If you don't CIO

UnofficiallyLO · December 2014

what do you do when baby wakes? Be it from a too short nap or MOTN, etc. I have no issues with CIO and have only started to let him cry a bit as of last night but I'm curious if those who do not currently CIO have great miracle sleepers so it doesn't matter or don't mind assisting them thru every freaking sleep cycle (as I'm currently doing, can you tell)?
I know it's been awhile since there was a sleep question, eh?!
Some background we've gone from bedsharing to pnp in our room to pnp in his room and now crib in his room, he wakes every few hours and eventually ends up back in bed with us.

UnofficiallyLO · December 2014

We definitely created a skin to skin craving, comfort nursing sleep monster and he doesn't take a paci

( I didn't mind him in our bed when he was smaller but he kicks, turns sideways, and has fallen out once and I felt like an asshole and moved him out the next day lol at least I'm not alone, thanks for that!

allyandmike24 · December 2014

LO only wakes to nurse, around 4:30 or 5am, so DH brings her into bed and I nurse her back to sleep. She goes back down for another few hours.

The only time she is up more often than that is when she's sick and I usually end up bringing her into bed with us in that case.

Jbeuerle · December 2014

I've tried to let her CIO but we can't do it. We moved in October so we delayed moving her to her crib, she's still in a pnp in our closet (size of a small bedroom and has window, heated and air conditioned) it's easier since her room is on the other side of the house and she still wakes up once or twice. All we do is give her her binky, her lamb stuffed animal that she cuddles with and put the light blanket back on her if we need to. No talking, only shooshing noises. If she's really not falling back asleep we change diaper and give a small bottle, then back to bed.

Dahlia414 · December 2014

I nurse him back to sleep (we cosleep). If he is waking frequently because of teething, I pat his back until he falls asleep. Don't worry, you aren't creating monsters. As they get older, they get better and better at sleeping alone. DS1 slept in our bed, then crib in our room, then in his own room (not until almost 2). Now if he wakes up in the night, DH just puts him back in bed and he is fine.

porterlove525 · December 2014

@AprilMay9‌, I do the exact same, literally, so add me to the monster club as well.

My LO has NEVER slept more than a few hours a day and has screamed from 10pm-6am since birth. He goes to bed drowsy and sleeps 2-3hrs, but then is up the rest of the night. I can count on one hand the nights I've had 4hrs of sleep and that wasn't even consecutive. CIO doesn't work for us because he already screams for hours and doesn't fall asleep. I have just learned to deal with spending my nights rocking my child while he screams. In my mind, it's all about survival. Baby and mama need to sleep and whatever works to accomplish that is a win!

AmberLiz99 · December 2014

I haven't done CIO with roger kid. I've never rocked them to sleep, so they got used to falling asleep on their own. When thy fuss or wake up in the night I go in and replace paci or lovey, if that doesn't work I pat their back. Next I'll try picking up till they calm down, and put them back in the crib. Repeat till thy fall asleep. Dd has been much easier with it compared to my son, but it's worked great for both

katy4128 · December 2014

I am in the creating a monster club too. LO goes to sleep great in his crib in his room. Once he wakes up though he screams until we pick him up. He will go back to sleep but if we put him back in his crib the crying begins again. So he comes in bed with DH and I and sleeps like a champ until 830. Oh well..

BuggasMom · December 2014

I have never CIO with any of my kids. It's not for me. I always keep the room dark, no talking I walk in and gently rub there back and offer the paci. and rub a small lovey blanket on their face and back of neck. Most of the time this works within minutes . If they are really upset I pick up baby in the dark still no talking and rock them back to sleep . And put them back in their crib.

MissWhis · December 2014

Well, we don't have a crib set up. We have her room baby-proofed and she sleeps on a queen mattress on the floor. I put her down in there (snuggle/nursing to sleep) at bedtime and she sleeps alone until her first MOTN wake up after I go to bed. After that I go in and bed share with her. She's up anywhere from 3 to eight million times a night and has usually wanted to nurse back to sleep for all of those.

Just the past week she has started wanting to go to sleep without nursing. She still wants me there with her, but if she's not hungry she turns her back to me and fusses until she dozes off. Last night she was up around six times, I think, and nursed about half of them which is huge for us!

It is hard sometimes, but I know she will sleep on her own someday and I'll miss all those cuddles!

Twirple · December 2014

CIO didn't work for DS. We ended up attempting different versions of it 5 separate times, and it would work for no more than a week before we would have to do it again. It was just easier to go nurse him back to sleep.

