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November 2011 Moms
raepny2
member
Sleep Training: Thoughts and Questions
raepny2
member
Now that it's almost time for my summer vacation, I really want to buckle down and try to work on DS's sleeping habits. I can't complain too much because his night time sleep goes *generally* well (except this past week because of his two bottom teeth! ugh!). But his naps are a disaster and most nights getting him to wind down to sleep is always a gamble if it will be easy or hard. I read the Sleepeasy Solution and am now reading Healthy Sleep Habits, Happy Child and I have to say I'm getting more and more anxiety about this.
Not sure I like HSHHC so far. I'm a bit put off by things he writes:
"If your child does not learn to sleep well, he may become an incurable adult insomniac, chronically disabled from sleepiness and dependent on sleeping pills."
"Later, I will explain how these fatigues, fussy brats are also more likely to become fat kids."
I know that sleep is important and lack of sleep can cause many problems, but I really don't need to hear that if I don't work it out I'm going to have an obese addict with ADHD time and again. I have enough worries on my plate without adding those to the mix.
Now some questions:
1. I put DS to sleep on his back. Most of the time when he crys early in the night, it's because he's flipped to his tummy. People who let their child cry it out, do you just let them cry on their tummies? He hates it and I usually go in and flip him back and often have to rock him to calm him back down. What should I do instead?
2. How many of you have weaned completely at night? How have you done that? What do you do when you've stopped giving the breast or bottle and your child is still waking up?
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Re: Sleep Training: Thoughts and Questions
1. I put DS to sleep on his back. Most of the time when he crys early in the night, it's because he's flipped to his tummy. People who let their child cry it out, do you just let them cry on their tummies? He hates it and I usually go in and flip him back and often have to rock him to calm him back down. What should I do instead? We did Ferber so I would only go in when it was time to and if she was on her tummy I'd flip her because she also hates it but I would just flip her and then rub her tummy/head for a minute or so.
I don't have any advice for number two because DD never woke in the middle of the night to eat.
We just went through this for the second time with DD. We had tried at 4m and it worked a little but it was still rough and then we just gave up and went back to bedsharring. We did it again a little after 6m and it worked great. By the fourth or fifth night (I really can't remember) she didn't cry at all just rolled to her side and went right to sleep. I started with just nights and then did it with naps too on the third day. I didn't want to overwhelm her by doing them at the same time and I also didn't want her to be overtired for nights. She still cries sometimes for naps but never for more than 5 minutes.
We went from one sometimes two 20-30 minute naps to three 1.5-2 hour naps. And from me spending 2-3 hours getting her down for the night and 5+ wake-ups in the those first few hours (from the time I put her to bed to the time we went to bed) to just laying her down and her going right to sleep and sleeping 12+ hours with no wake-ups.
I never read HSHHC, so I found those quotes pretty amusing!
Anyhow, to answer your questions:
DS always cries when he flips to his tummy. However, if I leave him be, he usually calms down within 5-10 minutes and then falls asleep on his tummy (and that's how he'll sleep for many more hours). So I think he's startled at first, but then realizes he kind of likes it!
If I go in to DS when he cries, there is absolutely NO calming him down unless I nurse him. 5 of out 7 nights I nurse him once a night (usually around 3:30am), and the other 2 nights he'll STTN. Because there is no way to calm him without nursing him on those nights, I tend to think that he might really be hungry or thirsty, and I just don't have to heart to deny him because he's a pretty dang good sleeper otherwise.
MMC 3.30.16
We did a modified Ferber method and it worked great with DD. And it REALLY helped her naps.
Re: tummy sleeping... Does your LO wake up in the morning on his tummy or back? We had the same problem with DD while we were doing sleep training BUT she was always waking up in the morning on her tummy so we knew that she could (preferred?) sleep on her tummy. So while I was convinced she was crying because she flipped herself over and was on her tummy and couldn't fall asleep that way, DH thought she was flipping onto her tummy and then crying b/c she knew we would come in (almost immediately) and flip her back over. (Also, she didn't stop crying when we flipped her AND most of the time she would IMMEDIATELY flip herself back on her tummy.) So I think she was flipping on her tummy b/c she prefers her tummy and crying b/c either (a) she knew we would come flip her or (b) b/c she had trouble falling asleep on her own (or maybe a combo of (a) and (b)) - but NOT because she didn't want to be on her tummy.
FWIW, once we started leaving her on her tummy, she started falling asleep very quickly in about 2 (maybe 3?) days.We still put her to sleep on her back. Most nights she flips over pretty quickly (no tears!) and some nights she stays on her back for quite a while. But she's almost always on her tummy when she wakes up.
I think mine does this too. Ever since he started rolling at night, he'll often wake up with a little shriek and then sob for a minute or two. But then a lot of the time he calms down and ends up sleeping on his tummy the rest of the night.
We also did a "modified" Ferber and took the principles of Healthy Sleep Habits and did this around 6.5 months. We had a lot of luck with that and for the most part. FWIW, DS was not really a bad sleeper/napper per se. Two things messed up his sleep though- traveling (which destroyed his habits) and the paci. We used these techniques to get him back on track and to wean him from the paci.
To answer your questions 1) When we were doing the so-called CIO (I hate that term btw, I think it poorly describes the true technique), we would put him down on his back and if he flipped to his belly, we left him like that. Now, he sleep only on his side or his belly, so we put him down on his belly because that's how he's most comfortable. 2) We've weaned completely. DS hasn't woke for a feeding since he was 8 weeks old. He was just waking because of his paci falling out. He would wake up so much in the middle of the night and want it and thus, not sleeping well. Since we got rid of the paci, he sleeps SOOOOO much better. This includes naps! .