Adapt and Overcome
The boy needs sleep. Loads of it, apparently. Ainsley and I often wonder which side of the family he takes after, but during the end of last year, he seemed to take on traits of both of us -- being a morning person (a la honeypants) and a night person (a la meatpants).
His afternoon nap has rarely been a problem -- he adjusted from two to one fairly easily and goes down right after lunch in a matter of minutes, and usually stays asleep for 3 hours or so. But his evening bedtime, as much as we tried to keep it fairly routine, was all over the place. 7:30. 8:15. And, for a few nights in there in December, he wouldn't bother to fall asleep until after 10. Which is well past Mommy's bedtime and a few lightyears beyond her patience threshold.
The worst part was that when he got so overly tired, there was little to nothing I could do to get him to sleep, and he would cry and scream for forty minutes straight until Ainsley would rescue me. Which is just a dreadful concept -- my son was so uncomfortable with me, with the situation, that I needed to be relieved by the one person who needed a break already.
I tried to think like a 35-yr-old Gottrich and suggested he may be napping too long, that he's just not tired enough at night (if I were to ever take a nap during the day, I would never get to sleep before midnight). But rather than barging into his room with a tuba after two hours of naptime, Ainsley suggested that we may be riling him up too much after dinner with TV and baths and reading and toys and fan spinning and basket counting* and laundry chores. And since he falls asleep so well right after lunch, we thought we would move his dinner time a little later, do baths and reading before dinner, and then put him to bed right afterwards. This has worked fairly well for a week now; he's fallen asleep within ten or fifteen minutes, or if he hasn't, I've been able to take over and lull him down with my sultry swagger and Barry White shooshing.
*As fans of the show know, Ryan points, we identify. Sometimes we ask, he points. We taught him "baskets", which hang decoratively yet conveniently functional over the kitchen pantry, but the other day Grandad started counting them for him as he pointed. So now when ever we walk into the kitchen, he'll point at the fan, but he six-shoots at the baskets until we start counting them.
One of his bibs has a sports theme, with balls and bats and pucks and shuttlecocks (fun word to teach a kid! Not that the LeapFrog Uppity Speaking Caterpillar will let me!) and rackets. We were in the dining room this morning and he was pointing at the objects on his bib. "That's a football." "Boxing glove." "Basketball." Ryan stopped what he was doing and started waving his hand. I was confused until he twisted around in his chair and started counting baskets in the kitchen with his wrist and trusty pointer finger.
His afternoon nap has rarely been a problem -- he adjusted from two to one fairly easily and goes down right after lunch in a matter of minutes, and usually stays asleep for 3 hours or so. But his evening bedtime, as much as we tried to keep it fairly routine, was all over the place. 7:30. 8:15. And, for a few nights in there in December, he wouldn't bother to fall asleep until after 10. Which is well past Mommy's bedtime and a few lightyears beyond her patience threshold.
The worst part was that when he got so overly tired, there was little to nothing I could do to get him to sleep, and he would cry and scream for forty minutes straight until Ainsley would rescue me. Which is just a dreadful concept -- my son was so uncomfortable with me, with the situation, that I needed to be relieved by the one person who needed a break already.
I tried to think like a 35-yr-old Gottrich and suggested he may be napping too long, that he's just not tired enough at night (if I were to ever take a nap during the day, I would never get to sleep before midnight). But rather than barging into his room with a tuba after two hours of naptime, Ainsley suggested that we may be riling him up too much after dinner with TV and baths and reading and toys and fan spinning and basket counting* and laundry chores. And since he falls asleep so well right after lunch, we thought we would move his dinner time a little later, do baths and reading before dinner, and then put him to bed right afterwards. This has worked fairly well for a week now; he's fallen asleep within ten or fifteen minutes, or if he hasn't, I've been able to take over and lull him down with my sultry swagger and Barry White shooshing.
*As fans of the show know, Ryan points, we identify. Sometimes we ask, he points. We taught him "baskets", which hang decoratively yet conveniently functional over the kitchen pantry, but the other day Grandad started counting them for him as he pointed. So now when ever we walk into the kitchen, he'll point at the fan, but he six-shoots at the baskets until we start counting them.
One of his bibs has a sports theme, with balls and bats and pucks and shuttlecocks (fun word to teach a kid! Not that the LeapFrog Uppity Speaking Caterpillar will let me!) and rackets. We were in the dining room this morning and he was pointing at the objects on his bib. "That's a football." "Boxing glove." "Basketball." Ryan stopped what he was doing and started waving his hand. I was confused until he twisted around in his chair and started counting baskets in the kitchen with his wrist and trusty pointer finger.
posted by Dan at 9:40 PM
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