The 8-9-10 Month Sleep Regression

Nobody told me about sleep regressions before having kids.  Sure, I assumed the first few weeks would be tough, but I naively assumed that once you "trained" your kids to sleep properly, they would be sweet dreamers and sleep through the night no problem.  Boy I was wrong!  Even with a sleep consultant at our side, and fairly well sleeping babies, I must say I can only count a handful of nights that BOTH babies have actually slept all the way through.

This week we picked up our sleep training hard core again.  I'll write more about how it goes once I have more to say.  But can I just say that this current regression is a beast!  It's hard to explain exactly what this regression is all about, but most information I find online says that somewhere between 8-10 months, it is common for babies to become like newborns again.  It's a combination of huge brain development (I think we are in one of the toughest "Wonder Weeks" yet), teething, and just a bunch of stuff altogether.

Yesterday RJ refused to nap all day, and only slept for 30 minutes in a sling while we went for a walk.  Last night MJ took over an hour to settle back to sleep after waking up.  And this morning I just spent an hour getting RJ to nap, and only succeeded when I held him, rocked him, and sang to him, like when he was a newborn.

As exasperating as it is at times, all I could think today was how lucky I am to have these boys in my life.  I love them SO MUCH it literally hurts.  Sure, it's tough at 3am when all you want it your warm bed, but they are so seriously incredible.  It pains me when they have a tough time falling asleep, and yet it is what they want and need most.  But the little cuddles, the sweet softness of breath, the silky skin up against yours... it takes my breath away.  I love you little bundles!

Twins 8-9 Month Update

Well, I guess you can tell when twin life gets busy again based on twin mamas start to fall off the blogosphere again.  That and the fact that it's summer means not much time for blogging.  However, I finally did my last month's update decided to lump it together with this month's.  So here is the scoop on the boys' 7 and 8 months of living:

Eat

These months have seen a huge shift in the boys’ eating patterns.  First off, RJ is nursing much better!  Whenever he is put to breast he will eat (unless he is full), but I am still pumping for two bottles and nursing him just for two feeds.  I guess I am still holding onto doubt that he will eat as much as he needs.  Though when it comes to solid food, I don’t have to worry.  This boy loves to eat!  We started Baby-Led Weaning (BLW) and he has eaten everything we give him.  He LOVES food.  Basically he will sit in a highchair as long as we allow him and eat continually until we stop giving him food.  He loves to feed himself.  MJ started a bit slower, but now he eats just as heartily.  The boys have eaten all sorts of foods: bananna, avocado, sweet potato, toast, peach, pear, squash, chicken, beef, pork, lamb...and that’s all just what they have fed themselves.  We also do some pureed food but it is time consuming and BLW works well for us.  We have tried to cut down a milk feed, so now they have 4 main feeds, with a little snack or two of milk and they eat 2-3 solid food meals a day (lunch is usually just a snack).  We haven’t had them weighed since their last set of shots (which in adjusted age was just at the start of 7 months), but RJ weighed about 16 1/2 lbs... and MJ weighed 18 1/2 (bruiser!). We are not worried about them any longer (little porkers).  I really think RJ just likes to do things himself and is much happier eating a variety of foods.  RJ is wearing some 6-9 month clothing, and more 9-12 month, and MJ wears 9-12 or 12-18.  He is huge!  Both are in size 4 diapers.  

Sleep

Sleep has improved so much that we can finally say the boys are sleeping through the night.  Wahoo!  Party time!!!  They still wake occasionally, but they have slept through for many nights.  Sometimes when they do wake they are able to self-settle too.  Teething threw that for a bit of a loop, but all in all they are doing very well.  Naps have settled into a nice routine too.  They go down at 9 for an hour to an hour and a half, and then again at 1:00 for and hour and a half to two hours.  If they haven’t napped well sometimes they will sneak in a third nap, but usually just an early bedtime.  They go to bed between 6:30-7:00pm (which gives us a nice evening to ourselves).  I am soooo glad we used a sleep consultant and developed some great sleep habits right away.  They still use soothers, which we’d like to get rid of, but it’s tough.  

Play

Again, it has been a fun time for play.  These boys are such characters!  I love seeing their personalities develop more and more as time goes on.  At about 8 months they started sitting up on their own, and from there things quickly happened.  MJ has been moving to the crawling position and then back to a sitting position all on his own.  He rocks back and forth in the crawling position but only moved backwards until today (July 13th).  Today MJ officially crawled!  And it was a real crawl.  We were so proud.  RJ is also on the move!  He doesn’t do a traditional crawl, but uses one side of his body to pull himself forward.  He is now just starting to try the crawl position a bit too.  We spend a lot of the day just playing on the floor and the rest of the time it feels like they are eating haha.  We try to get out once a day, either for a walk, or to the park, or to a group.  The boys haven’t really started interacting with other children, but are slowly starting to “play” with one another.  RJ loves to be outdoors looking at trees and MJ seems to like noises like trucks and airplanes.  RJ is still very vocal and knows what he wants and doesn’t want.  He is quite silly and giggles a lot.  He also has become quite the flirt, particularly amongst ladies.  He still is extremely responsive to music and wants to jump and dance and sing.  MJ is less vocal, apart from using the back of his throat for a very guttural sound but sometimes laughs and likes to sing during church.  He is a charmer when he smiles and just has such a sweet disposition.

