Intrepid Murmurings

Hey y'all.  So, I pretty much abandoned ship in terms of the sleep training.  While the current mode of operation is really not so great (babies sleeping on me all night, me as the human pacifier, a kabillion wakeups as one or another of us moves) the alternative -- hours and hours of screaming, less sleep than ever -- was not worth it.  Neither option is really sustainable, though!  I will probably have to start it up again soon, but for now I am living with the lesser of two evils until I catch up enough on sleep to try it again.

Basically, the issue is twofold:  1) The babies want to sleep with my nipple in their mouth and 2) I am unwilling to let them cry alone in a room in order to "break them" of this very strong (but also very natural) sleep association, at least when they are this young.  I was hoping some "crying with company" and other things would help, and maybe it would in the long run, but after a week with very little improvement I couldn't hack it.   With three kids under the age of three, I need more than three hours sleep!    

So we are back to them sleeping on me, and me as the human pacifier.  I get a few more hours of sleep this way, there is no crying, however, our sleep is disjointed and my arms sometimes go numb.   I know lots of people in this boat (I can say from experience it is WAY easier with one baby, though), and its one I seriously totally envisioned, very clearly, when I was told I was having twins.  I knew I would be here, and it would suck (ha, literally).   So its not like this whole sleep stuff was any big surprise.  

But, in the first few months when these things were a little less ingrained, I was not (and am still not) willing to sacrifice breastfeeding for it, or let them cry alone, so here we are!  Wheee!

To those of you worried about my sanity, never fear.  Yeah, it gets really really bad, fast, when I don't get sleep.  And that is going to happen again, when I restart the experiment, unless I hire a night nanny or something.  But on days when I do get at least a cumulative 5 hours sleep, or even when I don't but they are at least not screaming for hours on end, I feel pretty good about how we are all managing.  I feel like a rockstar for getting dinner on the table many nights, going grocery shopping, taking all three to the park, finding time to do projects with Emma, or even just getting to the dishes.... 

Its 1:50 am.  Both babies have been crying for more than an hour, again.  Nursed for an hour before that. They are in their own beds now because I cannot keep them from smooshing themselves up into pillows and rolling off the bed as they howl.  

I hate the crying.  I cannot handle the crying.  This is day 7 of not letting them sleep on me and day 7 of hours and hours of crying a night.  I don't know what else to do.  I believe in attachment parenting and the crying feels so wrong to me.   I feel like throwing up every time it happens, which is all night long.  I feel like throwing up all day long, because I am so exhausted.   I feel like I cannot win.  Tell me this will get better.  Its starting to feel like it won't for a long, long time. 

I really don't know what else to do here.  I am getting less sleep than I ever have, even when Emma or the babies were newborns. 

Last night I think I got 3.5 hours total.  I was in bed from 7:30pm-6:00am,  but awake with babies crying or feeding for all but those 3.5 hours.  It was mostly Elsie, too -- she just gets hysterical if she cannot nurse to sleep.  Its been 5 days on the new routine and she still cries for upwards of 2 hours at a shot.  Patting, singing, cuddling and breathing on her and shushing doesn't do a thing.  She does the same thing if I put her in the Amby in our room.  Eventually Delia wakes up to the noise, and I break down and feed them both, since its been two hours or more. They feed, sometimes I can get Elsie to sleep again and she'll sleep for 45 minutes, then wake and start over.  

Delia, on the other hand, is doing really well.  I think she only had 2 wakeups all night (maybe it was just one long one?).  Lonnie got her down with a bottle and cuddles, and she slept pretty long until she woke during one of Elsies scream fests and ate.  I think after that she cried for 30 min or so until I put her in the Amby, where she fell asleep after 3 minutes and is still sleeping (4 hours later).   

I guess I will try a few more days of this, but its really hard to continue without getting more sleep.  The only thing I can think of, in my sleep induced fog, is to hire night help.  I really didn't want to but I know a lot of twin parents do in the early days, especially.   Even if its just the early stretch, from 5:30-8 am or so, when Lonnie is gone and Emma is up, so I could sleep in, though all night would be awesome as well.   Maybe if they could learn to go to sleep with someone else, away from me and the milk, they would get to resettling better and sleeping longer?  I know a few postpartum doulas, so I guess I am going to see about it.  It costs a lot, but at this point I feel like it would be worth it, just to get some sleep.

If not, I think I might have to go back to having Elsie sleep on me again (ridiculous, I know!) because I honestly was getting a lot more sleep then, despite brief wakeups every hour or two. 

