bee74

Hi I work from home as well but sadly can't be in my pjs as I see clients. I find it quite isolating, but also extremely convenient. Except that if the kids are in the other room crying or playing it can be very distracting! How about meeting up?! Bee

there is no parking around the Crooked Well, so take the bus. It is toddler friendly and open to anyone. B

I am interested in the sleep seminar and have a very large sitting room, so I would be happy to host. I am also going to be at the Crooked Well this or next Friday to answer questions related to psychotherapy and yoga for children and parents. I will be there with a homeopath Paula Webb as part of the Nest team - www.nestlondon.com Check the Crooked Well website to check if it is this or next Friday. Hope to catch up soon.

Anna, i m interested too. Thank you

thanks everyone. It is interesting to see how different all chidlren are as if we needed reminding! I am hopefull that our nights whicih have been totally exhausting (I feel your pain sunbob) with wakings every 20-40 minutes due to pain, will be over soon once the little girl starts on solids and her reflux is gone. Then i will try to have some sort of routine like Pickle suggests. Which i had with my son and he is now a wonderful sleeper - although as with Belle it was more luck than organisation. This time, instead, i think i will need to be more organised to teach her to be a good sleeper.

oh, i hate you Pickle ;-) how about day naps?

My little girl has had reflux since birth and nights have been horrendous with, at the moment, still not much improvement. For the life of me, I just cannot remember how nights were with my son (maybe it is a defence mechanism which kicks in once you start thinking of having another...) So I wonder what other people's nights are/were like with a 6 month old to get a sense of what is normal and what i should aim for / apire to once she gets a bit better... Thank you

I can agree with Anna. I have not managed one meet up. Partly because I need to pick up my son from nursery at 3 so 2 is not possible and partly because my new baby has been so sick that I haven't had energy to! But I would like to go on mailing list, in case I manage to get organised!

saffron - thank you for the advice. i see what you are saying but i think it's more mechanical with me in the sense that my body has been pushed completely out of rhythm (by a reflux baby who has a vert disturbed sleep) that it needs 'resetting' or re-learning that it can do something i.e. sleep. i am neither worried (i don't even lie there worrying about bills or the meaning of life or whatever else) nor particularly stressed about anything - apart from being concerned about the baby's health, of course. i think pn depression or anxiety is very different. i m not even low in mood, although of course i have understandable moments of 'despair' when i ask myself how long this baby is going to be unwell... acupuncture might be a good idea tho. melbnourne groover - i m going to the health shop tomorrow to buy passiflora tincture too!

3.20 at hambledon wing 3rd floor?

yes, that is a good idea : putting the kids in the same room and i will at some stage, when baby is healthier. but it is not feasable for us at the moment. first because my partner sleeps in the same room as our boy and so did i till the baby came along. we like sleeping all together and it was not such a big deal in terms of waking up for me as time went on. in fact, my son's breathing when asleep is a ressuring white noise that helps me sleep. not so my partner's loud snoring! second because the baby doesn't just wake up for a feed, she wakes up in pain so she needs her tummy rubbed or being picked up - and that's not a sort of compaling noise. it is a pain cry for help, which obviously needs attending to now she also cries for losing the dummy (the damned thing!) which i have to put back in. i used the dummy for a brief time for my son too, but he rarely did this and found his thumb pretty early on. so really i couldn't face going up and down the stairs every 20 minutes in throught the night - 9.30 till 5.30! i would then just shoot myself ;-) pebbles - thanks for the recharging phone info. i won't do that again! as for zopiclone the pharmacist confirmed what you said but only if i take it for max 3 nights and the doc said i should take it for 5. tomorrow the baby is being reassed by the peadiatrician at king's so i will double check. thanks

oh, it did make me laugh! so true. thank you bumpy. X

hello, thank you all for sharing tips. i don't have particular worries that keep me awake at night, except of course the baby sleeping next to me. i don't nap in the day and don't read or watch tv in bed. i have never drank tea nor coffee and now i have even stopped having a glass of wine in the evening, replaced by chamomile. i don't eat too late (max 8 pm) and tend to go to bed around 10, except last night i tried going at 8.30 but was awake till 11.30 then got up the baby cries every 20 minutes and that's what wakes me up but i would like to be able to fall asleep and go back to sleep once woken, that would be great. gp today prescribed zopiclone which she wants me to take for 5 nights in a row, but said i can's use it while breastfeedign and not sure i can go 5 days without breastfeeding the baby esp since she has reflux and formula is not ideal. anyone else was breastfeeding while taking them? gp also referred me to sleep clinic. will keep you posted. btw what's wrong with clock watching and rechargind mobile by bed?

thanks for the tip about the Maudsley. I will ask my GP as I m seeing her tomorrow morning. I was thinking of asking for sedatives as I thought i might just need my sleep 'reset' as it were... I guess you tried that.

