I think DD3 suffers from insomnia!

[tiff211]

She has a hard time falling asleep. Listening to books on CD has helped a little. Now in the past few months, she has been getting up in the middle of the night between 3-4am. I will hear her get up and turn the tv on. I try to remember to unplug it so she can't watch it. If I do, she will roam around the house and go into the living room and try to figure out the remote control. Or, she will raid the frig! I have gone to her room in the morning and found wrappers, empty cups of pudding, yogurt, jello, fruit peelings. Those are the nights when I don't hear her. We put the gate up now which only leaves access to the bedrooms and bathroom. When we do that, she will come in my room and cry for the tv, food, water etc. The house is child proofed but I fear she will get into something that can hurt her. I am so exhausted! I will put her back to bed but if she cries too loud, sometimes, I will put the timer on the tv and let her watch it for 15 minutes or so. Bad, I know but I don't want her to wake up DD5 or the baby. Then...... in the morning, she doesn't want to get up.

Any ideas, should I call her pedi? Is this normal?

 

[INDISMOM]

Does she still take a nap? I had a problem with youngest DD falling asleep and had to wean her off of her afternoon nap. I also cut off drinking and eating after 6:30pm or 7pm. She tended to get up to go potty and then trying to get her back to sleep was awful!

Those 2 things seemed to help her a lot and she was back to sleeping through the night.

 

[Mishetta]

I was just gonna say the same as INDISMOM ~ about cutting out her naps. It will be hard the first few days though because I know with mine, he gets sooooo cranky or his eyes roll back around 6pm & he's out cold! But, my oldest DS(10), does suffer from insomnia. He only needs about 3 hours of sleep. He also used to roam the house but now when he wakes up & can't fall back asleep, he just lays in bed or he'll fire up his little book light & read. For years he'd come to my bedside & shake me "Mama! I can't sleep!" Then the ever loving patient Mom that I am, I'd yell at him "WELL, I CAN!! GO BACK TO BED!"

Can you tell that after years of this wakeup call, I finally lost it!! I NEED my sleep! Anyways he still can't sleep the whole night through but he's safe & he finds ways to entertain himself until sleep comes again. His neurologist did give him medication that helps him sleep but that only gets pulled out when he really really needs it. He doesn't like it & neither do I, so if he feels he can do without, we do 'without!'

Now me on the otherhand, until I was in my late 20's, I used to sleepwalk! I once woke up on my bedroom balcony (2nd floor) kind of leaning over the railing (but it was high enough that I would have had to stand on a chair to make it over). I woke up because I was COLD!

If you continue to have problems, maybe you can call your pediatrician to see what they recommend?

Those babies are just beautiful in your siggie too!

 

[Rafiki Rafiki Rafiki]

Believe it or not, I've gone through the same thing with my daughter for nearly 8 years now. I am not exxagerating or lying. She usually gets up between 1 and 2 am. Here's what I know:

Most kids go through this at some point in their lives, and it is one of the biggest complaints of parents during pediatrician visits. At the worst end of the spectrum, your daughter could be suffering from some sort of sleep apnea. At the easiest end, it's a phase or a learned trait.

First, do all you can to regulate her sleep (as posted by the people above). If she does wake, get her back to sleep as soon as humanly possible. Do not talk to her or have any sort of conversation with her. Don't turn on the lights.

If her waking persists, check to be sure something isn't happening in your house at that hour...i.e., the air conditioning kicks on, a train passes nearby, the neighbor lets the barking dogs out...all that. You can try to eliminate all the noises, but in the end, she'll have to learn to sleep through them. If you're hearing her, it may be because you were already awake, so if you're making noise, it may be waking her.

We give my 7 year old 3mg of melatonin just before bed and it helps...but only for about 4 hours. It's always worth a try!

We've been through counseling, 4 doctors, and now the sleep study. We're hoping to get answers next week.

Meanwhile, hang in there and try to get someone else to share the waking duties with you to keep your sanity.

 

[tiff211]

Does she still take a nap? I had a problem with youngest DD falling asleep and had to wean her off of her afternoon nap. I also cut off drinking and eating after 6:30pm or 7pm. She tended to get up to go potty and then trying to get her back to sleep was awful!

Those 2 things seemed to help her a lot and she was back to sleeping through the night.

She still "rests" at naptime at daycare during the week. On the weekends I make her and DD5 go lay down for quiet time. DD5 falls asleep, DD3 does not.

I stopped giving her drinks after 7 because she was having accidents. She doesn't have those anymore and doesn't seem to go to the bathroom when she wakes up in the night either.

 

[tiff211]

Believe it or not, I've gone through the same thing with my daughter for nearly 8 years now. I am not exxagerating or lying. She usually gets up between 1 and 2 am. Here's what I know:

Most kids go through this at some point in their lives, and it is one of the biggest complaints of parents during pediatrician visits. At the worst end of the spectrum, your daughter could be suffering from some sort of sleep apnea. At the easiest end, it's a phase or a learned trait.

First, do all you can to regulate her sleep (as posted by the people above). If she does wake, get her back to sleep as soon as humanly possible. Do not talk to her or have any sort of conversation with her. Don't turn on the lights.

