Babywise

So I have drunk the Kool Aid and read the Babywise book, in an attempt to work with Katie to get her sleeping through the night and on a regular schedule.  I'll be heading back to work in about 3.5 weeks, so I really want to make sure she's going to transition to "school"/ daycare easily, and turned to Babywise to help prepare her.

But I'm sooooooo over it!  The basic tenets of the Babywise theory are ensuring that a child gets enough to eat during the day to sustain them overnight and helping to regulate their internal clock with a predictable routine.  To accomplish this, parents should direct feedings about every 2.5 - 3.5 hours and ensure that a complete feeding is accomplished.  Also, a routine of eating, activity, then back to sleep helps regulate the baby's internal clock, giving them the wonderful gift of regularity and security.  Makes sense and sounds easy enough, right?

Not for my kiddo!  Trying to direct her to eat full meals every three hours makes her GASSY and uncomfortable, and I end up getting up with her about 25 times a night to help comfort her.  Wasn't the goal to help her sleep through the night?  Babywise says that 95% of babies using this method can sleep 7 hours through the night by 9 weeks, and Katie will be 9 weeks on Monday.  I'm pretty sure that's not going to happen for us...  Between acid reflux (she's on Zantac, but it doesn't seem to be helping) and being impossible to burp sometimes, I think her little tummy is just too sensitive for this authoritarian method of parenting.  I've tried implementing this method 3 times now and each time, I end up spending the worst night of my life and cursing that *#@!&^%* book the next day.  (Can you tell I'm having one of those days today?!)

Let's just hope that baby girl can hack it at school, where routine is a given.  Given that Babywise is going so horribly now, I need to figure out a new approach to help her get ready for this big step!  Wish me luck... I don't have much time left!

Yawn.