Day 4, continued

I don't see much point in continuing to describe the play-by-play in our land of (not) sleep... I imagine everything is going to change tomorrow anyway. Yesterday (Day 4) was pretty good in terms of daytime sleep, but of course it still involved mid-nap bouncing and a 1.5 hour drive in the afternoon. Last night's sleep was completely disastrous. I pretty much lost my sh*t after being up with Shoghi from 10:30-12:45 and 2:15-4:45. Lucky for both of us, he finally fell asleep at 4:45 and slept in until a whopping 7:30. Of course, Max was up at 6:10, so it's not like I got to "sleep in" anyway.

This whole thing really challenges me to the core. I have written before about how I find the emotions of mothering alarming at times, and this issue seems particularly charged for me.

I was asked by email what led to deciding to work on sleep in this way. The simplest explanation is that the boys are each not hitting the 14 hours of sleep needed at this age. It's making Max very fussy, has meant that we have no discernible schedule, and leaves me full of anxiety every night. Basically, Shoghi's nights are a disaster, while Max's days are terrible. Fun for everyone, to be sure. That and the fact that mama needs to get some measure of sleep combined to make me desperate enough to pursue A Plan. If I just had one of them, I'm sure I could make it work, but with both of them, I'm at the end of my rope.

I've decided to go the route of the sleep consultant. I spoke with her for a free phone consultation this morning, describing our situation. I think her rates are pretty affordable, and while I won't have her come to the house, we'll talk on the phone tomorrow for probably over an hour, come up with a plan, and then she will provide me with daily email support as I implement our agreed upon plan. I assume there will be some thickening of my skin involved, for there is certain to be some fussing involved in whatever plan we come up with. She says she will work with me and my comfort level to choose from the range of sleep strategies. I like this - that she draws from everything that's out there. That's how I approach things, too... some aspects of this strategy, a little tool from that philosophy... creating something that will hopefully work for us. She warned me that with twins, it's likely to take more than a week.

So, I guess I'm probably going to abandon my posts about The Schedule, and after my consultation tomorrow, I'll start posting about the new plan. I'll let you know what we're trying and how it goes. Please keep up the encouragements. I take heart knowing that you're all reading and cheering me on... I love to see that there have even been readers from far-off places like Finland, Sweden, India and Morocco. I'd love to hear your take on sleep, and anything I might be missing.