Let's use this thread for all things sleep training!
Need some advice on sleep training? Want to start sleep training and could use some encouragement? Post here!
Those of you who have already tried sleep training or plan to do so, please post your stories here and/or your progress!
Re: The official sleep training thread!
I definitely get where you're coming from! I've read all kinds of articles that are similar and also many from the other side of the argument.
And I definitely am NOT in the camp that babies don't need to wake to feed at night. My DD is breastfed so I'm even more convinced that if she's hungry, I'm going to feed her!
My big thing is, I just need to try and get some relief. I want to at least give it a try. If it fails miserably, we'll just keep doing what we're doing and make it work all the while being sleep deprived. But I just can't NOT try something.
I'm defs interested to see how this thread plays out too. I'm sure we'll have some success stories and some not-so-success stories!
Fingers crossed that those who try some sort of sleep training are successful!
Last night I watched her on the monitor, she would cry out and then watch the door to see if anyone would come. Little stinker.
After the grunting or fussing for 30-45 minutes, does he eventually put himself to sleep?
And I hate to ask such a basic question, but maybe he has a dirty diaper in those cases?
I have a 1%er so I don't foresee knocking out any feedings for quite some time but if/when I do, I plan on using Ferber again.
One thing I did do is introduce a lovey since he doesn't take a pacifier. I gave him an Aden and Anais security blanket (not big like the swaddle ones, just a small light square one he can hold). He uses it to fall asleep - he likes it near his face. For naps I usually let him keep it the whole time since I can watch on the monitor and at night I take it away from him before I go to bed because even though it's light, I don't want to take any chances while I'm sleeping and not watching. It's only been a couple weeks and I can tell it's already become a bit of a comfort item for him when he goes in to sleep.
Okay, this is going to be long.
Since sleep training, my LO STTN with very rare exceptions. And when he does wake up, he is literally wake for 30 seconds.
Let me start by saying that I am sure that part/ most of this is luck and has nothing to do with what I actually did.
Before my H and I decided to sleep sleep training we got the okay from his ped. A few pieces of infomation: LO is 6 months already. LO never used a paci because he never liked them, he now rolls both ways, he was past the 4 month sleep regression, and when he was waking up in the MOTN I was able to get him back to bed without food.
I used to rock him to bed in a pitch black room, until he was completely to sleep. That was the first thing we changed. We started to leave the door open a bit and put him in his crib when his eye lids were getting heavy.
The second thing we did was let him cry. I let him cry for a few minutes, then I went in and rubbed his belly, "shhhh-ed" him and left again. While I was in his room (maybe one minute max) he calmed down and started to smile. So I left again. I repeated this after another 5-7 minutes.
The first night he was asleep in less than 20 minutes. He woke up once, I went to him immediately. Rubbed him belly and he was back asleep in 3 minutes.
Second night he was sleep in 15 minutes. Woke up once in the MOTN. He was stuck on his belly in a weird position, so I flipped him over and he was asleep immediately.
He has fallen asleep faster and faster since then. We average 3-5 minutes now. I have also worked with our nanny to make sure she is following the same methods for naps. He sleeps almost exactly 12 hours every night.
I dont know why, but I am handling the crying at night better then my H. So I make him either walk the dog or take a shower so he cant hear the cries. It has helped, otherwise H would be running into the nursery every 20 seconds.
I dont know if we did anything special, but it worked for us.
I dont why but I cant edit my post. I should add that we picked a week when we knew we would be home every night so H and I would be the ones putting LO to sleep.
She wakes up around 5 and I nurse her back to sleep and then go to work and my DH gets her to my mom.
Granted this is all after I let her cry one night. Which was horrible, but I am grateful that she has learned to soothe herself back to sleep and she's still the same happy smiling baby she was before.
This. I learned a lot from DS. With him, bedtime could last 2 hours because he didn't go down awake. I let DD fuss/cry for a max of 15 or so minutes. If she is wailing, then I go immediately because she is most likely in distress or very hungry. However, usually she goes back to sleep. Sleep training doesn't necessarily mean starve your baby all night. It means breaking sleep associations so they learn to fall asleep on their own. DD still gets fed about once a night between 3-5 AM. These past few nights she's been up 2-3 times, but she's cutting a top tooth. I always put her down awake and not drowsy, either.
There's definitely more to it, but I also had them come to our house for an in home consultation (shower gift from SIL).
Same general bedtime routine from day one
Same routine for every night waking (only hallway light, no talking, just change and feed...with some snuggles thrown in, of course)
Always put to bed awake
Allow some time before going to him for a night feed, in case he will fall back asleep on his own.
After the first two weeks, always in his own crib.
Maybe I've just been lucky, but we haven't had to deal with many regressions or needing crying it out with being consistent on those things.
This was an interesting read about sleep cycles. I could never put my baby to bed at 5:30, but it does sound similar to what we have been doing.
The only thing I haven't tried just yet is how they describe bedtime. For months we've been doing bath, lotion, bottle, bed. So she's basically being fed to sleep. I'd like to try to do as they describe in the article with bottle, then bath, book, bed. But what we've been doing for the most part has been working.
For naps we do a diaper change, book, and hen bed and it has been working so maybe over the weekend I'll try the order mentioned in the article for bedtime as well.
Either way I felt it was worth the read.
The one thing I learned was, I was sure as shit that I was the reason my first slept so well, so early. We can set up a good environment and consistency, but high maintenence babies will continue to be high maintenence no matter what you do.
https://www.psychologytoday.com/blog/moral-landscapes/201304/understanding-and-helping-toddler-sleep-preparing-success?#_=_