The parenting topic I get asked about most often is sleep training. I know that a lot of people are against sleep training because I was dead set against it too at first. I couldn’t let my precious baby cry intentionally; it was against every instinct I had as a mother! But sleep training really has been the one thing that has had the biggest impact on our family’s sanity and happiness. Looking back, I just wish that I’d read up on baby sleep before having Charlie so that I could have prevented a lot of his sleeping problems instead of causing them. Hopefully you can learn from my mistakes!
When Charlie was around 2 1/2 months old, his sleep started getting really bad with him waking up between 7-10 times a night, and needing to be rocked for up to 30 minutes each time to get back to sleep. By the time he was 4 months old, he was regularly wide awake for hours in the middle of the night. His poor night time sleep affected his naps, his poor naps affected his night time sleep, and the vicious cycle continued. Charlie was so exhausted from his fragmented sleep, he was barely able to stay awake even an hour at times and would quickly lose interest in playing. Utterly exhausted myself and searching for answers, I posted on parenting boards, asked friends for advice, and bought every single popular book on baby sleep out there. The most common advice was 1) cry it out (our pediatrician and friends), 2) it’s a phase and he’ll eventually grow out of it (messageboards and friends), or 3) cosleep (my mom).
I didn’t want to start cosleeping to fix a sleeping problem, and it just wasn’t an option I wanted to pursue since I’m an insomniac. And while Charlie’s sleep might have been a phase he eventually outgrew, it wasn’t fair to allow him to be exhausted day after day until that happened. The parents who told me it was a phase also didn’t have babies that were waking up as often as Charlie — they may have felt differently if they were surviving on 2 hours of fragmented sleep every day.
Because I wanted to avoid crying, I first gave The No Cry Sleep Solution a try. After weeks with no improvement, I’d finally begun to consider that crying it out (or dying of exhaustion) might be our only solution. During that time I also read Solve Your Child’s Sleep Problems (Ferber), Healthy Sleep Habits, Happy Child (Weissbluth), Secrets of the Baby Whisperer, Sleeping Through the Night (Mindell), The Sleep Lady’s Good Night, Sleep Tight and The SleepEasy Solution. They all started to blend together in my late night, bleary eyed reading sessions, but one thing soon became apparent — all sleep training involved some form of crying it out.
After Charlie’s bath, I left the apartment and went to a local cafe while Mr. Bee put Charlie down for the night because I knew I couldn’t handle hearing him cry. Mr. Bee put Charlie in his crib drowsy, but awake after a bottle. We used the Ferber method which utilizes a progressive waiting approach — you go in and check in on your baby after 5 minutes, 10 minutes, then every 15 minutes until your baby falls asleep. You can talk to them, but you can’t touch them or pick them. And you have to repeat the checks every time the baby wakes up in the middle of the night. You may notice that we varied the times we did the checks because if Charlie seemed like he was calming down, we didn’t want to go in and rile him up again. You have to use your discretion. We also decided to keep one middle of the night feeding because we didn’t want to eliminate too many calories by cutting out both of his usual night feedings at once.
Night 1 – Saturday
7:53pm – in crib
7:56pm – started crying a little bit
8:01pm – 5 min check. sang a song and Charlie stopped crying right away, but started crying again when Mr. Bee left.
8:12pm – 10 min check. started crying very loudly, and talking to him made him cry even louder. Mr. Bee sang to him and he stopped crying very quickly.
8:15pm – completely stopped crying.
8:17pm – asleep. Total crying: 19 minutes on and off.
11:53pm – started crying softly on and off
11:58pm – 5 min check. cried on and off for 17 minutes and fell asleep.
2:31am – 5 min check. cried on and off for 17 minutes and fell asleep.
4:28am – bottle, diaper change, fell right back asleep.
8:00am – up for day.
Total Sleep: 10 1/2 hours
Night 2 – Sunday
7:47pm – asleep in 5 minutes with no crying.
12:50am – Woke up, fed, changed, back in crib. No crying, played by himself for 5 min and fell asleep.
3:36am – Woke up, cried a couple minutes, fell asleep in 15 minutes.
4:49am – Woke up, cried pretty much an hour and 25 minutes straight until 6:15am when we went to go get him. It was BRUTAL. We found out after the fact that babies have a strong shift in sleep cycle at 4am. This is when we should have fed him, or got him up for the day.
Total Sleep: 8 hours
Night 3 – Monday
6:34pm – Asleep, no crying.
