When Boyboy was a baby, he slept in cycles of 15-20 mins. I would tediously rock him to dreamland in my arms, only to have him awaken when I was just ready to put him down on the bed.
It got to the point where it was impossible for me to keep having him in my arms, so we caved in and bought a 2nd-hand 摇篮 as we tried the cot, even letting him 'cry it out' but he just couldn't sleep.
It worked well initially, offering me much relief. It also managed to extend Boyboy's cycles to 45 mins, after which the rocking lulled him back into another cycle, hooray!
Alas good times weren't made to last. Soon he needed patting in addition to the rocking. Then singing. So we ended up rocking, singing and patting at the same time. It looked and felt totally ridiculous.
One afternoon I was doing that and got fed up, and 'threw' the baby into his cot, and he slept so well -_-" From then we sold the 摇篮.
Now it seems like deja vu!
Boyboy has been sleeping w Papa and Mummy in our platform bed since he started to roll around in his sleep and outgrew the cot. When he mastered walking, things got tricky.
To prevent him from leaving the bed when lights are off, one of us started lying in bed w him til he was asleep. Because of his poor sleep, sometimes that takes a whole hour.
It was bearable when there were two of us to take turns on alternate nights. Wah now the boy is getting super sticky!
Boyboy insists on Mummy putting him to bed. Most of the time I have to spoon and cuddle him before he can fall asleep. In the middle of the night he wakes to look for me too to hold my hand before he can sleep.
I love pillow talk with my son but regretfully sometimes my bedroom feels like a prison :(
For naps I spend 30 mins (on a good day) putting him to bed, then have to hang around for 2 hrs in case he wakes up after his first cycle. If I'm not there to pat him back to sleep he'll wake fully.
For bedtime I usually spend 1 hr on what Hubby and I call "spying", before life can go on :p Either I gobble dinner before that and go to bed with an uncomfortably heavy stomach, or I tahan til after that and sometimes get gastric pains.
And usually I'm so tired that I fall asleep while spying. When Hubby comes in to wake me up so I can exit and finish my other tasks, it becomes difficult to fall asleep again later. Vicious cycle that makes me sleep late and become too tired the next day.
Boyboy has an early bedtime as that's the only way for him to get the 12 hrs of sleep he needs at his age. Nap is of so bad quality that it doesn't count. We've tried putting him to bed later in the hope that his nighttime sleep is better, but nope. So might as well sleep earlier so he can sleep more.
Tonight was really bad. Put Boyboy to bed at 745pm, he slept only near 9pm. Woke again at 930pm while Mummy was preparing the ingredients for his lunch tomorrow. Had to go back in and lie with him til 1015pm. Was so frustrated.
Actually I'm very angry at the construction site outside my window. My boy already has chronic sleeping problems, which are now aggravated cos he CANNOT get quality naps in the day.
It's not a matter of being awakened by sudden construction noise; the din is constant. Boyboy goes to nap with hammering and drilling noises that last and go up and down in volume.
I wonder if Boyboy's bad sleep contributes to his poor concentration in studies.
Punggol is a sucky place for young couples to build their love nest. You build so many BTOs here and trick couples into moving in. But we don't realize that the very time our little chicks hatch, the empty plots around us will be undergoing development.
And HDB set new stupid regulations that make it impossible for us to move away.
What a go, uniquely Singapore quality of life! >:(((
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