- My twin boys had trouble sleeping and nothing worked, so we decided to try sleep school.
- Despite sleep schools touting a 99% success rate, they failed at three facilities.
I had always planned on having just one child — a plan that swiftly ended when our obstetrician told us to expect "double the joy" at our 12-week scan. There was no history of twins in the family, so it came as quite a surprise and meant we would quickly go from a family of two to four.
My wife and I always knew that being first-time parents would be hard, but that's perhaps especially true when you're having twins. To prepare for the arrival of two babies, I bought a variety of books on parenting. The most common advice was to get babies into a predictable routine from day one. We soon found this was easier said than done.
The first several months, it was impossible for any of us to sleep
Our baby boys, Charlie and Thomas, were born a month early and had a few initial health problems. They spent a week in the hospital getting extra care before we were allowed to take them home.
Thankfully, they were deemed healthy enough to leave the hospital after seven days. The next few months flew by in a sleep-deprived blur for all four of us. We could never get either of them to settle down, and it seemed that one of them was always crying. Whenever Charlie fell asleep, Thomas would cry and wake him up — or vice versa. We were prepared for this to last a few weeks, as it does with many newborns, but it continued for several months.
Our nights were constantly disrupted, and we never managed to get more than an hour or two of uninterrupted sleep. As there were often two screaming babies, my wife and I would both have to get up, meaning neither of us ever got to rest fully.
To compound matters, I had started a new job, and the lack of sleep made it hard to settle in. I had gone my entire 32 years of life without ever having coffee but soon became a caffeine addict to get through the workday and stress of a new job.
We kept hearing the same advice over and over about the importance of routine
The advice of setting up a strict routine kept pouring in from friends and families, as well as from books we were reading. We were told to set one up and maintain it, no matter what. My wife and I were given books that were said to be "foolproof," but this made us more frustrated — and feel like fools — as nothing worked.
Amazon is full of baby-routine books, and I felt as though we read them all. Most made it sound like babies needed to enroll in some form of military for newborns. Unfortunately, Charlie and Thomas were not old enough to read the same sleep books as mom and dad did and did not want to follow a set sleep schedule.
Along with advice about setting routines, we heard all the well-meaning platitudes most parents hear — like, "It will get better." But to tired parents who were barely functioning, phrases like those made us feel like failures.
One cold winter day at 3 a.m., I was walking two crying babies in a stroller around the neighborhood when I realized we had to try something radical or my wife and I would collapse. I started googling for sleep solutions and discovered there were facilities known as sleep schools.
We decided to give sleep school a go
We researched sleep schools in our city and learned all we could, as we had never heard about them. Basically, sleep schools offer programs providing intensive support and care for families experiencing difficulties getting their babies or infants to sleep. Most are live-in programs that run for about a week.
My wife and I decided to try one that was recommended by our pediatrician. Thankfully, the cost was covered by our health insurance, which saved us several thousand dollars. In our orientation, we were told the program had a 99% success rate, giving us the biggest smiles we had had in months. The definition of success varied, but we agreed with the team it would mean achieving a settled routine that allowed the boys to sleep through the night at least half the time.
My wife spent five days and nights living at the facility full time. She enjoyed having more support with the children, as well as three meals a day provided for her. I would visit before and after work and attend the evening classes before returning home late at night.
There were sessions with qualified pediatricians, nurses, sleep specialists, and psychologists. They ran a lot of tests, and the boys wore wires at night to monitor their sleep patterns. I had hoped the boys would toss their nightcaps in the air at a graduation ceremony. Unfortunately, nothing the experts had tried was working, and little had changed after the week was over. Charlie and Thomas still refused to sleep.
3 strikes, and we were out of sleep schools
Our pediatrician said we should try again and recommended another sleep school. This time, our insurance wouldn't cover it all, and we had to pay half of the $3,000 price tag. It was expensive, but for us, the idea of getting a good night's sleep was priceless. However, we were let down again — and then once more.
The three schools each had different methods and programs, but none of them worked. The biggest disappointment was that none of the specialists across the three schools could pinpoint why the boys weren't sleeping. Even separating the boys for a night or two into different rooms within the sleep school didn't work.
Whether they were together or apart, they both refused to sleep. I guess a 99% success rate still means 1% fail, and we happened to have two babies who fell into that small margin three times.
By this time, Charlie and Thomas were almost 18 months old and still unable to sleep through the night. When people asked how I felt during this period, I told them it felt like I was permanently jet-lagged. I had a foggy brain, was constantly tired, never seemed to know what time it was, and felt irritable.
I wondered whether I would ever get a good night's sleep again. To me, "sleeping like a baby" meant fitful bursts of rest followed by loud crying and tears.
We decided to forget all the advice we'd heard and throw our schedules out the window
The last resort was to ditch the advice of every book and expert. Instead, we would implement the "no-routine routine." Charlie and Thomas didn't need to be on the same schedule or even follow a schedule at all.
When one of them was tired, he would go to bed — no matter the time. They would eat whenever they were hungry and play at the time that suited them.
We stopped trying to fit them into our schedule. Everyone told us we were out of our minds to let them dictate our lives — but the truth was they already were. If a routine works "99% of the time," it doesn't work 1% of the time. So we changed our mindsets and let the boys tell us what worked best for them.
It took some time, but this was the solution that worked. After 18 months of listening to advice from so many people, we discovered there were only two people we should have listened to — Charlie and Thomas. Without a schedule, the boys' sleep improved, and by the time they were 2 years old, they started sleeping through the night. I held a little graduation ceremony for them.
People constantly told me that it would get better. While it took months longer than I'd hoped, eventually, it did. Best of all, I now get my revenge on Charlie and Thomas. It has taken me 16 years, but it has been worth the wait.
Now the boys are 16, and like many teenagers, they like to sleep — perhaps even more than I'd prefer. On days they don't have school, they stay in bed until midday. But this is where, after many years, I get my revenge.
On these days, I am up early, making as much noise as possible. Sometimes I will go into their bedrooms and open their curtains. Often, I will walk in and sing. The joy I get from waking them up now almost makes up for all those lost hours of sleep.
Now if I could just kick the caffeine addiction they gave me.