2:30am – Woke up, played for awhile then started wailing so we gave him a bottle and he went back to sleep.
6:54am – Woke up. happily cooed in his crib until we got him at 7:05am.
Total Sleep: 12 hours
Night 4 – Tuesday
7:17pm – Asleep, no crying.
3:40am – Woke up, fed, changed, and back to sleep.
5:30am – Woke up, played by himself, fell back asleep.
6:00am – Up for the day
Total Sleep: 10 1/2 hours
It really only took us two nights to sleep train Charlie for nights. He dropped his middle of the night bottle on his own shortly after sleep training, and then he pretty much slept through the night through his first year of life. It was truly life changing, and our entire family was happier. Had I known that it was going to take us two nights, I definitely would have sleep trained sooner.
The biggest piece of advice I wish I could have told myself is to start teaching healthy sleep habits early so you can prevent sleep problems instead of treat them. Don’t nurse or rock your baby to sleep every time, and give them enough opportunities to learn how to fall asleep on their own. Babies that know how to self soothe can fall asleep on their own, and put themselves back to sleep when they wake up in the middle of the night. By picking Charlie up and soothing him every time he woke up, we’d been reinforcing the very behavior we wanted him to stop. He relied on rocking as a crutch to fall back asleep because he didn’t know how to fall asleep any other way.
I’ll go into FAQ’s, different sleep training methods, and nap training in separate posts because this is such a monster of a topic, but please let me know if you have any questions and what topics you’d like me to cover.
Did you sleep train your baby?
Sleep Training part 7 of 11
1. Sleep Training Books by Guides2. When to Sleep Train by Mrs. Bee
3. Does When You Sleep Train Help Determine Success? by Mrs. Bee
4. Sleep Training Noelle: Part I by Mrs. High Heels
5. Sleep Training Noelle: Part II by Mrs. High Heels
6. Rubies' Sleep Training Story by parenting
7. Sleep Training Part 1 - How We Night Trained by Mrs. Bee
8. Sleep Training by Mrs. Jump Rope
9. The Whens, Whys and Hows of Our Sleep Training Process by Mrs. Pen
10. Sleep at 8 months & How Baby H Started Sleeping Through the Night at 12 Weeks by Mrs. Hopscotch
11. Crying it Out by Mrs. Pencil
persimmon / 1255 posts
We developed some bad sleeping habits when Aly was a newborn and by the time I read Dr. Ferber’s book, it was too late to undo them without sleep training. Since she was only 2 months at the time, we had to suffer another 2 months before starting the sleep training. She was really stubborn the first night (must get it from hubby) and cried almost 2 hours before falling asleep. 1 hr the 2nd night, 30 minutes on the 3rd, and no crying on the 4th.
It was a bit stressful but sleep training is honestly the BEST thing we’ve done for her quality of sleep and my sanity. Now she sleeps and naps almost immediately after she is placed in her crib or Peapod (awesome travel crib) and life is good…..until she gets sick and it messes up her sleep, in which case a small refresher training is required afterwards to get her back on track. All in all, both baby and I are happier cause we’re both sleeping better. Even the hubby is happier because I’m not a tired mess all day.
Seriously, sleep training is one of those things that has a million pros and only a few temporary cons. I tell all my newly pregnant friends to read up on it before their baby arrives so that they avoid developing bad sleep associations that can interrupt their baby’s sleep.
grape / 86 posts
This post is very helpful since we’re going to venture this route very soon. Thanks for the very detail post.
admin / watermelon / 14210 posts
@red — i do think charlie was easier than average to night train. but nap training…. phew that was tough!
persimmon / 1255 posts
@Bee, nap training does seem to be tougher than night sleep training and most books seem to just gloss over it for some reason.
admin / watermelon / 14210 posts
@red – i had to do a ton of research on my own about nap training. the books had no good information on it. which is why i’m going to write my own.
persimmon / 1255 posts
@Bee, nice. Looking forward to reading it
honeydew / 7968 posts
awesome, this will be very useful information in about 6 months.
blogger / eggplant / 11551 posts
I just wrote a series on sleep training! I love hearing what other people did, but it is such a controversial topic I’m sure a lot of people hesitate to talk about it.
http://babychin.wordpress.com/2011/09/18/sleep-training-part-iii/
cherry / 230 posts
We sleep trained with my youngest, as well, using the cry it out method after months of sleep deprivation, and missteps with letting him fall asleep nursing. We weren’t comfortable with co-sleeping or CIO either, but finally we were both so exhausted, CIO became our only hope, lol. (Exhaustion has a funny way of bringing about determination, lol) We did the gradual checking in at the timed intervals, and after about 4 or 5 nights, he was trained. We were like, “WHYYYYY didn’t we do this sooner?” Naps, however, were (and still are) a problem.
