If you tried EVERYTHING and then did CIO a ?

Annystazia

We have tried what I think is everything we can do to get my son to sleep on his own.  Drowsy but awake doesn't work for him because as soon as we lay him down he wakes up! He even wakes up if we put him down after he's just fallen asleep, when he's snoring, when he's dreaming, we've tried everything and nothing seems to be working!!!! So, if you did CIO how did you deal with the crying?? We tried the sleep lady shuffle and that's where you sit by the crib and pat them and sing to them and talk to them a little bit and she says if they are hysterical crying to pick them up and comfort them and put them back down when they've settled, BUT if they stop crying the minute you pick them up then try to leave them a bit longer the next time they are hysterical crying.  We tried this and I ended up hysterical crying because I couldn't leave him to cry by himself.  LOL!!! But, I don't know what else to do. So, how did you cope with your LO crying?

adamstodrake

The first night... I curled up in a ball on our bed and cried too. It sucked. But, it gets easier as they learn to fall asleep on thier own because at least you know the crying will end. When we really stick to it, he'll get ticked off and cry for a few minutes and then he's out. I know that he likely won't cry past a certain point and I can count down the minutes knowing that he'll be asleep soon. I still hate every single minute of waiting for that to happen, but I know he needs the sleep and me being in there and trying to comfort him without picking him up just makes him more upset.

If your DH is willing to do the check-ins, then go keep yourself busy. Do the dishes, take a shower, something with running water helps to keep my mind elsewhere. Otherwise I am listening for every single sound.

Annystazia

adamstodrake  How long have you been doing CIO?

Annystazia

Brandi Bee we do have a very good bedtime ritual and he knows that reading in the rocking chair is the last part of it because he gets all limp and relaxed! LOL!!! We rock him after that but the problem is. he's getting too big and he kicks whatever his feet are touching and keeps himself awake! He goes to bed at 7:30 - 8.

adamstodrake

We started it at about 8 1/2 months. It took about 5 nights of gradually less crying until he was STTN from 7:30p-6:30am. But.... then he started teething and his sleeping started to go downhill again. After those teeth broke through about a month ago we went back to Ferber and had about 3 nights of transitioning. Now that he is teething again, he sleeps from about 7:30pm-5:30am and may wake up once a night. We give him his paci and he goes back to sleep unless he is really hurting and needs some tylenol and snuggles. When he's teething, all bets are off and I just try to keep him comfortable.

Like BrandiBee said, you have to do what is comfortable for you and your LO. We made the decision to try Ferber after trying the NCSS and it didn't work after about a month. I read the book, and it gave me lots of info and the conviction that Ferber (with some modifications) could work for us. Instead of increasing the number of minutes every night, we would do every two nights. We also started with intervals of 1,3,5,7 minutes and capping out at 7 minutes the first two nights. Then did 3, 5, 7, 9 and capped out at 9 for two nights. The first time we started it took about 45 minutes of combined checks for him to fall asleep. I hated every minute of it, so I won't gloss over that. It was really hard. But rereading the scientific info helped me to know that Ethan was unable to sleep through his sleep cycles because he associated being rocked by me with sleeping.

Ferber put it like this, imagine going to sleep every night in your warm, comfy bed and waking up after an hour on the cold floor. Every time you wake up you can't figure out how you ended up on the floor again! DS learned that sleeping in his crib is comfy too. Now, I still nurse Ethan to sleep, so we start his checks if he wakes up when we put him down initially and during nighttime wakings. I can't keep him awake while nursing! Our trouble came with laying him down. We need to start working on naps because right now even though he does great at night, naps are non-existant if I am not holding him. I have yet to try Ferber with naps, but we need to!

sucrets4

We kept ourselves busy.  I also hid in our room with the tv on and door closed and told DH to come get me when the timer went off.  I cried as well.

