he has been asleep since before then and I need to feed him when he wakes up, which should be a matter of moments.
11:45 rolls around and I decide I need to find out what time he ate. Gently nudging my wife I ask her when he ate. Well it was almost 7pm, so while we are still past 4 hours, it isn't that big a deal. at midnight I lay down to try to get some sleep and see what he does. 12:51 the monitor wakes me up, it is time to eat.
That night we got 6 hours between bottles and thought everything was wonderful. Well then the constipation kicked in, and boy this child HURTS when he is constipated.
Saturday night Aiden slept maybe 3 hours TOTAL for the night. Monday night I don't know if I slept at all, so Tuesday we called the doctor and set up an appointment for thursday.
Of course what it boils down to is that every child is different and the doctor doesn't have any magic fixes for us. It is going to be a process of trial and error until we find the right combination that works for Aiden.
The Doctor changed us from the Zantac to prilosec for his reflux, jumped up his rice cereal per bottle to a plan to escalate it to eventually 2 teaspoons per bottle, and recommended apple prune juice to stave off constipation.
So now we have a specialized formula and medicine to combat reflux, rice cereal to thicken up this thin unfilling formula so he feels more full, and prune juice to combat the constipation caused by the rice cereal that is supposed to fix the sleeping problem. Anyone else confused yet?
This problem still isn't nipped. Each night brings a different experience for us. One night he actually went 5 hours between feedings for three straight feedings. The next night he was up from 3:30am on.
We know eventually he will sleep, and that will be a wonderful day in our household. Until then, I am going to need some concealer to hide the bags under my eyes when we take family portraits.
Other fun facts from the 3rd month:
-Mommy is back at work. This makes things a little strange for Aiden, as in order for Daddy to get in the hours he works he has to pack Aiden up into the car, drive to work, take Aiden up to Mommies office and drop him off. Mommy (is supposed to) immediately leave work and packs Aiden back up into her car to take him home. That's a lot of packing up. Fortunately it only happens a couple of times a week.
-Aiden is smiling regularly now, and even may be making a good giggle or two from time to time.
-Although he isn't sleeping much more than previously, Aiden is crying less overall.
-Aiden has moved from his Basinet in Mommy & Daddy's room into the crib in his own room. He made the transition very well, in part because he sleeps in a snuggle next that moved from the basinet to the crib, leaving him still in familiar surroundings.
-Vocalizations have officially started in force. In the past week Aiden has begun to make a "Bvvvv" sounds by blowing air between his lips. He can converse with himself for as much as a half hour at a time trying different variations of this one sound.
-At three months of Age Aiden wieghs roughly 14 pounds and is approximately 24 inches long
1 comment:
Just got the time to read your first blogs. I have to say... THANK YOU!!!!! Reading about your experiences with Aiden will make the world of difference as we prepare to enter parenthood ourselves. Hopefully we'll have an easier go of it in the beginning, but there is a silver lining to the struggles - part of which is that you are able to share what you have gone through with others - passing on advice and lessons learned - and giving them the opportunity to see that there are others out there that have endured similar hardships and survived - even thrived. Aiden is a beautiful little boy and appears to be developing healthily and happily (doubling weight in 1st 3 months, smiling, giggling and vocalizing) despite his sleepless nights and worried parents. Maybe there's some hope for our Matthew yet! :-)
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