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Georgia Babies
kbowman78
member
Scared to death of "CIO"
kbowman78
member
At Cason's 4 month visit today, pedi. made it very clear that we need to get out of our bad sleep habits, which I already knew. Cason will not nap longer than 45 minutes and absolutely will not go to sleep for naps or bedtime without being rocked. He often falls asleep while nursing, which she says is bad. She did tell us to go ahead and swaddle him for his naps, which we haven't been doing. We had only been swaddling him at night, thinking it was too much to swaddle for naps, too.
She said the faster we teach him to go to sleep on his own, the better, but I'm so not looking forward to letting him cry. I have tried a couple times and given in. The last time I tried, he cried 15 minutes and worked himself into such a frenzy, when I finally picked him up, he spit up everywhere. Can you girls give me some "CIO" success stories so I'll get pumped up for this?
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Re: Scared to death of "CIO"
No CIO success stories here. I often give in to Ava crying b/c I feel so bad. I know I am not helping her. I have always nursed her to sleep and now this is a huge problem. I am not sure what I am going to do when she turns a year old and I begin to wean her. Wish I would have started sooner with the CIO. Good for you for starting at 4 months and good luck!! Stay strong!
Frankly, I'm surprised your pedi would tell you you can't rock him to sleep. I rocked my daughter to sleep until she was a little over a year old. I don't think theres anything wrong with it, as long as you are ok with being the only person who can ever put your baby to bed.
That said, there's no reason you can't start CIO now. Read Healthy Sleep Habits, Happy Child by Dr. Marc Weissbluth. I did that method at 10 months and wished I had done it sooner. More-so because she was refusing to nap. I still rocked her to sleep.
The first night will be the hardest thing you ever do. But after that it gets much easier.
Abigail Taylor 09.18.2008
I agree with the pedi- swaddling at naps worked wonders for us. I don't know why I got it in my head that he should only be swaddled a night, but when we started doing it for naps it totally changed the sleep dynamic for him. He ended up being swaddled for almost 7 mos and just outgrew it on his own. No intervention necessary. As for CIO, I never did it until after 12 mos b/c I just couldn't handle it and Gavin was always pretty good sleeper. But what I did have to do was to establish a very strict routine for naps/bedtime and STICK TO IT. In fact, we still stick to the same basic structure and it works great. Consistency is key. Also, for right now, don't feel bad about letting him sleep in a swing or bouncy. Some babies just need that- Gavin slept great in his crib at night, but daycare had to let him sleep in the bouncy until he was almost 9 mos old! But whatever works! Hang in there!!!
I second nearly all of what SLW said--only part I can't agree with is the good sleeper part, because HC wasn't for a loooong time!
I tried modified CIO around 8-9 months, but I have to say I can't stomach hearing my daughter cry and resisting going in to comfort her. At this young of an age, babies have NO clue why their caregiver isn't helping them feel better, right? SLW mentioned sticking to a routine; ITA with that. Even at 4 months, you can establish a loose bedtime routine of your choosing and figure out what works for your family best, and it'll absolutely help get Cason anticipating bedtime. Swaddling is also great for added security and comfort, but I'm sure you already know that!
The EASY routine seemed to help HC learn to go to sleep without needing my help, after a bit of adjusting. It's something like Eat, Active/Activity, Sleep, You Time--not sure about the last one but basically you get them into a routine where they eat immediately upon waking, not immediately before sleeping. Then you play a bit, then try to get them to go to sleep, etc.
In my opinion, if you don't want to CIO, just don't do it. I think 4 months is really on the young side, too; most books that advocate it say firmly not to even start until after 6 months, I'm pretty sure. And HC did the 30 minute nap stunt for MONTHS--it's all part of their brand-spanking-new sleep cycle as they become less nocturnal. Good luck and post as often as you need to for support and help; we're all here for you!