If her waking persists, check to be sure something isn't happening in your house at that hour...i.e., the air conditioning kicks on, a train passes nearby, the neighbor lets the barking dogs out...all that. You can try to eliminate all the noises, but in the end, she'll have to learn to sleep through them. If you're hearing her, it may be because you were already awake, so if you're making noise, it may be waking her.

We give my 7 year old 3mg of melatonin just before bed and it helps...but only for about 4 hours. It's always worth a try!

We've been through counseling, 4 doctors, and now the sleep study. We're hoping to get answers next week.

Meanwhile, hang in there and try to get someone else to share the waking duties with you to keep your sanity.

I wonder if it's hereditary. I am such a light sleeper that I rarely go into that deep sleep (REM?). I wake up from the slightest whisper, sound, movement. I don't really need a monitor to hear the baby just have one for back-up. I have never waken up to an alarm clock. I sleep better with the tv on, as it feels more comfortable for sleeping than "silence". I have been trying to get out of that habit. I can't imagine what wakes her up that wouldn't wake me up. I wake up to her walking around. WHen she does to sleep for the night, I can go in there, turn on the light, clean, put toys away, laundry and she is out like a light.

She is fully awake when she wakes up, last night she turned on the light to get out some of her toys, thank goodness DD5 sleeps like a rock! Last week , she came in my room and whispered "mommy". I opened one eye and pleaded with her to please go back to bed. She said "can I ask you something" "what honey, what?" "Tomorrow, can you buy me a puppy?" Of course I told her I would. Everyday she asks me about the puppy!

 

[CEDmom]

It sounds like she's just gotten herself into a bad habit. Maybe 1 or 2 nights something work her up and now she can't break the cycle. The first thing I'd recommend is getting the TV out of her room. When she comes into your room take her back to bed. Stay with her for a few minutes if you need to but try not to talk. Maybe just lay with her and rub her back. You'll probably have a few rough nights but she should be back to sleeping through the night pretty quickly. Good luck.

 

[joyeric]

When my DS was small he would wake up because he would have nightmares. This was a nightly event for years, One thing the doctor suggested was a snack, not fluids right before bed. Something small but filling, like granola bar or oatmeal or peanut butter cookie. Not sure how these things connected but that snack did help alot of nights

 

[Rafiki Rafiki Rafiki]

I wonder if it's hereditary. I am such a light sleeper that I rarely go into that deep sleep (REM?). I wake up from the slightest whisper, sound, movement. I don't really need a monitor to hear the baby just have one for back-up. I have never waken up to an alarm clock. I sleep better with the tv on, as it feels more comfortable for sleeping than "silence". I have been trying to get out of that habit. I can't imagine what wakes her up that wouldn't wake me up. I wake up to her walking around. WHen she does to sleep for the night, I can go in there, turn on the light, clean, put toys away, laundry and she is out like a light.

She is fully awake when she wakes up, last night she turned on the light to get out some of her toys, thank goodness DD5 sleeps like a rock! Last week , she came in my room and whispered "mommy". I opened one eye and pleaded with her to please go back to bed. She said "can I ask you something" "what honey, what?" "Tomorrow, can you buy me a puppy?" Of course I told her I would. Everyday she asks me about the puppy!

Try this: tell her you'll give her a reward for staying in her bed all night long...something good, but maybe not as big as a puppy. Tell her she'll get that reward or a similar reward for doing it every single night. Tell her that it's okay to wake, but she HAS to stay in the bed.

With a week or so of that one, you'll be able to figure out if it's something she CAN do, and go from there. My daughter has never been able to do it, except for on a rare occasion--like once a month.

Think about it though. If she's never really slept well through the night, she was probably used to a nighttime waking inside the womb! I've often wondered if it was hereditary myself....

 

[mickeyboat]

I think your DD has found something fun to do at night. Instead of going back to sleep when she wakes, she gets up and plays, eats, watches tv, etc. You need to make certain that for the future, nighttime waking will not be enjoyable. No tv, no snacks, no toys, not even conversation with mom. When you hear her wake up, go into her room, put her back into bed without talking, and go back to bed.

My girls were doing a lot of waking up at night not too long ago. I was getting up with them several times a night, and they would want me to lay down with them, which was the reward they were getting for waking me up. Finally I told them I would let them wake me up only once a night, if they had a bad dream or needed help with the covers. Otherwise, they were to go back to bed and back to sleep. I still get up every once in a while with them, but most of the time we all sleep all night.

Good luck.

Denae

 

[DVCLiz]

Oh, the puppy story is great!!!!

Each of my daughters, at about 2 and a half or so, went through a waking in the night phase. They each wanted to watch a Disney movie. "Mama, see Dumbo" with the first, and ""See 'hontas!" (Pocohontas) with the other. I can still quote almost the entire movie. We would lie down on the sofa, they would watch, and I would fall asleep (and eventually they would, too.) I kept an alarm clock in the den after we overslept a few mornings!!

I can't remember how long it lasted - just a few months, I think. Thank goodness!!! I was getting mighty tired of hearing Pocohontas sing "Colors of the Wind" and listening to that sad "Mrs. Dumbo locked up" music!!!