I used to be a great sleeper. I have been known to fall asleep on the back of a motorbike and in a garage while a metal band was practising! After my first child, i started sleeping lighter, listening consciously or not to his noises so that i could be alert if he needed me. That never went away. Now i have a baby whose nigt sleep is brutal. She has reflux and I have also introduced the dymmy and that the nights have become worse and worse rather than better as she has just turned 4 months. She now regularly wakes between every hour and every 20 minutes every night. I am desperate for sleep and incredibly tired. YET when i get an opportunity to sleep - i.e. when she is asleep for an hour or when exhausted she collapses for an hour and a half at 5 am i cannot fall alseep! Last night my partner took pity on me and offered to do the night. I spent 4 hours trying to fall alseep and then woke up myself every half hour or an hour till eventually I went back to the baby as there seemed to be no point in neither myself or my partner not having any sleep. I found him snoring with the baby asleep. He told me she had woken up several times but he had given her the dummy each time and both had gone back to sleep - just like that! I can only dream (if only!) of that happening to me! I have booked an appointment with my GP as now I have come to the conclusion that I have a sleep problem... Has this happened to you too? And what have you found useful? Thank you

great ideas. no, nothing wrong with fairy dresses, just wanted more suggestions. thank you all. and i like the idea of props too! quite excited about looking for stuff on ebay and carboots now. and if any of you have anything to sell that your kids have outgrown, please get in touch.

I have a boy who enjoys dressing up at his girlfriends' houses (he likes a fairy dress with wings in particular) but I have not yet got him any... Any suggestions? PS he doesn't watch tv so any tv characters are lost on him. Thank you

i've been using one for almost 10 years - changed to different size after kids, and love it, never had problems

i so feel your pain. my daughter is just getting better at 3 1/2 months, but still not our of the woods. in the end, i took her to italy as peds at kings' didn't seem very helpful. in italy they took her off the med she was on (prescribed here) and put her on gaviscon, except it comes in a syrup, easy to administer and it worked well. they also said reflux aggravates wind, so they gave me some herbal remedy for it. get in touch if you want the italian gaviscon. she also slept in a hard carrier (the one to take toddlers hiking) for almost 2 months so i didn't have to hold her constantly in the night. good luck and i hope it gets better soon.

It is on tonight at 5.50 on Channel 4 and I wonder if at 3 hour long and quiete violent is still suitable for a 3 year old? So far it has not seen anything longer than an hour and 15 minutes on two occasions - Whinnie the Pooh and Bambi... What do you think?

We've been to Gran Canaria. We want somewhere with nice beaches, not tacky and some interesting green nature for walks. Too much to ask? We have 4 month old and 3 year old with us.. Thanks

i was told today that it wasn't going to re-open. I will ask again next week.

Do you remember how great it was? And that when they shut down the centre for refurb they promised it would open again?Well, it hasn't opened again and it looks like it won't. So I am wondering if anyone would be interested in putting a letter together with signatures to pressure the Council to open the Tiny Gym once more - there is lots of space available? Thank you

Hi Polly, M does the same. I've never been worried about it - well, not till I saw your post! He is 3 and one month now and his nappies are FULL in the morning but has been potty trained since he was 18 months. I don't make a big fuss about it apart from joking when he wakes up with a bum twice the size he went to bed with. He knows he should go more often during the day and he does go at nursery. I think with M it is because he is so busy during the day he doesn't want to stop whatever it is he is doing. Good luck with it.

Littlemoo, I agree - afternoon with older ones are better for me too. Shamefully, unlike what i did with my first, I am avoiding all baby related activities when I am with her only, and prefer to stay home to catch up with chores, do yoga, read, etc. Although I am going to the cinema again on Thur! Laura - huge congratulations! B