We survived CIO and we started at 5 months (pedi said G. was ready). Geneva's been sleeping 12 hours a night since. No lie. She would wake for one feed around 3-4 a.m. but stopped that at 11 months. I liked a modified version of Dr. Ferber's Plan. There's no abandonment, no freaking out until vomit, just a schedule you can hold to. First night, we waited, 2 minutes, then 5, 5, 5 and 5 until she went to sleep. Second night, we waited 5 minutes, then 10, 10, 10. You get the picture. Everytime we went in, we didn't pick her up, nor did we linger longer than 30 seconds. We shhhh, shhh'ed her, gave her her binky, and left the room. There were certainly times where I thought I would die listening to her cry, but it passes!
I wanna say it took around a week or so for her to get it. We occasionally have regressions (when ill or teething), but I am SO thankful we did it so early. We literally lay her in her bed at bedtime and she doesn't so much as make a peep. She goes straight to sleep and wakes up one happy girl in the a.m. It also worked for naps. Once she got the nighttime stuff figured out, naps quickly followed.
With that said, 4 months seems a little early, but your pedi may have been speaking more to you constantly holding baby instead of letting the baby figure the self-soothing thing out on its own.
It's not going to work until you believe you're doing what is best for your baby. If you're scared to death and feel pressured by your pedi then I say don't do it until you find something that you are comfortable with. Google the basics of a couple of different sleep plans, Ferber, the one Michelle mentioned, Happiest baby on the block, etc. Feber worked for us in less than a week. I never let her cry the full amount of suggested time though, I went in and soothed after no more than 10 mins until she was asleep. I will say once we started with it my #1 motivation in not giving in and picking her up was that if you do that, all you're teaching them is that if they cry long enough you'll pick them up instead of learning to stop crying and drift off to sleep. Good luck with whatever you decide!
No CIO here...when we were pumped to do it, she slept through the night, figures. I will say SC has never been a good napper and I nursed her to sleep for the longest time and you know she turned out ok - I really liked the bonding we did at bedtime. My pedi told me some kids are great nappers and some are not.....now SC did do great at sleeping at night so I can't totally complain. Try not to be intimidated, just do what you need to do. Remember all kids are different and the successful Ferber CIO method many of my friends used includes comforting your child that you will be there for them...of course you just spread it out as time goes by. I know I am no doctor and don't want to say your pediatrician is wrong, but they are only little for such a short time, I don't see why people think its a crime to rock them to sleep or nurse them to sleep. Its not like your son is 5 and needs to be rocked to sleep...our pedi told me not to even think about CIO until after 4 months, so its not like you have been neglectful or a "bad" parent.
OK, book over. Good luck.....just be consistant with whatever you need to do. If you aren't ready, you don't have to rush into it yet...give it a couple weeks or a month.
I also was again CIO until we tried it ourself and saw how well it worked. Ethan was an ok sleeper and then started regressing around 4-5 months. I was going out of my mind getting up with him all night and knew we had to do something. I got to a point where I felt like it was best for him and that I was no longer helping. I think that's what helped. I wanted it for him too- for him to have a full night of sleep uninterrupted and without huge wet diapers because he was eating all night. I did similar to Amanda. I used our video monitor with the volume turned down. If you decide to do it, you just need to stick to it. If you let him cry for 15 minutes and go in, you're going to "train" or teach him to cry for that long and then you'll get him. Going back in to retuck or console didn't work for Ethan. I think you just have to figure out what works for your baby. For us, it just made him that much angrier so we just left him alone. It was hard but he cried about 45 the first night and then only 5-10 the second. Of all the sleep books, I really liked Healthy Sleep Habits Happy Child. Lots to read through but very good and just made so much sense to me. If you think rocking is not bothering his sleep, then go ahead and rock. If you think it is, then don't. For example, we wondered if paci was interrupting his sleep because he was waking when it fell out. I also wondered the same about nursing (when he woke I was gone). Many books I read say that whatever conditions your baby goes to sleep under should be the same then as they will be when he wakes up. If you were asleep and someone took your pillow out from under you, you'd wake up and be like WTH?! Same with baby. So we tried to make everything the same as it would be when he woke. He was putting himself to sleep without me so he didn't need me to put himself back to sleep at night. Waking up at night is totally normal, your baby just has to learn how to self sooth and put themselves back to sleep. Do you have a crib soother? That really helped Ethan. I was shocked at how quickly he learned to reach over and turn it on. I didn't mind him using it because it was all him and he controlled whether he wanted it or not. Anyway, when I was desperate and sleep deprived I read a ton of books on CIO and sleep, so interesting. Good luck! You can do it. Let us know how it goes whatever you decide.