FWIW, my oldest was a pure angel when it came to sleeping at night, and at naptime, no training necessary, so the whole sleep training thing was new for us.
pomegranate / 3053 posts
I started sleep training with naps first and then once we got that down, started with night time sleep training. It seemed to work for us and, so far, we’ve had a great sleeper since then. I believe in CIO only b/c it worked for us. But I did sit by his crib in the glider hearing him cry until he fell asleep. N didn’t roll over until 6 months and I think I started around 5 months or so so that sort of worked to my advantage since he wasn’t mobile enough to see me sitting there! If he rolled over earlier…don’t know how that would have turned out!
pomegranate / 3053 posts
Oh, and now at almost 29 months, the nap and night time routine can be a bit of a struggle when he wants us to read a zillion books and sing a zillion songs to him before he agrees to go down. I’m able to cut it down to one book read 2x and sing maybe like 5 or so songs, some repeated by request. When the hubby does it…he messes me up b/c he’ll do what N asks! My 10 minute routine went up to 20-30 minutes at one point. Consistency is key…
cherry / 128 posts
I never sleep-trained. I did try to follow guidelines like, “put your baby down drowsy but not asleep” but he would just cry. I’d say it really depends on your baby’s temperament. My son needed to be held a lot when he was younger and to this day (he’s 2 now) is just more cautious compared to some of his friends. At least now that he’s walking it works in my favor since I rarely have to worry about him dashing across the street – he’s more of a “Mommy, please hold my hand” kind of guy.
So the first year of his life most of his naps took place in the baby carrier. I’d plop him in, he’d fall asleep pretty quickly, and then I’d get my work done online. Some naps and nighttimes involved nursing to sleep. We co-sleep, and still do. It works for us. The advantage to co-sleeping is the cuddles, and when he is sick, my body automatically senses when he starts running a fever.
As he got older, he just started sleeping better. It wasn’t always linear, but overall it has improved. Around 12 months he would fall asleep in his car seat, and at about 18 months, he could also fall asleep in his stroller. So I knew that he was capable of falling asleep on his own, without being held or nursed to sleep. At around 20 months, he started going to day care a few days a week and he’s able to fall asleep there. I think his teacher had to hold him at first, but they’ve gradually transitioned him to his nap mat.
I think the biggest things are consistency – we do have a bedtime/naptime routine, as well as a schedule. I’m not super strict on the schedule, but we do try to go down for naps and bedtime around the same time every day.
I don’t think CIO works for every child; I really do think it all depends on your child’s temperament. My advice is: don’t feel like you have to listen to other’s advice, you only need to change something if it isn’t working for you & the family; and listen to your own gut. Regardless of what “sleep training”, I think sleep does improve naturally over time, particularly if you make it a priority in terms of providing a quiet space and time to sleep.
As far as books go, I really like Mary Sheedy Kurcinka’s “Sleepless in America” because she lists all the options and ways of figuring out which ones might work best for you, and she’s totally non-judgemental.
For what it’s worth, my son once had a CIO experience when he accidentally locked me out on the balcony (we live on the 24th floor). In the 2+ hours that it took for the locksmith, who took his sweet time to come and rescue me, he cried himself to sleep even though I was only a few inches away on the other side of a glass door. It was a horrible experience; he threw up all over himself and was a hysterical mess. My son is a “tension escalator” and that was just confirmation of what I had suspected all along. Parenting is a tough job that requires an incredible amount of creativity, but I think it’s a job that only you can do for your child – definitely get a lot of perspectives and educate yourself on different ways, and then go with what feels right for you and your child.
guest
Hi, my 5.5 months old used to sleep well until she learned how to roll. She’d roll everywhere, even in the cot during sleeping time. We hoped that she’d get tired at the end and sleep but instead she’d get overtired or worse, stuck in between railings in the crib. Tried all methods and it would still take us a few hours to settle her. Any tips? Thanks
admin / watermelon / 14210 posts
@mrs pleasant – how long has it been going on? with rolling over, often you just have to wait it out. it could last a week or two.
blogger / eggplant / 11551 posts
@Mrs Pleasant – I was going to say the same thing as Mrs. Bee – I remember when N first started rolling over, we just had to wait it out… I remember it coincided with one of the Wonder Weeks. How long has this been going on for?
guest
@bee. It has been a week. Yesterday she slept well. She still rolls around the cot but she fell asleep at the end. I was hoping that this is just a phase. You’ve just put my mind at ease.