Events

A HUGE milestone for the boys was finally the development of teeth!  While we were away on holidays, the boys both popped out two each!  And they got their first tooth on the very same day.  Our summer vacation was the biggest event during this period.  We took a trip to Harrison Hot Springs for a friend’s wedding and then carried on to Kelowna for nearly 2 weeks with D’s parents.  The boys did fantastic with all the travel and new scenery.  They slept great in their travel cots, did awesome during the driving, and adapted well to being in a new home.  We tried to keep their schedule pretty consistent and it really worked.  They had a great time with D’s parents (especially his dad).  We also celebrated their first Father’s Day with taking them out to brunch (which was more work than it was worth it with just the two of us handling two babies).   We also took the boys for their first “swim” outdoors, but they just cried at the waves and the cold water in the lake.  We tried a river too, but they just weren’t into it.  I guess we should start with a warm kiddie pool and see how that goes.  We continue to meet with the moms from our preemie group and take the boys to church.  It will be great once they are moving around in the fall and we can take them to more “active” groups of kids.  For now, we’ll sit back and enjoy this summer as much as we can!  

Twins 5 Month Sleep Training

I mentioned a while back that we have hired a sleep consultant to help us out over the next little while.  I know it is still early for sleep training, but most moms I have spoken to have babies who either sleep the night (without feeds), or only nurse once by this point.  Our boys were still getting up 3 times a night to eat!  I think it was just the pattern they were used to, and not that they were necessarily hungry.  However, the sleep deprivation reached a new low and I was ready to move on.

I heard of this consultant from a few other twin moms in the area, who found great success with her.  The support is great, because it is ongoing for as long as you need, and we only paid $200!  I think that is totally worth it to help twins (and us) achieve a healthy sleep life.

The first thing she did was have us fill out a questionnaire about their current sleep/eat/play patterns, as well as a bunch of questions about their health and personalities.  Then she drafted up an awesome sleep plan for us.  It was encouraging because it was pretty close to what we were doing, but provided something to work towards.  We decided we would try to start implementing the changes with the hope of having the plan in place by the time they reach 4 months adjusted age (which is tomorrow!).

So, for those who are interested, here is the plan we currently have (and some notes on how it is going).

7am - Wake up time for the boys.  If they are not awake we go in and turn on the lights and wake them up.  If they are up early, we try to leave them in their cribs till this time (usually they wake up talking and not necessarily crying).  I then stagger feed them for the morning and have playtime till the nap.

9am - Nap #1.  This is supposed to be at least an hour nap.  We are having troubles transitioning the boys past the first sleep cycle of 45 minutes, so they often wake up after 40 minutes and we leave them fussing till the hour is up (we put in soothers, pat their backs, rub their tummies).  Once they are up, we feed again and then play.

12pm - Nap #2.  This nap should last between 1-2 hours, though we aim for the two hour mark so that they can last longer through the afternoon.  Usually one of them wakes up early from this one too.  We can often get RJ back to sleep with his soother and a blanket, but MJ is having issues falling asleep after waking up, so sometimes we pull him out and bring him to the bed in our room and help him resettle.  We aren't supposed to be doing this, as they are supposed to learn to sleep through each others' cries/fussing, and we aren't supposed to take them out early, but we also want RJ to learn to sleep himself, and so it is a toss up.  We are currently working with the consultant on how to handle this.  Once they are up, we feed again, and then have playtime.

3-4pm - Nap #3. Depending on the afternoon, this is when we schedule the 3rd nap.  It is only supposed to be 30-60 minutes, but often the other naps are shorter, and I feel like the boys can't quite make it to bedtime if this nap is not long enough.  So we have resorted to going for a walk or a drive.  Once they are in motion, they sleep much better and longer.  Or, sometimes they go down at 3 or 3:30 and if they only sleep for half an hour, we will take them for a walk after so that they can continue to rest till close to 5pm.  This may not be the right thing to do, but by this time I am tired and just need a break!  All the things I read say that if they are not sleeping well, put them to bed early, but we just can't do bedtime earlier than 6:30/7:00.  It is tough enough as it is.  Anyways, more on that later.  Once they are up, we do a top-up feed and then play until bedtime.  We try to start the bedtime routine around 7 and have them tucked in between 7:30/8:00 (unless they have had a bad nap day and we bump it earlier).  It's just hard with DH getting home from work, trying to get dinner in order and cleaned up, and then get them ready for bed while they are becoming fussy.  This is, by far, one of the most draining times of the day.  Fortunately, our boys go down to bed very well so far!  I hope this doesn't change as they get older...

11:30pm/12:00am - Night feed #1. We are supposed to wake them up but we usually wait till the first one wakes up, feed them, then wake the second one up. 

3:30am/4:00 - Night feed #2.  Same thing... feed one, then the other.  They are supposed to go right back down, but we've been having troubles settling RJ after this feed.  He is usually up for an hour at least. This is a frustrating time so we are working on what to do with him here. 

