Two Week Checkup

Monday, Cassandra had her two week check up with her pediatrician.

She weighed in at 6lbs 13.5oz (3.5oz past her birth weight) and was 19.25" long. He didn't give me any percentiles, but mentioned she's on the small side which makes sense because she is small!

The appointment went well except that Cassandra cried the entire time!  He said that all looks good with her and that she doesn't have to go back until she's 2 months old!

I spent a lot of time talking to her doctor about Avery. She has had a really rough time at bedtime lately so I wanted to get some advice from him. 

Avery really doesn't nap anymore and hasn't napped consistently in a very long time. Because of that, we try to get her in bed between 730-8pm every night. Our routine is that she takes a bath (when needed), gets in her PJs, brushes teeth, read stories, then lie down and sing songs in bed. She used to do really well and would fall asleep within a few minutes of us lying there with her.

Lately it's been a different story. When we lay down with her, she is very restless-she thrashes around, kicks her legs and just is constantly moving. It's like she can't calm herself down enough to fall asleep. She does get frustrated and will start to whine/cry because she just can't get comfortable. It's almost like her brain won't shut off or something.

If we stay with her, sometimes we can get her to fall asleep in a decent amount of time. Sometimes she's so wound up that we end up leaving her because she just won't lay down and relax.

If we leave her room, things can get ugly really fast. She knows how to get out of bed, open her door and turn on the lights. Basically as soon as we leave, no matter how tired she is, she jumps out of bed and starts to play. We've tried totally leaving her alone and she'll literally play until all hours of the night (one night was close to midnight!)-one of us will end up caving and going into her just because it's so darn late and we want to get to sleep too!

It's such a hard situation-if we leave her alone, she plays all night. If we go in, we're reinforcing things in a way and she's not learning to go to sleep on her own. It's just so hard to know what is right to do.

So, I mentioned all of this to her doctor and he suggested trying a small dose of melatonin before bed. He said it sounds like we're doing everything we should be doing with her. He did say to remove all toys/books from her room and to try leaving her alone as much as possible.

So last night I emptied out her room and we did our usual routine. I stayed with her from 8-830 then told her it was time for me to go. As soon as I left the room, she was out of bed. I checked on her a few times and removed a few more toys I missed along the way. Gabe and I went up to bed around 1045 and she was still awake. Around 1120, Gabe went in with her and got her to fall asleep. Even without the toys/books, she found something to amuse herself: her dresser drawers....her entire floor was covered in every piece of clothing she has!  So I guess she doesn't need toys/books to amuse herself.

We decided to hold on the melatonin for now and see how things go. I don't know if this is an adjustment to Cassandra being home or what. We're going to give her a few weeks and see how things go.