Why at Night?

 

When I got pregnant I expected that I would have many sleepless nights. I thought it would be because my baby would want to eat frequently. But that is not the case for Fiona. Fiona really only wakes up once per night to eat and when she first came home I had to wake her up to eat. The reason that I don’t sleep much is not because of hunger or fussiness, it’s because she is so grunty and the only way to get her to sleep peacefully is to let her sleep on me or John.

Fiona, like 80% of all preemies, has acid reflux. It’s pretty mild right now, but causes her to grunt, groan, strain, cough, gurgle, spit, and make choking and throat clearing noises all night long. But that’s the thing, it only happens at night and only when she lies in her crib or bassinet. During the day she can sleep in either place and is so quiet I have to put my head right next to her to hear her breath. At night, she sounds like an asthmatic smoker. She gets more and more uncomfortable, arches her back, grimaces, until she finally wakes up with a wail and starts crying. If I hold her on me, she sleeps soundly.

It doesn’t matter if she breastfeeds or drinks breast milk from a bottle. It doesn’t matter how much she eats or how long we hold her upright after she eats (usually up to an hour). She might spit up or not. It doesn’t matter what time she eats exactly, except if it’s after 4, she might be ok, but after 10 or 11, forget it.

I just don’t understand what the difference is between eating at 7am or 11am and eating at 11pm. Why does she only make these noises at night? And for that matter, why do all babies have such issues with nighttime? Colicky babies are usually only colicky at night, fussy babies are fussier at night, and you never hear mothers complain that their babies wanted to eat every hour during the day, only at night.

If anyone has a theory, please share.