I am blessed in that DD is pretty much a miracle sleeper. She usually sleeps from 9 p.m. until 7 a.m. The last week she has been waking up at night to nurse once, and I'll do that and she goes right back to sleep. I'm pretty sure it has corresponded with her getting more active and, therefore, more distract-able. She nurses during the day, just to the point of not being hungry any more, before she wants to look around and play. Then she is making up for it at night.

JWest07 · December 2014

Katy0525 said:
I am in the creating a monster club too. LO goes to sleep great in his crib in his room. Once he wakes up though he screams until we pick him up. He will go back to sleep but if we put him back in his crib the crying begins again. So he comes in bed with DH and I and sleeps like a champ until 830. Oh well..

This. Yeah. Ugh. I love bed sharing, but I would like it to be a couple hours total, not from 9pm through to morning wake up.

cjpell0 · December 2014

We did a little CIO/pick up put down method when DS was 6.5 weeks which has helped a little bit but generally any MOTN wake ups are full on melt downs, whimpers are not in this kids vocabulary.

For MOTN wake ups, I just go in and nurse him back to sleep. It's generally 2-3 times a night and he's back down within 15-20 minutes.

He won't nap unless he's in our arms or in a car seat. This generally works out ok since we're always on the go. He naps fine at daycare.

livin541 · December 2014

On this topic, we bedshare and have since about 4 months. It has worked great for us, but for the last couple weeks he seriously squirms and tosses and turns all night long! We have a king size bed and he still manages to push SO and I all the way to the edge. Besides making it nearly impossible to sleep, I'm worried something he is eating might be bothering him? Or is this just normal behavior at this age? Any other bedsharing mamas experience this? He also "sleep crawls" which I'm worried could get dangerous!

Serenla · December 2014

I've also created a monster @aprilmay9 and @porterlove525 Finn wakes up and the only thing to get him down again is a boob. He takes naps w/o nursing but at night he just wants me.

UnofficiallyLO · December 2014

Thanks for your responses, I feel much better about my sleep monster now. I only have a few friends with young kids and they CIO so I don't get much advice otherwise or commiseration.

SoulTermination · December 2014

I blame DH for the fact that we have to bedshare, but I'm getting a little payback in that he has to sleep on our loveseat for it to work. XD

chichi589 · December 2014

We don't do CIO. It didn't work for us. I do let him whine but it doesn't usually help much at all. When he wakes up at night he usually gets a bottle and we pat his back to sleep. Sometimes he falls asleep on his own but it's getting more and more rare. I blamed it on nursing before but now it's habit and its total survival mode. I work 40 hrs a week and is rather not fight him to stay in his own bed. If I stay awake I move him in his own bed but that doesn't happen often.

Jodash24 · December 2014

I wish I could cio, lo freaks when he wakes, arches his back screams, gets himself so worked up he could even end up being sick, and this is only in a short space of time (less than 5 mins) also I don't want to disturb ds1, he comes in with us for the Motn feed then goes back in his crib, if he's fussy we try to make shh noises and cuddle him in until he goes back

MissWhis · December 2014

Serenla said:
I've also created a monster @aprilmay9 and @porterlove525 Finn wakes up and the only thing to get him down again is a boob. He takes naps w/o nursing but at night he just wants me.

That's the thing I struggle most with - once she's in bed, she only wants mom. The rest of the day she thinks Dad is wonderful, but if he tries to go in to soothe her at night she flips out and gets MAD. It would just be so nice to get a break from one of her wake ups so I could actually get a decent stretch of sleep.

Jodash24 · December 2014

MissWhis said:

Serenla said:
I've also created a monster @aprilmay9 and @porterlove525 Finn wakes up and the only thing to get him down again is a boob. He takes naps w/o nursing but at night he just wants me.
That's the thing I struggle most with - once she's in bed, she only wants mom. The rest of the day she thinks Dad is wonderful, but if he tries to go in to soothe her at night she flips out and gets MAD. It would just be so nice to get a break from one of her wake ups so I could actually get a decent stretch of sleep.

Same here, lo is dad all day but mum at night, dad can't seem to get him to sleep so it's always on me

bpatrick0809 · December 2014

Thank goodness we have a great sleeper. He sleeps from 7:00/7:30 till 5:30-6 with no wake ups. Even for some odd reason he does i just stick the paci back in his mouth. We have never rocked, patted or shushed.. Always just put him to bed with a paci lovey and a light blanket and he has slept through the night since he was 8 weeks

nicole mackenzie · December 2014

I know it's a saying... But are they really monsters?

We've been bed sharing since we got home from the hospital. Bed and box spring on the floor. Maybe 40 inches up. Wood floor.