The babies are getting to be so much fun.  Tons of smiles, giggles and "talking".  Elsie found her voice in the past few days and can really get chatty sometimes!  Delia is a rolling rockstar and I constantly find her somewhere other than where I put her down (though she still can't quite figure out how to get back over to her back, so she usually just scoots after the initial roll). 

 

 

Emma is almost pottytrained!  She is pretty much dry all day, unless I forget to switch her into underwear after night/nap diaper (she actually asked us last night at dinner "am I wearing a diaper or underpants?" because she wanted to just go in her diaper if she had that on.  Silly kid!  .  She wore training pants to daycare on Thursday and used the potty there, too (her first out of our house potty usage).  YAY! 

And the babies are really starting to nap well in their Amby Hammocks! Yesterday Delia slept for an epic 4 hours, egads!  If they are asleep in arms, the easily transfer, just glancing up at me, then turning their heads and going back to sleep.  Unfortunately, it is hard to do this with two at once, which means fairly staggered naps, and it also usually means I am nursing or wearing them down in a carrier.  Since we are working on not doing that for nights, I am letting them cry it out during naps now, putting them in after they look sleepy or start to dose.  They are not impressed, but do eventually fall asleep.  See more about this below.

I am losing my mind with the nighttime sleep stuff.  Seriously.

I initiated a sleep routine based on a few books I've read (mainly the No Cry Sleep Solution, but going with her "desperation" section about letting them cry with company, not alone.).  I start bedtime for the babies around 7ish, ideally having them down by 8 or so.  Lots of nursing and feeding still, but once they start to drowse and fall asleep I take them off and don't let them suck to sleep.  I am doing it in our bed, which is what they are familiar with, and I stay there and pat/comfort/sing.  Last night Elsie cried for 2 HOURS, from 8:30-10:30ish.  Delia went to sleep without a fuss and slept through her sisters cries for 2 hours, then woke.  I fed them both (I had already fed Elsie but she ate again) and then they both cried for 2 MORE HOURS.  Around 12:30, more than 5 hours since I started the bedtime routine, they fell asleep. The rest of the night they woke 2-4 times and I nursed/let them sleep on me as usual because I just HAD to get some sleep.  I cannot function during the day on less than 4 hours sleep, and with non-coordinated nappers usually can't nap during the day.  Emma was jumping on my head as usual at 5:30AM.  Whee!

This was actually night 2, the first night was actually more reasonable -- both crying to sleep in about 20 min with me there patting and singing.

I am doing a little more stringent CIO for naps, because they tend to go down so much easier during the day (as noted in the good section, above!).  Basically I put them in their own beds when sleepy and check and console every 3-5 min, sometimes longer.  Takes anywhere from 5 min to 45 min of crying for them to be out.  I HATE the crying but I really feel there is no other way right now.

I am going to reassess after a week or so and decide if I need to move them out of the bed at night completely.  I LOVE cosleeping for so many reasons (ease of nightfeedings, and closeness/bonding being biggies), but only if they do actually sleep.  Which I know is possible --  I know tons of successful cosleeping families.  I hate the idea of getting up and fully awake for 1-3 feedings a night (and I do not feel like they are ready to cut those out yet, being so wee still).  But.  That would definitely be better than what we have currently.... 

Emma is crying too, because she is in time out for the SECOND time today for waking/attempting to wake the babies.  I shut the doors to their room and she bangs of them!  This morning she jumped onto the bed and started mauling them to try to wake them up.  OMG. This is a total non-negotiable for me, up there with playing with the oven and biting.  Seriously.  I put up with your challenging sleep issues, kid, don't mess with my efforts with your sisters.  

P.S. This was written yesterday, Friday, and indeed last night was much better.  Still some crying, still some sleeping on me later in the wee hours, but  lot less crying and more sleeping for us all. Whew. 

 I am typing this on my new MAC laptop, woohoo!  While also wearing two babies in carriers on front and back, while bouncing on the ball to get them to sleep.  Got to go put them down soon to give my shoulders a rest!

Well, after my last post I finally got a few hours of solid sleep and that helped my outlook some.  Ha!  We still really need to get cracking on some changes, though.   

