? for those who did Ferber (and a shout out to *Hey_Jellisy*)

Artslvr

First off - thank you to Hey_Jellisy for loaning the Ferber book to me!  It was great timing, because DS had his six month appointment yesterday and the pedi says YES - green light to sleep train.  Not only that, she said that she has the exact same book in her house and used it for her son when he was in infant (he's now 2 1/2). 

OK - our situation is this - we will be doing a double task of not only following the chapter in the book that talks about waiting 5 mins., 10 mins., 15 mins., etc, and getting DS to fall asleep alone in his crib without all the holding/rocking we've been doing, but we're also following the other chapter in the book that talks about dropping night feedings.  Between reading those two chapters and talking to the pedi, we're trying to figure out how to do this.

DS takes a dream feed bottle around 10:30 pm.  Pedi says that bottle is OK if we want to continue with that.  It's the bottle we've been giving later in the night - usually around 3:00 am, that we need to cut out.  Pedi (and Ferber book) advised that the 3 am bottle is not nutritionally necessary and DS is developing a habit of asking for that 3 am bottle.  Not only that, he is likely eating less during the day because we're giving that bottle at night, which could account for his disinterest in solids. 

(Aside:  The disinterest in solids is kind of killing me because I still think if he ate more solids he would sleep longer at night.  Vicious cycle:  we feed him a 10:30 and 3 am bottle causing him to not eat much during the day, causing him to wake up at night, and on and on). 

So - at the 3 am waking, we can do one of two things. 

1)  We can either do the 5 min, 10 min, 15 min thing knowing that he doesn't need that bottle for survival.  We'd start this Friday to at least have some weekend nights be the hard nights.  Or...

2) We give him the bottle but with a decreased amount of formula.  Decrease the formula each night for a week until he gets no bottle, and then start the 5 min, 10 min, 15 min thing after the week is up.

Hard to decide.

If you've read this far - WWYD?

 

DCtoLowcountry

I would cut out the 3 am bottle cold turkey. We cut out night feedings at 6 months starting on a Friday night with pedi's OK, and he STTN Tuesday. I was worried about it since DS is in the lower percentiles, but he did increase his intake during the day so it stayed constant. GL and hope you're sleeping better soon!

Artslvr

DCtoLowcountry:

I would cut out the 3 am bottle cold turkey. We cut out night feedings at 6 months starting on a Friday night with pedi's OK, and he STTN Tuesday. I was worried about it since DS is in the lower percentiles, but he did increase his intake during the day so it stayed constant. GL and hope you're sleeping better soon!

Ah!  This kind of answer gives me hope.  Thanks for sharing!

tomandcourt

We did #2. We started dropping (I think we were up to 8oz at one point but started dropping at 5oz, an ounce a night). By the time we got to 3oz or so, he stopped waking up for a while - I think he realized it was kind of a waste.

Then, he did start waking back up again, and we tried doing the 3min/5min/10min thing. That made him SO MAD - he couldn't understand why we were coming in there and NOT feeding him. So we ended up going cold turkey in that sense - we just didn't go in at all, and eventually he stopped crying and went back to sleep. The first night it took about an hour (but we kept going in and riling him up), but the next few days it took less and less time and I'd say he stopped waking up at all in less than a week.

I didn't notice any impact on his daytime appetite, though.

emack

Fun times! At least there is a light at the end of the tunnel. I think A LOT depends on the baby's temperament.

For instance, we went straight to a bottle of water. She got annoyed quickly and stopped waking up to ask for it. That might make some babies so mad, though, that it makes things worse. Further, DH had to be the one to do it. If she saw me, she wanted milk. So, if one of you typically does the nighttime feeding, have the other person go in the room instead.

Also, for us, like TomandCourt, Ferber just made her mad. It was much harder for her to see us and it really dragged it out. We had to do the straight CIO which was harder for us, but it seemed to be the better choice for her because it caused less upset.

So, my advice is to try the things that make the most sense to you and then be flexible if your DS responds badly and then alter slightly as needed. Eventually, it will work and all three kids will sleep through the night!! 

Hey Jellisy

I'm watching this with great curiosity.  The pedi told me at DS's 4 month appt. I should be dropping some of his night feedings (he gets 2 but sometimes 3) but I really think he still needs them so I was going to wait till 6 months.  DD naturally dropped her feedings and slept through the night.  DS seems to want nothing to do with that.     

Artslvr

Hey Jellisy:

I'm watching this with great curiosity.  The pedi told me at DS's 4 month appt. I should be dropping some of his night feedings (he gets 2 but sometimes 3) but I really think he still needs them so I was going to wait till 6 months.  DD naturally dropped her feedings and slept through the night.  DS seems to want nothing to do with that.     

It feels strange, as both my girls dropped their night feedings and STTN on their own too - strange in that it feels like we're "forcing" DS to do it.  But I feel better doing it after reading the book and talking to the pedi.

LMH1209

We tried to do things gradually, starting with the chapter you mentioned that deals with night feedings, and it didn't go well. Things went better for Ferber round 2 when we did everything at once. (We waited until more like nine or ten months, though.) I agree that personality plays a huge role. DS is just not a moderation kind of guy

mssaint

Our pedi really encouraged us to drop his night feeding(s), too, at his 4-month appointment. But since there really is only one night feeding (most nights), I am going to keep it up until 6 months. He always eats a lot during that feeding and he tends to fall right back asleep now.

jess08200

emack:

For instance, we went straight to a bottle of water. She got annoyed quickly and stopped waking up to ask for it. That might make some babies so mad, though, that it makes things worse.

We did not Ferber, but to cut the 3 am feeding we did water as well.

he would take like two sips and fall right back to sleep.  I think he stopped waking up after a couple of days.

Sofka

I think you need to do 1 thing at a time and drop the night feedings 1st. Once that happens, he might STTN on his own and fall asleep on his own. If he doesn't, once the night feedings are gone, do the Ferber. I'd also advise to make up your own times,  With DS, we did 1, 2, 2, 3, 3, 4, 5 the 1st night and just gradually increased it for 2nd, 3rd etc. It took us FOUR f-ing WEEKS (after about 2 weeks, we stopped going in completely) and it's not 100% (he was up at 4:40 this morning). With DD it took less than a week. She was 9.5mo, he was close to 11mo.

remember, he may cry for a whole sleep cycle, which is 90mins, which is normal, just horrible for you!

 

Baby4OT

emack:

Also, for us, like TomandCourt, Ferber just made her mad. It was much harder for her to see us and it really dragged it out. We had to do the straight CIO which was harder for us, but it seemed to be the better choice for her because it caused less upset.

So, my advice is to try the things that make the most sense to you and then be flexible if your DS responds badly and then alter slightly as needed. Eventually, it will work and all three kids will sleep through the night!! 

I agree with this when we used Ferber for DD1. Us going in every so often made me feel like a better parent because I wasn't just ignoring her, but she responded so much worse when we went in and didn't pick her up - back rubs, calming voice, etc did NOT matter to her. She wanted to be picked up and held and nothing else mattered. We ended up making up our own timeframes, but they were longer and we listened very closely to the types of crying. If crying was decreasing (but she was still crying) we still wouldn't go in because it would just start her up in hysterics again.

Ferber didn't work AT ALL for DD2. I hope it works for you! It took about a week with DD1 (she was 9 months old at the time) and it sucked at the time but things went SO well once we got through that week of hell.