The 4-Month Wakeful

aka the 4-Month Sleep Regression aka the bane of my existence since we got back from Atlanta

Ethan had been doing amazingly in the crib! After a few transition days of waking up twice during the night (once around midnight and once around 4 AM) right when we got to Atlanta, he soon was up to 7-hour stretches and then 10.5-, 9-, and 10-hour stretches the last 3 nights in town, which is the best he ever did in the swing. When he was back to waking up more frequently the first night at home, I assumed it was just the same transition. Then the next night he was up once an hour. Then the same thing the night after that. By the fourth night of repeated wakings, I knew something was up. In addition, while it's never been easy to get him down in the crib, it had gotten much easier, both at the beginning of the night and when he woke up, and all of a sudden it became impossible! As soon as you put him down, no matter how long he'd been asleep, he was up and screaming. That's the other thing: it wasn't that he is waking up happy and wanting to play; he's screaming his head off. But, if you get there quickly enough, he'll go back to sleep immediately after you pick him up, so that's good at least.

ANYWAY (my apologies for the rambling, but, as alluded to above, I've gotten very little sleep this week), something was definitely going on with him to make my STTN baby suddenly sleep worse than when he was a newborn. Could it be teething? Perhaps, but he's been teething for a while now. Maybe a growth spurt? Yes, he's definitely more hungry this week and gaining weight expediently, but when he wakes up during the night, he doesn't want to nurse, and most growth spurts don't last this long. Surely it couldn't be the four-month wakeful already! He's only 16 weeks. Oh wait, that's when it typically starts? And changing sleep cycles (the cause behind his waking up as soon as he's put in the crib) are a part of it? Damn.

So hopefully, Ethan will be a typical baby in that this will last about 2 weeks. And hopefully, there will be more nights like last night where he only woke up 3 times during the night, was fairly easy to get back in the crib, and remained in the crib the whole night. In the meantime, everything I've read says there's nothing you can do and no changes you can make to help it. It's just a developmental stage where he's learning so much and growing so much emotionally, mentally, and physically that he wakes up more frequently during the night.

It's also affected things slightly during the day, though. In addition to my not getting as much done as I'd planned due to exhaustion, there have also been slight changes in his eating and napping. For starters, I've spaced out his feedings more since I was having to feed him when he wasn't hungry in order to fit them all in to the day. Now, if he's hungry, of course I go ahead and feed him, and all bets are off at night, but as far as the supplementing goes, I've upped the quantity and eliminated one bottle, and so far it seems to suit him better. As a result, he's down to just 2-3 naps, which seems OK since he'd been fighting at least one nap a day for a while. In addition, I've been letting him nap in the Moby again instead of putting him in the crib or swing. I know some people (non-APers at least) recommend against this at this age, but my reasoning is threefold: 1) He's not getting as much sleep at night so I want to make sure he gets adequate sleep during the day so he's not overtired, and he sleeps better in the Moby. 2) My productivity is already down due to sleep deprivation, and this way I can get more done than when I'm just sitting rocking him in the nursery in an attempt to get him down in the crib. 3) Perhaps most importantly, with the way the nights are going, I need to see that I can have a happily sleeping baby, and, since I have to hear him scream so much at night now, for my own sanity, I just can't listen to him crying during the day. Yes, this last one is wholly selfish, but do you really blame me? Napping in the Moby makes him happier; therefore it makes me happier, and since it's just a temporary thing until the wakeful period is over, I don't see it as a problem.

A post full of pictures from Christmas is forthcoming, but I have a couple more pressing matters to attend to before then (all will be revealed in time). I start classes back a week from yesterday, so this wakeful stuff certainly could have chosen a more convenient time... but maybe he'll continue his streak of being an amazing baby and fly through this sleep regression in just a week! I can dream (figuratively speaking at least), can't I?