I've found that at this age I can more easily tell between a real cry and a fake one.  Sometimes she cries a little bit when we put her in her crib, but if it's a fake one, I leave her.  I tell myself it's because she loves me so much and has so much fun with me that she doesn't want it to end.  :-)  With the fake one, she's usually out within a minute or so and it's more intermittent.

adamstodrake

Exactly. It is easier to do if you feel like you can control it. Well said!

sucrets4

I agree.  There have been nights when I just know something is up, so she comes into bed with us and we all sleep.  She's never had issues going back into her crib after getting over whatever was bugging her, although every baby is different.  But I think you need to read the book and learn what you can and make your own decisions with DH.  Make it work for you and your baby.

balibaby

How long have you been doing the shuffle for? After a very long first night, Oliver did much better the remaining nights. To be honest, I can't handle the crying either (at least in the same room, I can't look at him cry it breaks my heart). DH has to do the sleep training. I feel like it is fair since I was the one to get up and nurse him the first 6 months... DH can handle the tears in the same room. We also used the sleep lady shuffle for DD who coslept with us and had way more sleep issues. We tried CIO with her and Ferber and she was obviously traumatized by them, at around 4pm she would start clinging to me and look scared out of her mind (we did it at 17 months). I loved sleep lady for her because she was not traumatized in the same way and was her normal happy self during the day. I also like it for Oliver, because he wakes up totally happy like you never would have known he was crying to go to sleep, he doesn't seem effected on any sort of lasting basis. It is really hard though. For me, I can handle it easier in another room. I think it's easier with baby #2 as well, you just do what you have to do. I would do it now though (whatever you decide to do) b/c in my experience their sleep doesn't ever magically get better on their own. You have to be ready to do it though (or at least DH/SO does!)

loveyoubean

We let her go for 5 min. then 10 then 15, you get the idea.  She tired herself out eventually, but after like a week of that we had to let her go cold turkey.  She cried for 20 min. and feel asleep and repeated that for about3 nights.  She has been STTN ever since and going down for both naps and bedtime without a hitch!  How did I handle it?  Not well.  I cried at first and I caved a few times, but ultimately I told myself that I was doing it to be cruel, I was letting her sleep alone because it was the healthiest thing for her because she needed good sleep to be a happy, healthy baby.  You really just have to put on your game face... I also did laundry, ran on the treadmill, baked cookies... anything to distract me.  DH was supportive and handled the crying better than I did.  It was worth it for us!

Jessys_Girl

Annystazia:

Brandi Bee we do have a very good bedtime ritual and he knows that reading in the rocking chair is the last part of it because he gets all limp and relaxed! LOL!!! We rock him after that but the problem is. he's getting too big and he kicks whatever his feet are touching and keeps himself awake! He goes to bed at 7:30 - 8.

 My DD does this too!  What i've found is if I put her down IMMEDIATELY when she starts kicking her feet/trying to sit up in my arms it works.  Here's what we do:

Bedtime routine, last part is a bottle and rocking/singing.  When she finishes her bottle I USED to rock her some more, till she was mostly asleep.  Now though she kicks/squirms/pushes away from me, so I put her in the crib right away.  I turn on her seahorse (the light distracts her long enough for me to tuck her lovey in her arm and throw a blanket on her and leave the room.

She may cry for a minute or two when she realizes I'm leaving, but once the lights are out and i'm out of the room she settles down pretty quickly.

 The only reason this works is because my husband was laid off for 3 weeks and did CIO for every single nap (her naps were off because she wanted to stay up and play with Daddy).  The first few days she'd cry for 20-30 minutes (he'd go check on her every 5-10).  Then the next few days she'd cry for 15-25, and then it was 10-20, and then it was 5-15, and then it was 10 minutes.  And then 5, and then eventually it went to only fussing/crying as we're walking out of the room.

 I TOTALLY don't have the strength to listen to her cry, so it was great that my husband was able to do the CIO method while I was at work and I didn't really have to be involved LOL.  But the few times I've had to be there when we were letting her CIO i've just kept myself busy.  Or I'll set an egg timer and tell myself I can go check on her in X amount of minutes.  I also turn the monitor WAAAYYY down.  Everything is amplified over the monitor, so when she cries it sounds so much worse, but if I turn the volume way down to where I can just barely hear her, I can still listen for anything that may be wrong but it grates on the nerves much less.