Agh! My MIL is in town to visit LO and overall it's a huge help, BUT! She keeps insisting that we keep him awake for longer stretches to improve nighttime sleep. He's 3 mos old and I'm talking 2+ hours at a time. Any time I try to put him down for a nap she says "really?" Over and over And then asks him why his mommy is making him nap when he's not tired at all. Meanwhile his eyes are red, he's rubbing his ear and is a grumpy Gus.
Serenity now!
wonderful cherry / 21504 posts
You know, even if she wasn't wrong about this (which she is) he's your baby, you are the one who knows him best, and you're the mama so you do it your way!
It's one thing if you ask for advice but you seem to have this down!
(Side note, I wish I could get my baby to sleep every two hours. She didn't get the memo even though she has all the tired signs too. Work in progress).
GOLD / coconut / 8266 posts
Oh, MILs - they just know everything! 
I wish I could get R to sleep after an awake time of 2 hours all the time!
pomegranate / 3212 posts
Yeah, his night sleep has been horrendous and I'm trying everything. Right now I'm trying to really be on top of his sleep cues/put him down after an hour - hour and a half at the latest. At night he wakes up every 1-2 hours! Ugh. I'm open to almost all suggestions, but not ones that make him MORE tired!
honeydew / 7586 posts
@swedishfish: @Foodnerd81: Me too! B stays awake for 4-5 hours sometimes. Kid does not like to nap!
@knittylady: Big hugs. MILs can be such a pain in the patoot!
papaya / 10473 posts
Hugs! I have a bad sleeper too. Remind your MIL that sleep begets sleep! Good day sleep helps night sleep.
cantaloupe / 6017 posts
My MIL is great, but this is one area that drives me nuts. My husband was (is) a bad sleeper, and she talks about it all the time, but I'm beginning to think she just never put him to sleep. They babysat and kept my 4 month old awake for 6 hours. She was a zombie.
GOLD / pomelo / 5737 posts
Ugh! Will we really not remember this when we're in MIL's shoes? We got those same comments!
cantaloupe / 6692 posts
Willing you a lot of patience!! That frustrates me just reading about it!
pomelo / 5258 posts
When my MIL first came for a visit to meet LO she commented that I fed her too frequently. LO couldn't possibly be hungry as often as I fed her, she said. Then one night DH and I went out to dinner. Wouldn't you know, she called me 43 minutes into our date saying - surprise, surprise - LO was starving and I needed to come home right that minute. She hasn't questioned me since.
pomegranate / 3791 posts
I get this all the time too, and it's so freaking annoying! And it's hard because between his tired fussiness, L will appear to be super happy and awake...but that does NOT mean he doesn't really need a nap, it means he's having a brief second wind which will end in an epic meltdown if I don't get him to nap really soon! Yet I'm forever hearing, "He doesn't look tired now! You should be enjoying all the awake time you have with him!" Ughhh makes me want to scream.
Can your DH talk to her, since it's his mom? Even just a casual comment when she'd doing it? Something like, "Mom, knittylady has LO's tired signs down and we'll be in for an even worse night if we try to keep him up more during the day. Please stop giving us a hard time about it." And if she keeps pushing let her know that even the pediatrician and baby books say that better naps equals better nighttime sleep. I'd seriously be ready to bite her head off after a couple days of that.
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