wishin' and hopin'

Joseline is sleeping really well at night... she's just still 3 weeks old. I guess I shouldn't expect too much. For a 3 week old, she sleeps really well. My only complaint with all the sleep books I've been reading is that they all say that newborns can only handle being awake for about 2 hours at a time, then they need to sleep. Well, that's a bunch of bull, because for some reason, Joseline can handle being awake for 3-4 hours in the evening. Crying the whole time unless we're holding her and bouncing her and walking around. The surprising part to me is that she doesn't fall alseep, and if she DOES start to close her eyes, she wakes up right away. She won't even really sleep in our arms. 

During the day she follows the predicted pattern for newborns - awake for 1.5 - 2 hours, asleep for a few hours, up for a few hours, alseep for a few hours. So I just can't figure out why she won't fall asleep at night. Once she does fall asleep, she's out for good - all night long. The problem is she won't completely fall alseep until midnight. Which I guess is okay, but it's not like she'll let me do anything for the several hours she's awake (from about 8pm til midnight). She wants to be held and rocked - but sleep?! HA! Preposterous! (that's what's going through her head, I'm sure). She fights and fights and fights sleep at night. I can tell she needs to sleep - her eyelids are all droopy, her eyes roll back in her head, she's really mellow - but actually falling asleep is out of the question. I'm convinced that she's fighting sleep... but a 3 week old, fighting sleep? I know that can be normal once babies become more social around 6 weeks... maybe Joseline's just socially advanced?

We have a bedtime routine, I've tried keeping her up during the day (which just results in an overtired baby who won't sleep at night at all - I'm not doing that one again), I've tried making sure she doesn't nap for longer than about 2 hours at a time, she naps in a room with plenty of sunlight, but still calm and quiet so her nap sleep is good quality. She's well rested during the day (and in the morning, when she finally wakes up). I nurse her right before "bedtime" - by "bedtime" I mean the time at night (usually around 8:30-9pm) when I notice her drowsy signs and I start trying to soothe her to sleep. Yeah. It doesn't work. She doesn't fall asleep. Even if she falls alseep nursing, she won't stay asleep (and she's not used to nursing to fall asleep, because that's not how she falls alseep for naps... so it's not the whole "put baby down when drowsy but awake" thing, because she falls asleep fine for naps without nursing). 

I'm almost ready to resign myself to the fact that she will just be fussy at nights and go to bed a midnight (this has been basically what's happened ever since she was born). And then she'll sleep fine all night long (she'll sleep until 5 or 6am, and then go back to sleep until I wake her up at 8am). All the books I've read and all the advice I've seen says that babies just don't have the mental development to sleep correctly until they are six weeks old. So three more weeks of this, and then hopefully she'll start sleeping earlier.

I don't remember having problems with Vincente sleeping at night... but then, that was 2 years ago... you forget a lot that long. I know Vincente was sleeping through the night at 4 weeks. Ha, so I guess he didn't even start sleeping the 4-5 hour stretch at night until he was 4 weeks old. I guess Joseline's already working out better than that, so I shouldn't complain. And after that, we never had sleep problem with Vincente (until the nap problems that I've been solving recently - and those are all but history!).

I guess there is hope, and the end is in sight for the earlier bedtime for Joseline. If I can just hold on to what's left of my sanity for the next few weeks, I know things will get better.