The Story of no wraps, cold turkey

Bit of the background: Kaitlyn likes being wrapped to sleep. When she was very little, like from birth to about 3 months, she was swaddled, i.e. her arms and legs were wrapped snuggly. Otherwise, she would startle herself and wake up screaming. Gradually, she got too long for the wraps, so we only wrapped her arms down at night.

Then one night around 5 months, she decided she no longer liked to be wrapped with arms down by her side. So we had to leave her to sleep without being wrapped at all. But that's when she got worse with her sleeping patterns and waking every single hour throughout the day and night. She also started moving all over the bed, and getting her head, arms and legs trapped between the cot railings or had them bruised by smacking the wood too hard. Eventually, after 2 months of struggling with that, we took her to Tresillian. In Tresillian, they tried to get her to settle and sleep without being wrapped at first... and she cried for TWO entire hours that afternoon and didn't get a wink of sleep. So, the nurse wrapped her loosely with her arms near her face. BINGO! that was the trick. She slept!!!

After 7 days at Tresillian, she started sleeping, and a week after we got home, she was consistently sleeping through the night, from 8pm to 4am-6am. And she also napped for 1.5 to 3 hours during the day. Ah, it was heaven~!~~!~ We also bought her the SafeTWrap, which is a long piece of material that is secured to the mattress and to secure her onto the mattress. She can still turn to her sides if she wished, but she couldn't move all over the bed, and couldn't get trapped under the covers, or between the railings. I slept a lot better after we got the SafeTWrap, knowing she is safe in the cot.

So, fast forwad to last month, My father decided he'd start nagging me about the wrapping and wanting me to stop wrapping her and securing her down with the safeTwrap. I thought, ok, it wasn't broken, she's sleeping great, and she liked the security of the wraps, everyone in the house is much happier because she was sleeping well, why change it? It's not like we wrap her very tight, it was so loose that she could get out of the wraps easily. And a lot of mornings, we did find her out of her wraps and waving her arms at us or clapping anyways. BUT NO, dad still nags and nags and nags.... it got so bad last week, every word he said to me was about removing the wraps and how I am harming the baby intentionally and stunting her development, hurting her bones etc. Way to go dad!

So, I got very fed up with the nagging and being told that I was the worst mother in the world. I decided to show him what it would've been like to totally unwrap her. Oh boy did she cry... Out fo the 24 hours that we totally unwrapped her, she slept for maybe max 8 hours in totally (that's less than half of her usual sleep!) She wouldn't nap at all during the day, and woke up every hour during the night again. It also wasn't the whining cry, it was screaming and startled sort of cry. She kept crying mama, mama... it was heart breaking! We also found her upside down in the bed, or on her tummy and couldn't get herself back over to her back...etc. Wasn't safe, and lucky I put the baby breathing and motion monitor back on so _I_ could get a little bit of sleep, otherwise I would've been worrying all night long. I was so tempted to wrap her again, but I didn't. I wanted to make sure dad cave first.

Well, he did. He's never very good with handling Kaitlyn's crying anyways. He asked us to re-wrap her after 24 hours of torture. Ok, I am fine with weaning her off the wrap that goes over her arms as I do agree that it is probably not great for her development to bend her arm all night. But the SafeTWrap was to keep her safe! It's not like she's held down in one single position all night, it's just to keep her from getting to her tummy or get hurt by the railings!

I put the SafeTWrap back on, and Yay, she slept! The 24 hours cold turkey no wrapping at all had weaned her off the arm wraps. As long as we tuck her in nice and snug, she would sleep. She loved playing with the covers with her arms. But she still needed the security of being held around the tummy. I know when she's ready, she will outgrow the SafeTWrap, but I also know that this is NOT the time yet.

I got very annoyed during the 24 hours of no sleep and baby crying. But I am also happy that she no longer needs her arms held down at all. I just wish though that my dad will realise that I was trying to do what's best for my child and know my child better than he does. But I know, that's too much to hope for...