SingaporeMotherhood | Parenting
March 2014
SM Blogmums : Baby : The Pacifier, the Breast, the Rocker, and the Ergo
Real-life pregnancy and parenting stories set in Singapore, from mums in Singapore. Welcome to our SingaporeMotherhood blog series, where we get local bloggers to share their motherhood experiences – from the awesomeness of seeing that +ve, to the pitter-patter of first steps, to the joys and frustrations of bringing kiddo up in the little red dot. In her second blogpost for SingaporeMotherhood, June Yong of mamawearpapashirt spills the beans on baby and sleep – or the lack of.
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Or How I Got My Baby To Sleep
So it’s been slightly over two months since we ushered Baby Joshua into this world. At first he was a dream when it came to sleeping like a baby. He would literally be sleeping all the way if he wasn’t feeding or wailing his head off while getting his diaper changed.
Then he started to be more awake during his second month. On some nights, if he was sleepy enough after a feed, I would pop him onto his bed and he would sleep with little fuss. If he did fuss, the pacifier would do the trick.
Then he started to get more fussy, so I tried nursing some more just to ensure that he was full and sleepy. (Yup he’s definitely a booby kind of baby. Who could blame him though? Nursing brings warmth, a full tummy, and sweet milky dreams for Baby.)
Eventually, we started to have to rock him to sleep. At first it was just swaying from side to side, then with a bit of rocking action in rhythm with the swaying.
When my arms got tired, I tried to place him in his rocker and rock him there, since that’s how he likes to take his naps. Sometimes it worked, other times it didn’t. The witching hours of 7 – 9 p.m. still worked their mysterious ways. But thankfully he remained relatively calm through it all, albeit a tad grumpy from not being able to stay asleep.
I tried tweaking his day-time naps, making sure he didn’t sleep too long (one to 2.5 hours max each nap) and cutting short his last late afternoon nap. While this seemed to help him stay asleep for longer during the nights, it didn’t resolve the 7 – 9 p.m. wakefulness!
Finally we brought out the Ergo carrier. The Ergo has served us well through three kids, so we are well acquainted with its magic sleep-inducing powers.
I also learnt to relax about the 7 p.m. bedtime and allowed Joshua to hang around the family more by placing him in his rocker in the living room. When he was tired and fussy, we would rock him and give him the pacifier. He would doze and snooze here and there. Around 8-ish after I put his two older siblings to bed, I would feed him and try my darnedest to keep him asleep while disengaging the nipple and myself from him as stealthily as possible.
Sometimes it worked and I would do a little freedom jig out of the room. When it didn’t, I would pop him into the Ergo (using the infant insert when he was still too small for the Ergo alone), and voila! Down in 300 seconds!
All that was left was to do then was to transfer him onto his bed – usually not too big an issue unless I do it too early and he’s still not completely out. So I’d tarry a little, check Facebook postings on my phone in pitch darkness (bad for my eyes I know) while resting my back on a fat pillow. Then I’d transfer him after ten to 15 minutes.
Sounds like an intricate sleep strategy? You bet.
We do have a sleep routine going on. He gets a warm bath and a quick massage if he’s not cranky. (Never EVER massage a cranky baby.) Then I’d wrap it up with a good feeding session. But so far the Ergo seems to be the least stressful / quickest solution, and he doesn’t usually wake after, at least not until the next feeding time.
I don’t know how long we will need to keep this up, and I hope I’m not scaring any new mums out there, but I think it’s necessary to build a treasure chest of sleep tools in preparation for baby. These are just some of my tried and tested ones. What are yours?
P.S. When all else fails, there’s always mummy’s arms…
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