I think it's helped with my anxiety...

She used to sleep some in her pnp next to us which was nice. Well the pnp is packed somewhere and we finally got our bed frame... Putting our bed WAY off the wood floor. She fell off once before... Don't really want that to happen again...

We just got her crib so the last few nights we've tried that in her own room. Ugh it hurts my heart. She starts screaming as soon as you start to lower her in.

We nurse, shush, sing. If that doesn't work I hold her, maybe nurse the second side and repeat.

After an hour I picked her up once she calmed down and wer'ee back in bed... Where she screamed the entire time I brushed my teeth.

I say bedsharing is still working for us so we'll take it very slowly. I love my little monster

csmily51 · December 2014

Dd, has slept well since birth, except during growth spurts/leaps. We nursed exclusively until 4 months then half and half until 6, then I quit nursing/pumping. She slept through the night in her rnp, and when we sitched to thr crob her sleep got kind of wonky. She goes to sleep, and wakes 1 to 2 times per night, I give her a 2 Oz bottle, and she goes right back to sleep. She was diagnosed with Febrile seizures a few weeks ago, so now I check her out and rub her head etc to check temp. She's startin to sleep through the n if ht again, 3 out of 7 nights this past week!

nycgirlkat · January 2015

My LO has had a changing pattern since birth.

I've got a nap monster!!! She will only nap in her carriage in the kitchen with the microwave fan on!!!! Freak!!!! And I've tried it all, put her in the Mamaroo, put her in the RnP, put her in the PnP, up in her room in the crib, white noise, no white noise, pacifier, lovey, etc.....and she is a major cat napper so we deal with that too.

As far as night time sleep.....We can't co-sleep because my husband snores like a chainsaw and he wakes DD up. We started off with she & I in her room (me on the pullout and her in the RnP, then bassinet). She was a decent sleeper at night until 3 or 4 months and then started getting up a lot at night, at this point she started sleeping in her crib in her room and I slept in our room with a monitor because I was going back to work. Then at 5 months she went to sleeping through the night to 6-7 months HELL...was up constantly at night no matter what we did. Maybe about a week before she turned 8 months she went back to sleeping through the night and has been doing so for a few weeks.

I bottle fed and rocked her to sleep until about 6.5 months. From there I stopped bottle feeding to sleep because I think she was overfull and it was hindering her ability to fall asleep on her own. Now she plays with her toys after dinner, gets a bath every other night, gets PJs, snuggle with daddy on the couch and then I take her up to her room and we read a book, say goodnight to the lights and sometimes I rock her, but most of the time she just wants to go in the crib (she's a belly sleeper).

When I asked my pediatrician at 6 months if we could CIO because I was that miserable from all the night wakings he said she was still too young and to wait until 8 or 9 months. And so far she has been doing much better with falling asleep on her own by herself.

Suzanne237 · January 2015

@mborn24‌ my LO too. Hubby lays him back down and he goes right back to sleep. - i haven't tried in a while but if it's me he wants boobie so hubby goes in. We been doing that for a month now so maybe we could/should try letting him lay down himself to see of he would. At first he didn't know how to get back down. But now we know he can cause he does all day by himself. But it really only takes like 2 min when hubby lays him back down so if it ain't broke....

Suzanne237 · January 2015

@mborn24‌ Zac haaaated being on his back but in the last month he's mellowed and is on being put on his back and he rolls if he wants instead of flailing like why did you do this to me!? We laid he down onto his side now he's ok with back. - We just tried tonight when the dog barked and woke him up. We let him cry/fuss and hoped maybe he'd sit himself down but he just fussed for 10 min so hub just went in laid him down and he was back out. I donno.

Nxy · January 2015

Now that she can sit down on her own I tend to just leave her until she cries. I am however having issues with her waking up every hour and a half like clockwork unless she is in bed with me. It's been going on for weeks now and I'm just out of things to try. She just can't seem to fall back asleep after each sleep cycle and it's really wearing me down

cnbean · January 2015

We didn't use CIO with either boys, but we did use the sleep training from the Baby Whisperer. I felt like that was a method that I could handle. We had to do more if it with DS1, but this LO we started from the beginning using the advise from this book and he is usually a pretty good sleeper ( a lot of that is just him not anything I did right!). But neither of my boys ever had a huge problem with going back to sleep in the middle of the night. We make sure to keep it dark and calm to help. Every once in a while LO will wake up and think its party time, we usually just let him hang out in his crib until he goes back to sleep. If he gets fussy we will pick up and soothe etc.

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