More on sleeptraining/Daycare

cannonbride · July 2009

Please help!! Our LO will be starting in-home daycare in a month, and I am torn as to what to do about the napping situation- he falls asleep easily just when we hold or rock him, then I usually lay him down in the crib. Our daycare provider strongly encourages crying to sleep, but I just can't let him do that for more than a couple minutes. Is it fair to ask her to hold him until he falls asleep, even though there are five other children there? I wish I would have addressed this with her on our interviews before he was born, but I didn't think of questions like this at that time! Thanks for all of your advice!

duchess0727 · July 2009

It is fair to ask her to hold him until he falls asleep. A lot of daycare providers will do this (ours did). However if there are other kids there and she gets pulled away, there is a good possibility he's going to spend some time crying (especially now that you know she is ok with this). I think it will be easier on everyone if you try to get him to learn to sleep without being rocked. Some kids outgrow it but most eventually have to be sleep trained and from experience, I can say that it is a heck of a lot easier at 3 or 4 months than it is at 9 months - 1 year. We originally swaddled our son and rocked him to sleep but realized this was a bad idea so at about 3 months, we tried letting him cry. The most he cried was 20 minutes the first night and after that, it was 5 minutes for 2 or 3 days and that was it - he stopped crying after that except when he was sick or teething.

jenuine · July 2009

Personally, I'd be looking for a new day care. I wouldn't want my LO to witness other kids CIO. You need to be on the same page is child rearing as your DCP. I'd start questioning her other philosophies. How does she react to biting? Discipline? I'd re-interview her and look elsewhere if she won't raise your child the way you would if you were home. I know it's hard with other kids to keep an eye on, but you need to do what's best for your child, not your DCP.

Our DCP worked with our DD to help her to get to sleep on her own, just as we did at home, by rubbing her back, quietly taking to her, picking her up if necessary. DD didn't go to sleep on her own until she was a year. I think 9 months is a bit young for that, but I also don't believe in CIO.

You still have a month to try to help him learn to sleep on his own. Have you read "The No Cry Sleep Solution?" It has some great ideas as does the Baby Whisperer. Good luck!

Edited to say: Yikes! He's THREE months old. Most peditricians won't encourage CIO until 6 months. I'd talk with more people about CIO and the long term damage it can do at a young age before you do that.

cannonbride · July 2009

duchess0727:
It is fair to ask her to hold him until he falls asleep. A lot of daycare providers will do this (ours did). However if there are other kids there and she gets pulled away, there is a good possibility he's going to spend some time crying (especially now that you know she is ok with this). I think it will be easier on everyone if you try to get him to learn to sleep without being rocked. Some kids outgrow it but most eventually have to be sleep trained and from experience, I can say that it is a heck of a lot easier at 3 or 4 months than it is at 9 months - 1 year. We originally swaddled our son and rocked him to sleep but realized this was a bad idea so at about 3 months, we tried letting him cry. The most he cried was 20 minutes the first night and after that, it was 5 minutes for 2 or 3 days and that was it - he stopped crying after that except when he was sick or teething.

Thanks for the advice! Do you think 3 months is a good time to start? Do you put your LO down fussy but awake? We've done that and sometimes he falls asleep after 2 seconds of crying, but sometimes we've tried to wait it out and 10 minutes is about all I can do without running upstairs and picking him up! Do you do this with naps and at bedtime?

March2004bride · July 2009

Please, please, please do not sleep train so early! Your baby isn't even 3 months old yet! The youngest any book recommends sleep training is 4 months. You could try lying the baby down "drowsy, but awake", but do not let them fuss.

Try reading the No-Cry Sleep solution. Your baby won't be able to completely fall asleep on their own, but it shoudl help. She has an area specifically for Newborns - 4 months old.

EveryNameIWantIsTaken · July 2009

We had this situation with our origional DCP. Guess what? Since then we have switched. She was the one there, and she believed in CIO. He would come home and you could tell he spent a good part of the day crying. Needless to say, after discussing this with her, and her saying he was just "fussing" (sorry, he wasn't just fussing the time I picked him up and she had him in the swing trying to shove a pacifier in his mouth so she could watch Dr. Phil) we switched him. Now he is happy, so I think it might be worth looking into somewhere else because they are the one with the child all day, they will do what they want if the feel like it.

flyer23 · July 2009

We were in a similar situation... nanny share, not in-home daycare, but same basic idea that our provider believed in CIO and it was hard to ask her to spend literally 30-45 mins getting DD down for a (30-minute) nap when she had two other kids to worry about. Also, my daughter was a little older, about 5 months old.

I didn't believe in CIO at all. And I worked from home and could hear everything going on. It was miserable.

But I have to say, it worked out wonderfully. Before, my daughter wouldn't nap well and was SO cranky by the end of the day. After about a week or so of CIO, she started putting herself to sleep with no crying, AND she napped much better and longer. She was so much better rested. It also helped ME a ton, because it was much easier to get her down for the night (it used to take up to 1-2 hours!) and for naps on weekends. She had also started waking up at night again (after STTN for months) and that just stopped -- I think learning how to self-soothe at naptime helped her know how to self-soothe when she woke up in the middle of the night, too.

All of the "bad" emotional stuff you hear about CIO never happened... she's now two, she's a very happy little girl, she's a great sleeper who goes down with no fuss, she never had attachment issues with her nanny or with DH or me, etc. etc.

Sometimes, my child care providers take an approach to caring for DD that I never would take on my own -- this was one of those times. But I do my best to choose good providers and trust that even if they don't do things exactly like I would, they'll do what's best for DD.

That said... I agree with pp's that 3 months is too young to CIO. I'd suggest talking to your provider and noting that most sleep experts agree that you have to wait until at least 4 months of age. If she won't budge, then I would at least look at other providers.

Don't feel bad about not thinking about this question ahead of time. I didn't, either. It's just one of those things.

cannonbride · July 2009

Thank you all so much - I think I know what I need to do!

duchess0727 · July 2009

We did very low key sleep training, which meant exactly what you said cannonbride, we would wrap him up and soothe him so he wasn't crying or fussing when we put him down, but he was awake. Then once he realized he wasn't being rocked, he would cry for a few minutes. If it continued for more than a few minutes, we'd go pick him up again and soothe him then put him down awake again. We did this until he got used to putting himself to sleep. People can say it's mean to sleep train but I think it's meaner not to try to teach your children how to sleep on their own so they never sleep through the night. My kids are great sleepers and my son is one of the happiest, most well-adjusted kids because he gets a lot of sleep.

Having said that, I personally would be nervous about one provider watching six kids, unless I was confident the other kids were very independent and didn't require the provider's constant attention.

vanillacourage · July 2009

Your baby is 3 months old. There is consensus among pediatricians and child development experts that most babies don't even have the capacity to self-soothe (and thus put themselves to sleep consistently) until 4 months old. Letting your 3 month old cry for 20+ minutes is just horribly wrong in my book.

I have no issues with sleep training when the baby is 6 months+, but if your DCP is telling you they cannot give your baby the time he/she needs at 3 months old, get a new DCP. I would have my doubts about one person watching 6 kids anyway.

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