Annie IS.NOT.SLEEPING. We get perhaps 2 hours at a time and that is it. We have tried to ferber and a plethora of other things (swaddle, no swaddle, white noise, music, consistant bedtime routine, cereal in ther bottle, you name it) and nothing is helping. I asked the doctor and was just told to ferber. Yeah, they didn't hear me when I said it DIDN"T WORK.
Has anyone used a method other then ferber or cio. Neither are working for us and we are all exhausted including Annie and I don't want this to start affecting her development.
I though sophia was a crappy sleeper but she didn't hold a candle to Annie.
Re: sleep help
(sorry this is a book)
I can completely sympathize, my pedi kept saying the same thing, let DD CIO. It doesn't freaking work! And like your DD she woke up every 2hours, if I was lucky to have her go that long. I was lucky to get 4-5 hours of sleep over an entire night, but I never got more than an hour in one stretch.
Not to be pessimistic, but DD just was not ready to sleep until 13 months after every kind of sleep training we tried, and we even threw cosleeping in there. She just did not sleep, woke up every 1 1/2 hrs (or less) all.night.long and required me to sleep in the recliner b/c she hated our bed and woke up just as much. I really hope this is not the case for you, but no amount of sleep training will work until your child is ready.
What worked for us at 13 months was starting with the Sleep Lady Shuffle. If you google it it is a mix of NCSS and CIO, a good middle ground that taught DD how to lay down on her own and go to sleep with us there. Once I knew she could at least lay down on her own, we progressed to mild Ferber, 2-3 min crying not letting her get worked up, and 2-3 minutes of soothing from us but not picking up. When we did the Ferber at 13 months I knew immediately that she was ready because it wasn't the panicked screeching crying, she was fussing but not panicked.
I honestly hope you find something that works, I dread having another child as much as I want one because of how our first year went with sleep (and DD still wakes 2-3 times a night but we get her down in a bout 30 minutes each time.) Unfortunately they forget to tell you that there are those kids that sleep from birth, and then those of us with kids who just do not sleep for anything and we're left to fend for ourselves.
ETA: added SLS link.