How To Get Your Child To Sleep Through The Night -Part II
After a long and difficult labor, my daughter was born seven years ago. Needless to say she didn't sleep through the night right away. In fact she screamed most of the time which I would soon learn would turn into three months of colic. This was not at all how I had envisioned motherhood.
Even though she had a difficult time with colic, I noticed that she did seem to be hungry about every 2 1/2 hours. After the first week, I noticed that she would sleep for four to five hours during the day, but still get up every two hours at night. I started to wake her up after three hours during the day. After two weeks of this, she dropped one of her nightly feedings. At five weeks of age, she dropped another night time feeding. And finally at eight weeks, she slept eight hours. She eventually settled into sleeping twelve hours at night with a two to three hour nap during the day.
When I told people about putting her on a schedule and that it had worked, most would say that I was just lucky. When my son was born five years ago, I tried my luck for the second time. He was much easier to put into a schedule because he only wanted to eat every four hours. By his six week check up, my son was sleeping twelve hours per night.
Does it sound too easy? It was not easy at all. Persistance and patience were very necessary throughout those weeks along with a lot of telephone calls to my mom. There were many times in the months that followed where something would break my baby's routine--a trip out of town, getting a cold, etc. Whenever this happened, I just went back to the basics: feeding her, spending some time with her, then putting her back to bed. Within a week or sometimes two, we were back to normal.
If anyone decides to try this, always check with your child's doctor first. My children's doctor was aware of my practices and approved them when he saw that both babies were in good health. I later read an excellent book that can help in the process--"On Becoming Babywise-Learn How over 500,000 Babies Were Trained to Sleep Through the Night the Natural Way" written by Gary Ezzo and available at your local bookstore or on Amazon.com.
Written by
Leisa Leininger Wilson
Even though she had a difficult time with colic, I noticed that she did seem to be hungry about every 2 1/2 hours. After the first week, I noticed that she would sleep for four to five hours during the day, but still get up every two hours at night. I started to wake her up after three hours during the day. After two weeks of this, she dropped one of her nightly feedings. At five weeks of age, she dropped another night time feeding. And finally at eight weeks, she slept eight hours. She eventually settled into sleeping twelve hours at night with a two to three hour nap during the day.
When I told people about putting her on a schedule and that it had worked, most would say that I was just lucky. When my son was born five years ago, I tried my luck for the second time. He was much easier to put into a schedule because he only wanted to eat every four hours. By his six week check up, my son was sleeping twelve hours per night.
Does it sound too easy? It was not easy at all. Persistance and patience were very necessary throughout those weeks along with a lot of telephone calls to my mom. There were many times in the months that followed where something would break my baby's routine--a trip out of town, getting a cold, etc. Whenever this happened, I just went back to the basics: feeding her, spending some time with her, then putting her back to bed. Within a week or sometimes two, we were back to normal.
If anyone decides to try this, always check with your child's doctor first. My children's doctor was aware of my practices and approved them when he saw that both babies were in good health. I later read an excellent book that can help in the process--"On Becoming Babywise-Learn How over 500,000 Babies Were Trained to Sleep Through the Night the Natural Way" written by Gary Ezzo and available at your local bookstore or on Amazon.com.
Written by
Leisa Leininger Wilson
8/24/2005
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