I'm on board with Julie. Doodle was a horrible sleeper. She didn't sttn until around 10 months old. She slept fairly well in the swing at that early of an age...but never slept longer than 2-4 hours at a time. I was at my wits end. At 10 months I bought ferber, borrowed the baby whisperer and read about Healthy sleep habits. I tried my own way of all of them for "CIO" pretty much followed a routine fairly consistently, bath bottle book bed pretty much all the time. WOuld leave her and then let her cry for a while (5-10 mins) and go in check on her leave again for longer (10-15) increasing it each time. She's honestly still not a great sleeper, but she does pretty much sleep about 10 hours a night (at 3 1/2 years old). I swear she doesn't require a lot of sleep.
Anyways, my point is...now with baby #2...you'd think I'd be all for CIO sooner to get him going better. He's a much better sleeper in general, great at naps. However, the time with his being my baby is going by so quickly. I treasure the night times when I go in and cuddle him and hold him and nurse and rock him to sleep. I've been doing going on about 11 months now and he's really only waking up 1 or 2 times a night. I wait a few mins after I wake up (so woh knows how long he's really been crying) and go in, check on him, hold him, nurse him if needed and he's usually asleep in less than 15 minutes for the rest of the night. On nights when it's really bad, he pretty much crying even while I'm holding him...so I evenutally just say sorry baby i you just have to figure it out yourself and I go back to my room after trying the usual stuff and fall back to sleep.
Enjoy your baby because they are not babies for long. good habits are of course good to have, but I personally don't think there is anything wrong with rocking/holding;/cuddling your 4 months baby to sleep. You'll know when you've reached your breaking point of sleep deprivation...then YOU will be ready to try anything and everything. :-)
We did CIO with Mason at 4.5 months. He seemed ready and pedi said it was okay. I was really ready for him to sleep more but it also terrified me that I was scarring him and didn't know it. It worked fantastic and he was STTN within 3 days. For most of the first year he would cry when we put him in his crib for bed or afternoon nap. It never lasted more than 5 minutes and usually only until you left the room. Sometimes between 12 and 24 months I would hear him cry and I would go into comfort him. I would pick him up and rock him but he always would cry that he wanted to go back to bed. So maybe CIO made him a little too adicted to the bed
We are now in the process of doing it with our second. He is a little bit harder because we can lay him down perfectly awake at the start of the night and he will go right to sleep. But then he wakes up in the middle of the night, which is so much harder for me to hear him cry then. He is also more of a moaner, so I feel like he lasts longer. This is the fourth night in and we are almost there. Cried maybe 10 minutes last night.
So that is two success stories for you. I do agree with PP though that you need to do it when you are ready or it is not worth it. Just keep in mind that after 9 or 10 months it can get harder, then they can stand up and really let it out. But even then, if it is the right time for you than it will be the best thing for your family. Also, I would definitely start it with bedtime. Naps seem like an easier time, but from reading these boards and my experience it seems to be where everyone has the most difficult time.
We don't do CIO. Babies change so much, I don't really understand the whole "if you don't do it NOW you'll regret it LATER" thing. What do they do at 4mo that they are still doing at a year? Besides, IMO they are just communicating their needs to you. A want = a need at that age.
If you choose to CIO, do it on your own terms and something you are comfortable doing. But don't feel pressured. Your baby's sleep patterns are frankly none of your pediatrician's business. If rocking/nursing him works for your family, don't feel bad about doing that.
Joseph Henry was born at home on March 9, 2009
Nora Mae was born at home on October 30, 2011