Naps in the crib = such a struggle

erinb49

My little girl goes to a nanny share twice a week and needs to nap in a crib there. At home, I stick to the same schedule, but she just hates going in the crib for naps. I have black out shades, swaddle (arms out) noise machine and I rock her, quiet play for 30 mins before nap but she just cries and cries. I can't take it. So I end up picking her up and nursing her 80% of the time. I can seriously count on 2 hands the number of times she has actually fallen asleep in the crib. I give the crying about 10-15 minutes but that's all I can take. My nanny says I'm teaching her that if she cries hard enough she'll get picked up (probably true). She says LO needs consistency. I don't want her to have to cry it out at the nanny, but I don't think I can bear letting her cry it out with me. Ugh! Any advice?

myjessesgirl

It is so hard to hear those cries! Is your house well insulated and do you rely on a monitor? We can barely hear our daughter without her monitor, so what I do is turn it off, set a timer for 15 minutes, and busy myself with dishes or other chores around the house. Then I turn the monitor back on and she's usually asleep. (It sounds like you may need to repeat the process or set a longer timer) I started doing this pretty early on (maybe around 3 months), so it may take longer for your daughter to catch on that you aren't going to come in. After a couple weeks, with your nanny reinforcing it as well, she should go down without a fight. Good luck!