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Toddlers: 12 - 24 Months
MPSW
member
Botched Ferber? (Long, but please help!)
MPSW
member
Background: DD sttn at 10wks by herself, and never looked back. We never sleep trained since she went down and stayed down thru the night.
Current problem: We have always rocked DD down for her naps. It became more and more of a crutch, and since she slept so well at night, we just kept up the bad habits. Now, she's giving us a tough time and often doesn't let us rock her down. Plus, she's turning 1 and we feel that it's time for her to be able to put herself down.
This weekend, she was a real challenge for both naps on both days. On Saturday, I tried for 30+ mins to rock her to sleep. Both days, I ended up just putting her into her crib. She cried for less than 10 mins and fell asleep both times.
Today, when I sensed she was going to challenge the rocking, I put her straight down. The first nap she fell asleep in 9 mins. The second, 6 mins.
SO ... here are my questions:
- Since she falls asleep before the 1st 10min. check-in, she doesn't get the "reassurance" that everything is okay. So we go through the crying fit each time. However, if I go in earlier than 10 mins, I think it will rile her up more. Thoughts?
- DD has become very clingy and needy since we started doing this. This is not her normal behavior at all. For example: won't let me put her down, won't take a bottle from anyone but me, cries everytime I leave the room (during waking hours), generally melancholy. Did you experience this w/ LO when ferberizing?
Thanks for reading this far. Any tips/ideas/help is much appreciated.
This discussion has been closed.
Re: Botched Ferber? (Long, but please help!)
I wouldnt go in, if she is falling asleep on her own, in 9 and 6 min, she is fine.
as far as the clingy, really, she is used to lots of cuddle time, and she isnt getting it... I think she needs extra love and reassurance at other times, like during the bottle, to adjust for the loss of rocking at naptime. It will work out fine, I think!
When I did Ferber at 8mos old I made my checkins super short (2mins). I wanted Alaina to KNOW that I was coming back for as long as it took and also that I wasn't going to be staying and soothing her for her anymore. I thought of it as as much practice learning the new "rules" in as short amt of time as possible.
I don't think you bothched it at all starting at 10mins. I think that YOU may feel better if maybe you would start lower next time so you give her a chance to know you haven't "abandoned" her in any way. She may not NEED that but if you are happy, you are more likely to be consisten kwim?
I think you're successful if she's falling asleep crying less each time.
However, Ferber starts at 3 minute increments, not 10. The book says, 3, 5, 10 minutes and then every 10 minutes after that until they fall asleep, so in your first question, she would have been "reassured" twice it Ferber was followed correctly.