After just three days I feel very good about Norah's new room. For one thing, it seems to be more appropriate for her stage. Her previous room was an infant room that was transformed into a "transition" room (between infants and the next stage). This one, on the other hand, is designed for her current stage. Her new room, for example, seems to have toys that are more appropriate for her age. Also, her previous room had bouncy seats in which the kids often slept. In her new room, 10 cribs are lined up across one wall and everyone sleeps in a crib - there are no other options.
Her new room has 9-10 kids between the ages of 7 and 11 months, so it is a bit crazier. But despite this craziness, however, it still feels much, much better than a room full of crying babies. I mentioned in a previous post that one of the teachers in this room used to be her teacher when we first started at this daycare. The other day I was holding her in the room and she reached out for this teacher. After a minute or so she reached out for me again, so it was sort of the best of both worlds - she obviously likes her teacher, but was ready to come back to me.
One day when I picked Norah up her teacher said, "Do you know what Norah had the nerve to do today? After napping for a while she started crying, woke up three other kids, then turned over and went back to sleep." They also told me that she is going to learn how to share (8-9 other mobile kids is an entirely different situation than her previous room). They said she already has some favorite toys, but she doesn't like when anyone else plays with them.
So overall I feel much better about our new situation. I think this is a good example of how my positive approach to life is not the strength that I often consider it to be. I wanted everything to be okay, so I was constantly trying to pick out the positives. Looking back, I realize that I wasn't completely happy with the teacher (in addition to the crying babies). I was focused on the positives (mainly that I didn't fear for her care), and hadn't considered what her situation could be. But after three days in this room, I feel like it is better suited for both her and me. Of course maybe that is my optimistic side coming out again, and I will continue to be on the lookout. (In my defense, the crying baby situation had only been going on for 2 weeks before I took steps to make a change.)
On to the sleep issues. Ever since Denver we have had some rough nights. In fact, most nights have included night wakings that required our involvement to get Norah back to sleep. All of a sudden a few nights ago we re-evaluated and realized we had contributed to the problem and that Norah could no longer self soothe herself back to sleep. Yikes. Our methods of getting her back to sleep varied from simply putting her pacifier in and giving her snuggly to (just twice) rocking her back to sleep. I'm sure other parents can relate to this - it was very hard to make good decisions in the middle of the night when we were sleep deprived and wanted nothing more than to get back to sleep ourselves. The morning after I had rocked her back to sleep I woke up thinking, "Crap - why did I do that. It was the wrong thing to do."
Anyway, I feel like we are now aware of the situation and are working to correct it. Wednesday night we went in with a plan - let her cry it out. Sure enough, she woke up around 1:30. After 30 minutes of what I would consider minor fussing, her cries escalated. We tried a tactic that I had read about online - we stood outside of her room (without opening the door) and talked to her telling her that we were there, but it was time to go back to sleep. We each did it once within 30 minutes. It didn't work. As soon as we stopped talking she was back to crying. Finally, after an hour, I went in, put in her paci and gave her snuggly. She rolled over, went to sleep and that was it for the night.
Last night she slept through the night. I heard some soft moans at one point, but she fell back alseep and slept until 7AM. We're pulling for another simliar night tonight. I'm almost dreading finishing this post and starting the night, but I'll have to eventually and I need to get in bed considering her early wake up times.
Ultimately, we know this can be fixed and we can over come the situation. We just have to figure out how to make it happen. I'm keeping my fingers crossed!
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