Sleep programme

After a miserable and very tiring week I spoke to the health visitor on 18th September and was advised to try a sleep programme, as the getting up two or three times per night to feed Elizabeth is breaking me now! We wouldn't want to go down the controlled crying route anyway, but she was against that and suggested a version of 'pick up put down' that husband would have to carry out. We waited until Friday night when he would be off work the following day, and put it into action. Elizabeth woke soon after midnight, and one and a half hours of screaming and struggling went by. She wasn't screaming the whole time, her anger subsided and she started 'playing', posting her toys through the bars of the cot and babbling away. She finally did go back to sleep without feeding, and although she woke a little later on, she settled herself and we even had a bit of a lie-in.

Night two was not, as we thought it might be, better. She woke up and settled within half an hour, but when she woke up later on we had another hour and a half of upset, and by the time she went back to sleep at nearly 6am we were both shattered! She came into our bed after her first feed, and after playing for a little while and pulling my hair like mad, she fell asleep next to her sleeping Daddy.

Last night was similar, although the settling was made more difficult because her cold symptoms had worsened. I felt horrible having to give her a dose of Medised while she shouted and screamed, and was almost choking on it. She did eventually settle down, but woke every hour as it approached 7am, and in the end I got up and sat with her, stroking her hair and back as she settled again in the cot.

This morning she has gone into her cot at a reasonable time (9.10am) and has had a long nap so I've been able to have a shower, get dressed, put the breadmaker on, put the washing on, do the dishes, write a shopping list.... I was all geared up for going out at around 10am, but am not going to wake the sleeping Elizabeth so plans are being postponed.

This morning I was beginning to question the sleep programme. On the one hand I can't continue to feed her two to three times a night, particularly if we are going to start thinking about baby number two. She doesn't 'need' feeding, she is comfort feeding. But, I feel terrible for with-holding that comfort, when thus far she has had completely unfettered access to me. I reason that if we break this habit now it will be easier for her and us in the long-run, but I feel terrible.

Just when I was feeling at my most tired, and emotional following a very difficult meeting with work last week (grievance hearing now set for October 10th as no resolution was forthcoming) I was kicked in the teeth further by my friend of 30 years who decided in the name of honesty and 'cards on the table' to tell me that it was abornmal that Elizabeth was feeding so frequently and that she 'clearly wasn't getting enough'. She compared me to friends of hers who have babies who are able to go out, and said that it wasn't right that I couldn't. (I'd said that I couldn't go out to her birthday meal because we couldn't 'do' evenings at the moment). It seems I have chosen a path that people don't agree with: breastfeeding beyond 6 months, reusable nappies, no dummies, homemade food. I don't know why she feels the need to share her opinions with me - saying that it is because 'she cares' is a strange excuse because it was so obviously upsetting me. I wouldn't dream of judging other people's parenting, and just feel sick of all the passing judgement that goes with the territory. I need a thicker skin!