7am - Start all over again.

It really is a manageable schedule, if it works.  Both the babies have periods where they won't settle and if one if up, they throw the whole schedule off.  It's a work in progress.  Since we started doing scheduled naps, most days have been so much easier.  I have had time to eat lunch, to sip tea, and actually get things done!  Now, if we get the nights in order so I can sleep, I will be even happier!  The hard part is getting up to pump so that hubby can do the night feed.  I'm not sure how to get around that one.  If I go to bed at 9, and don't pump before getting up for the 3:30 feed, I am way too engorged and choke the babies and make them scream, lol.  So I usually pump before bed at 9, then get up again around 1, then get up for the feed at 3:30, and then try to sleep another hour or two after the feed before they are up.  That is still a broken up sleep night and I am pretty exhausted still.  But there is hope! 

As you may have guessed if you've read my blog much, I am a schedule kind of girl!  I would have loved to be more flexible, feeding on demand, etc. with babies... but with twins, that is pretty much impossible. So it actually helps me be less anxious knowing that there is a schedule in place and having a framework to work from and towards.  We aren't doing any cry-it-out yet (not till 6 months, at least), but really just working to implement healthy sleep habits for the boys.  All in all, it is going very well and I hope the next few months bring much more success!

Twins 5 Month Update

5 Month Update

I'm a few days early, but since I had some time to sit down and write, I thought I'd post this now.  As challenging as raising twins are, it is such incredible fun too.  I absolutely LOVE the stage the boys are in (apart from the "wonder week" difficult behavior).  Also, they are so incredibly cute!  How can you not love them?

So, here's this month's update for anyone who is interested.

 

Eat

This month the picky eating trend continued with RJ.  We did everything we could to rule out thrush, nipple confusion, ear infection...and at the end of the day we have decided he just is a picky eater.  He even struggles with the bottle at times but he is too distracted to eat during the day.  His nursing sessions only last 5-10 minutes but he can drink 120-160 from a bottle.  MJ settled down in his eating, but continues to do well at breastfeeding.  He nurses in 10-20 minutes and drinks 140-160 in a bottle.  We only tandem feed 1-2x per day now, but it is cute when we do. The boys play with each other’s hands and stare at each other.  RJ now weighs 13lbs, 5oz and is in size 1-2 diapers and 3-6 month clothing and MJ weighs a whopping 15lbs, 11oz and is in size 2 diapers and mostly 6 month clothing!

Sleep

Though people say the 4-month regression maybe is not real, we definitely felt the effects of a regression this month.  It hit RJ especially bad.  He was going through such brain development and learning lots of new skills, but it really affected his eating and sleeping.  After quite a few nights of 7-8 feedings between the two boys, we buckled down and hired a sleep consultant.  We have only just started to implement some of the changes, but I am really excited to get the boys on a better schedule so that we can have happier, healthy boys.  Sleep and food are the most important things right now, so it was well worth it to shell out $200.  Also she will continue to support us through different stages of growth and development as the boys get older.  Our hope is to have the boys feed just twice through the night.  We are getting close, though usually RJ needs an extra little top-up early in the morning (and often he snuggles with us after that).  The boys go to bed no problem between 7-8pm, and usually get up by 7:30.  We had Daylight Savings last week and it threw us off a bit, but they seem to be adjusting now that we have incorporated a new schedule.  The goal is to have 3 naps of a total of 4 hours per day as well.  Here’s to hoping the next month gets us on track!

Play

This has been the most fun development to watch this month.  The boys really did hit a 4-month brain development growth spurt.  All of a sudden they were so much more active!  They love to hold objects with both hands and bring them to their mouths.  They put anything they can into their mouths (especially their hands).  They reach for objects hanging over them.  They are much better at tummy time and hold their heads up and are starting to reach towards object (sometimes).  They aren’t rolling over yet, but RJ especially is always squirming around.  He loves to kick his arms and legs like crazy and hits anything in his way.  They both sit in the bumbo seats and will reach for toys on the tray in front of them.  RJ is especially talkative this month.  MJ doesn’t cry in the mornings, but wakes up and sits in his crib “talking” until we come get him.  It is so cute!  The best is how excited they get about music!  We try not to let them watch media, but occasionally we play a music video on the computer and they both love it!  RJ moves all around and “sings.”  MJ sings and just stares engrossed in the music.  We love it.  

Events

This month was pretty busy with church events and just surviving, but after the AGM we decided to take our first trip with the boys!  We went to Tofino and stayed at Middle Beach Lodge along with our friend L.  It was such fun!  Super tiring, but still fun.  We took the boys walking on Long Beach in their new Ergo carriers, and played in the cabin by the fire.  We enjoyed hanging out in the lodge drinking coffee and watching the waves.  Even with a 3-hour drive each way, the boys did great.  They are quite adaptable and it was fun to be away with them.  Other than that, we carried on with our regular activities of church, preemie group, play dates, and walks as often as we could.  The boys are much more aware of their surroundings and the people around them so it is so much fun.