Unfortunately, in the past few days both babies have caught a gross cold from Emma, and are snuffly, snotty, coughing little girls. Yuck.  I wanted to start doing some sleep stuff last night but its hard when they are so uncomfortable and having trouble breathing as it is (I'm getting it a little bit, too).  I pulled out TNCSS again and am definitely working on getting them to start falling asleep without sucking (basically you detach them over and over again right before they fall asleep until they just accept it and fall asleep without it).  It actually works faster and with less fuss than I'd expect, but at 3am with two babies its really hard to keep at it.  REALLY HARD.  After awhile, all plans get called off because I just have to get some sleep or I will be unable to function.  But, I have hopes that it will slowly work if I just keep at it whenever I can.  

I am also looking into getting a chair to nurse the babies in upstairs, as I currently have no option other than the bed, which is really difficult to get them both off of by myself without waking them.  We have a regular glider that just does not accommodate the twin nursing pillow plus the three of us anymore.  I am looking into something like this, and have a bunch of unused credit card points that I can use to get it. Should I go for it?  I think it will be used for a long time after nursing is over for reading bedtime stories and such, or as a comfortable living room or family room chair.  

This morning I got up and left the house at 7:30 (!) to go to the twins club sale with Delia.  We are members, so for a half hour before it opens to the public we can get in and snap up all the good deals.  So fun!  I got a playgym mat that I've really been wanting, two different styles of baby bath seats that should be AWESOME to help facilitate baby & Emma combo baths,  some fancy cloth diapers at great prices, and some misc. clothes that we were needing.   I love getting good deals on baby gear! 

Okay, more very soon.  I have a 4 month update about the babies that deserves its own post.  

Oh lord, I am feeling really run down.

Nighttime sleep with the babies has reached critical stages.  Something must be done, and I am dreading it.  Basically, at 4 months old they still won't sleep at night unless on me, boob in mouth (daytime is another story, oddly).  For awhile things were getting better in this regard but now its worse than its ever been.  They won't go down at night unless I am there, nursing them.  If I set them down, the cry. If Lonnie holds them or tries to get them to sleep, they cry.  If we are able to transfer them to the Amby, they sleep for 20-30 min and then cry.

The general schedule is that they sleep & doze on me from 8-10, while I read or do internet stuff, then on a good day they sleep on me from 10-12, nurse, sleep from 12:45-2, and then are dosing and nursing from 2-5, when Emma wakes us all up and we are up for the day.  On bad days, it is pretty much wakeups every hour all night long, with them mostly awake from 2-5.  Lonnie usually leaves around 5:50 for work.   I think I am getting about 5 hours of extremely interrupted sleep and am so exhausted I can barely see straight.   Man, I could kill for those newborn months when they were actually sleeping for 3-4 hour stretches. 

During the day, naps are erratic, but when they happen, they are generally good.  Then, too, they HAVE to nurse to sleep (or be in a carrier/the car), but they transfer like a dream and sleep 2-3 hours at a time.  Some days they definitely sleep more during the day than at night.  Of course, it is rarely at the same time, so I don't get a chance to nap at all.  

I have been trying to break the nurse to sleep habit by tanking them up with bottles, singing, bouncing, rocking, holding, cramming pacifiers in their mouths (no luck), setting them in their beds sleepy but awake (ha!), but after 3-4 hours of fussing/whining/screaming babies I just give in.  2 minutes later they are out.

I do intend to do some sleep training this weekend (I have to wait until Fri so Lonnie doesn't need to go to work the next day without sleep) and basically I am going let them still cosleep in our bed but just lie next to me, not nurse.  They are going to scream their heads off, and I hate that.  Still, I just don't feel comfortable letting them scream in their own beds/room alone, and I do LIKE cosleeping in general (because it is much easier to do night feedings).   

I am fairly certain that while some of these issues are temperament/personality based (seriously, all three of these girls have a freakin' strong opinions about things!) some is also due to my low milk supply, and the early need to keep them nursing as much and as frequently as possible.  It was pretty much the same with Emma, and I know several other low supply mamas in the same boat.  I wouldn't trade not nursing for good sleep, though, and wouldn't change a thing even in hindsight (other than maybe pushing the pacifiers more).  

On top of all this Emma is sick with a really bad cold and couldn't go to daycare today.  Boo!  I count on those two mornings a week to work on sleep with the babies and get stuff done around the house but today it was just a madhouse all morning.  I finally but Emma to bed at noon, an hour early, because I couldn't handle it any more.   2/3 are currently sleeping, and I think I will try now to grab some lunch and then take Delia to bed and get her to sleep a little with me so I can nap.  There are a million things I'd rather do but I really need it!