The No-cry Sleep Solution (56 page)

How many days have you been following your plan? ______

Time baby

How baby

Where baby Where baby How

fell asleep

fell asleep

fell asleep

slept

long?

1. Review Table 2.1 on page 48, or copy the information from your first log:

How many naps should your baby be getting? _________________

How many naps is your baby getting now ? ___________________

How many hours should your baby be napping? _______________

How many hours is your baby napping now ? _________________

2. Do you have a formal nap routine? _________________________

3. Are you watching for sleepy signs and putting your baby down for a nap as soon as you notice he’s tired? _______________________

4. Are your baby’s naptimes/lengths consistent every day? _________

Do a Ten-Day Log

175

Ten-Day Prebedtime Routine Log

Baby’s Name: ________________________________________

Age: _______________________________________________

Date: _______________________________________________

How many days have you been following your plan? ______

Key:

Activity: active, moderate, or calm

Noise: loud, moderate, or quiet

Light: bright, dim, or dark

Activity

Noise

Light

Time

What we did

level

level

level

1. For the past ten days, approximately how many days did you follow your formal bedtime routine? _________________________________

2. Is the hour prior to bedtime mostly peaceful, quiet, and dimly lit? ___

3. Does your bedtime routine help your baby wind down and prepare for sleep? ____________________________________________

4. Is your nightly routine consistent, acting as a bedtime cue for your baby? __________________________________________________

5. Is your bedtime routine relaxing and enjoyable for you? ___________

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The No-Cry Sleep Solution

Ten-Day Night-Waking Log

Baby’s Name: ________________________________________

Age: _______________________________________________

Date: _______________________________________________

How many days have you been following your plan? ______

How long

How long Time

How

of a sleep

awake; baby baby

stretch

How baby

what we

fell back fell back since fell

Time

woke me up

did

to sleep to sleep asleep

Asleep time: __________________________________________

Awake time: ________________________________________

Total number of awakenings: _________________________________

Longest sleep span: ___________________________________

Total hours of sleep: ____________________________________

8

Analyze Your Success

It’s time to think about what’s happened since you began following your sleep plan. It’s also the time to tweak your plan and make any changes that you’ve learned are necessary to help your baby sleep better. Because we can’t sit down over a cup of coffee and talk about your baby (wouldn’t that be nice!), I’ve created this chapter to help you figure out which parts of your plan are working, and which ones need to be changed. Start by using the information from your logs in Chapter 7 to complete the comparison chart that follows. Fill in the times from both logs and the amount of change:

First log

Ten days

Amount of change

Number

of naps

Length

of naps

Bedtime:

Asleep time

Awake

time

Number of

awakenings

Longest

sleep span

Total hours

of sleep

177

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The No-Cry Sleep Solution

Now take a few minutes to answer the following questions that will help you analyze your efforts. If you can, talk over the information with your spouse, your parenting partner, or another mother who is working on her own sleep plan. You may even want to search out a group of mothers and create a support group—

either in person or by E-mail or bulletin board. The support of other parents who are going through the same things that you are right now can be very helpful and enlightening.

Evaluate Your Sleep Plan

During the past ten days, how closely did you follow your plan?

ٗ I followed all parts of my plan exactly for all ten days.

ٗ I followed some parts of my plan, but not everything.

ٗ I started out great, but reverted back to my old habits.

ٗ Plan? What plan? (Oops, better start over with Step One!) Have you seen positive changes in at least one area (for example: a fifteen-minute increase in naptime or sleep span; an earlier bedtime; a reduction in the number of night wakings)? _______

What areas show the most change? ______________________

Why do you think that’s true? (What have you done to influence this?) _____________________________________________

_______________________________________________________

_______________________________________________________

_______________________________________________________

Analyze Your Success

179

What areas show the least change? _____________________

Why do you think that’s true? (What have you done to influence this?) ______________________________________________

_______________________________________________________

_______________________________________________________

_______________________________________________________

What have you learned about your baby’s sleep habits over the past ten days? ___________________________________________

_______________________________________________________

_______________________________________________________

_______________________________________________________

_______________________________________________________

_______________________________________________________

_______________________________________________________

What parts of your plan seem to be having the best influence on your baby’s sleep? _____________________________________

_______________________________________________________

_______________________________________________________

_______________________________________________________

What changes do you think you now need to make? _______

_______________________________________________________

_______________________________________________________

_______________________________________________________

How are you going to make these changes? _______________

_______________________________________________________

_______________________________________________________

_______________________________________________________

_______________________________________________________

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The No-Cry Sleep Solution

Reuel, one month old

The following sections are divided into three parts. Find the one that matches your level of success and read through the information. You may also want to read through the other sections for additional insight and ideas. Choose from these options: If Your Baby Is Now Sleeping Through the

Night (Five or More Consecutive Hours)

Congratulations! I’m truly thrilled that you have seen such great sleep success so quickly. I suspect that you have more energy and are feeling happier even though your sleep has improved for just a few days. It’s amazing how a little sleep can have such a peaceful impact on your life, isn’t it?

We need to address a few issues now that you’ve seen some success. First, this is only the beginning! Now that your baby can