My basic night of sleep goes like this:
Fall asleep anywhere between 7:30 and 9:30 usually. Wake anywhere between midnight and 2am, atleast once, sometimes more, to a screaming Liam. Sometimes he just wants water or milk, or like last night, Motrin (HOLY TEETHING HELL). Most of the time he wants to get up and either play, or scream, or play and THEN scream. We usually DO fall back asleep for an hour, before getting up for the day at 4:45.
Soooooo... Needless to say, i'm tired. :(
We've put a new sleep routine into place. For both kids, even though Joshua is great at going to sleep around 7:30 and will sleep all the way through to 5, 6, or 7 if he's not woken up by his screaming brother. Oh, and Joshua likes to sleep RIGHT NEXT TO ME, so if I leave the bed, he feels i'm not there, and wakes up. Oh, how fun TWO needy kids are...
We don't do baths every night (it's almost Winter -- no outside time, no dirty time, no sweaty time = no baths), but when we do, it's warm water & lavender essential oils dropped in. Don't buy those nasty lavender Johnson & Johnson baths, they have terrible chemicals (like formaldehyde) just use Essential Oils instead :)
After bath, we do pajamas, and boy do we need WARM ones lately -- it's been cold! I attempt to brush Joshua's hair -- but HELLO sensory issues -- he refuses to have his hair get wet, washed, or brushed, so I try to do it only once a week.
Then I make them both tea. Yep, tea! Sleepytime tea for KIDS is GREAT. I mix it with a little all natural agave and some Lactaid. Then, I mix in one of the new supplements I got. It's a powdered magnesium "natural calm" supplement. It restores magnesium levels (helps with bowel movements), balances your calcium intake, calms and relieves stress, and helps with sleep. It's a little pricy -- I got it on Vitacost for $23.97 for 16oz -- which is a BIG bottle. And you only give the kids 1/8th teaspoon so.. it'll last forever. And it's obviously fine for adults, too, you just take a bit more. It's unflavored, so adding it to drinks is super easy.
This routine works great for Joshua, and I lay in (our) bed with him and let him watch Mickey Mouse, and he usually falls asleep right between 7 and 7:30. Liam, on the other hand... sigh Sometimes he's great and falls right asleep. He's still in that stage where sometimes he takes 1 nap during the day, sometimes 2... And never at the same time. So you never know when he'll be tired at night.
But NO MATTER WHAT. He wakes up in the middle of the night. I've tried everything. I tried putting him in the boys' room to see if he'd sleep better alone. It didn't work. I try letting him fall asleep on the couch and transferring, I try getting him to fall asleep in the bed... no matter what we try, he wakes up at 2am. It's KILLING ME.
If I only had one child, it'd be fine. Because I could rest, relax, even nap during the day when he does. But I have an (almost) 3 year old who is EXTREMELY hyperactive and stimulation seeking so my day is full of HIGH ENERGY. I can't keep up with him and it makes me feel extremely guilty.
So last night, I gave in and tried what I swore up and down and all over to everyone that i'd never try. I gave Liam some melatonin. You guys, I don't even know if it worked. I passed out before he did. And he, of course, was up by 2am. And up for the day at 4:45. KILL ME PLEASE.
But on the subject of sleep and hyperactivity, I also have tried something new with Joshua. We got his order of supplements in over the weekend, and with it, I ordered Valerian Super Calm by Herbs for Kids. It really does have a sedating effect. I don't want to use it ALL day, by all means, he needs to let the energy out. But, in the evenings, it can be VERY difficult to deal with. He literally will run into walls seeking out stimulation. He runs into me, jumps up and down, hits, slams, smashes... and it's at its worst in the evening after dinnertime. So, I give him a dose of the valerian around dinnertime (sometimes with dinner while he's getting his other supplements) and by the time we're trying to settle him into pajamas, etc, he's much, MUCH calmer and you can tell he's getting tired. Now, when I lay with him, he will actually lay next to me, hold my hand, rub my arm, etc. Instead of roll, bounce, tap, KICK ME IN THE STOMACH, etc etc.
So. That's our new thing. If only I could get Liam to sleep through that whole 2am thing, we'd be GOOOOOOD.
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