Stud Muffin and I are desperate to find a way to help our cupcake sleep through the night, but honestly even more importantly than that, we would love for her to be able to go fall asleep with out us having to swaddle or bounce her. I believe that if she can fall asleep on her own in the first place, the issue of her waking up in the night will also be resolved. I say that because if she wakes up in the night and she is able to fall back asleep on her own then she won't fuss and wake us up in need of our assistance. {If she wakes up because she is hungry, that is a whole-nother story and I am happy to feed my baby.}
It seems that the hardest part lately is that starting at 6 weeks, cupcake was 'sleeping through the night' {10 pm - 7ish am} with out a peep! She did this for a month or two and then, probably due to a growth spurt, she would wake up maybe once or twice to eat. BUT she would go right back to sleep after nursing or drinking a bottle... These last couple of nights, she is wide awake after finishing a bottle. It takes at least 20-30 min to get her back to sleep, depending on how much she fights it.
My husband and I are both opposed to the idea of letting our baby cry it out {CIO}. I won't take the time to get into all the details of why {but I would be happy to explain it to anyone interested :D}. But I will say that falling asleep is something that is learned, just like being potty trained. Would you 'ignore' your toddler, when they are trying to learn how to go potty in a toilet, with the attitude 'they just need to figure it out or they will never learn!' {Doubt it!}
We did some looking and found this book 'The No-Cry Sleep Solution' and we are in the beginning stages:
Right now we are taking a log of her current sleep schedule {or lack there of!} broken down in to her nap times, pre-bedtime routine and her actual night time sleep.
After we get an idea of where we are at then we will read on in the book to start trying different techniques, eventually getting her to be able to fall asleep on her own. Every 10 days we will do the log again to see how we are progressing and adjust as necessary.
The woman who wrote the book has 4 children of her own and developed these techniques with her own children, as well as with a group of 60 moms desperate for a solution that didn't involve letting their child CIO.
I plan to post our progress and hope to be able to report positively :) Thanks for the support from all of you who love cupcake as much as we do!
Your prayers would be heartily accepted :D
2 comments:
I understand completely and you are all in my thoughts. Having a routine has saved my life! For both naps and bedtime the kids know exactly what is next and I think it's the sole reason as to why they all STTN and go down without a fuss.
I do have to add, never say never on CIO. I never thought I would do it, swore up and down that I couldn't but when your 3rd kiddo (who co-sleeps in your room) at 9 months old suddenly decides to start waking 6+ times a night just to play, you may change your mind ;)
Good luck!
Thanks for your encouragement! We are definitely on our way to getting a routine, the hardest part for me is that I don't even like them for myself :p But I know that babies and kids in general need one. I'll be glad when we find one that works.
As for CIO, I guess the biggest reason why I don't want to do it is because at this point she doesn't know how to fall asleep by herself, without us putting her to sleep by bouncing her. That is probably our fault because we could have done it from the start, but I'm not going to make her pay for it... When she is able to understand and is not sleeping just because, then I think that is a completely different story. And we will have to figure out that one when/if we get there. I can't rationalize letting a baby suffer when she doesn't know why her cries are being ignored. Mostly we have to break her of the habit of us putting her to sleep and show her how she can do it on her own.
Definitely not criticizing how anyone else would handle their situations. Just don't feel that it's right for us with these circumstances.
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