Sleep regression: When your 4 month old decides sleeping just isn’t for them.
Yes, it’s a thing. And it’s a bitch.
This one’s pretty self explanatory… Their sleep regresses to that of a highly temperamental newborn. Just as you move into that sweet spot where you might be lucky enough to clock in some decent Z’s, (let’s be honest anything over 4 hours straight feels like you’ve won the baby lottery) you’re constantly being asked if you’ve established a ‘routine’ and proceed to talk about it like you’re pretty much nailing this whole parenting thing.
Enter sleep regression.
So, the sleep assassin decided Monday that she’d wake up at 11, 2 (can handle these) 3, 5, 5:30 (can’t handle these) and then just mumble and squeal to herself till 6 which is adorable at ANY OTHER time of the day. Rough night, I said. Must be a growth spurt, I said.
5 days of max. 4 hours sleep later I decided to google ‘what the hell is going on with my four month old and why is she torturing me?’ So here’s what google taught me*: it turns out that their sleep cycle ‘matures’ at around four months. It becomes more like an adult’s in that they begin to cycle between light and deep sleep. Interesting you might be thinking…but there’s a catch! Where you and I; sensible, sleep respecting humans would stay asleep during this light sleep phase, they wake up… So many sad faces. :(((((((((
So, we’re 6 days in and the cracks are beginning to show. The sleep assassin shifts between my happy baby to an angry mess quicker than you can say ‘sleep regression’. She’s just, after trying with all her might for a few days, figured out how to roll from back to front – and BOY was this a contentious issue today. She’d scream until she flipped (which still takes a while and a few constipated faces) then decide she doesn’t actually like the view from her belly any better and scream till I rescued her from the baby prison that is her play mat. This by the way has expanded now to pretty much the size of the loungeroom. No amount of stimulating, fluro pink elephants could save me from this nightmare.
I’m yet to find a remedy to this lunacy but for now the hope that she will be too exhausted to fight swaddling at 4 am is all I’ve got.
*my riveting google search (see also; things I never thought I’d google till I became a mother) revealed that sleep regressions happen at 8, 12, 18 & 24 months too! – Hooray!
Love, Mum who would very much like to just skip this month.
xxx
Just Mummying 