Just like to say, I love your blog. Came across it accidentally somehow. (I’m in Australia) Ive been reading it for 2 days. It inspire me to write one myself or at least record every moments, milestones etc somewhere. Don’t stop writing!
guest
@mrs high heels, @mrs bee. My A is back! She has been sleeping well again. Well..she’s still not sleeping through the night (I don’t think she ever will. I need to read on night weaning) but she has stop rolling around in her cot.
Sometimes she would sleep on her tummy and side which initially worried me. But she’s strong enough to lift her head and move it side to side as well so I’m not so worried anymore.
Thank you for your help. Out of curiosity, would the same happen when she learns to crawl/sit/stand? Also, is amber teething necklace famous in u.s? It’s so famous here.
blogger / eggplant / 11551 posts
@Mrs Pleasant – I’m so glad she’s back to her old self! Yes, I remember with every new major milestone like crawling/standing, there would be a sleep disruption. I recommend the Wonder Weeks book if you haven’t read it yet – it really helped me stay sane during some of the sleep disruption periods because I would anticipate when a Wonder Week would be coming up, and just expect her sleep to go out the window. Periods of teething and sickness do that to her too. After a week they usually go back to normal though. Hang in there, the first year is not easy, especially when it comes to sleep!
guest
Hi mrs high heels. Thanks for that. She was back to her old self but unfortunately now rolling is not the problem. She usually sleeps right away with no fuss, now all she wants to do is kick the crib, chew her sleeves or swaddle for 2 hours before falling asleep or poop. Sigh.
Since she doesn’t cry, I don’t know if I should try and help her sleep or leave her for 2 hours till she’s tired. It might be a wonder week but seems like every week is a wonder week. Haha!
Anyways I really hope that this is another phase. I don’t know if hubby and I can survive 3 weeks like this.
coffee bean / 27 posts
Thanks for this post! My son is 16 weeks and we are going to sleep train him on Friday. I’m exhausted from getting up several times a night to rock LO back to sleep. His main two issues are the sleep association with rocking and during the day he can’t nap for more than 20-30 min. Unless I hold him, but even holding him sometimes doesn’t help. We plan to so night training first and see how it goes and then try nap training later.
@mrsbee and @mrbee – my LO always wakes up at 4am. Is the only change you’d make be to feed him?
Also, after feeding, did you soothe him until he was drowsy before you put him down? LO is usually WIDE awake for his 4am feeding and it takes 20-30 min or rocking to get him to go back to sleep.
admin / watermelon / 14210 posts
@mrs pleasant – olive is sleeping through the night because i night weaned! she doesn’t put up too much of a fight luckily. it’s just that every time she gets sick her sleep gets totally off track.
i found that rolling over affected sleep, but we got through sitting up and crawling pretty much unscathed. hopefully that’s the case for you too!
@mrslace – we kept a feeding during sleep training and put charlie back in his crib after feeding and burping. it was pretty quick…. we didn’t try to get him drowsy. but he dropped that feeding on his own very quickly.
i would do the same with your lo… you can do ferber checks then, but most babies go back down pretty easily after a feeding. good luck !
guest
Thanks Mrs Bee. Everything has been going really well since the last time I wrote. Your comment assured me that it was only a phase…and it was! It was coincided with the wonder week as suggested by mrs high heels.
Now Ava has been commando crawling, sitting up unsupported with no problem. Also, we changed our formula to a follow on stage (6 month+), not sure if its the same in the States, plus solid 3 times a day and magically she has been sleeping through till 5am from 9! So in a way she was just a hungry baby before.
Now we’re just waiting for the next phase, teething. She’s almost 8 month and no teeth yet. I’m hoping that they don’t all come out at once.
Thank you again.
guest
Thanks for this blog post! We’re using the Ferber method with our son and the first two nights he woke up at 4am and, even after a feeding, would not go back to sleep! Not sure how to handle this. Both times we tried to let him cry it out with checkins but it just didn’t work so I got him up and ended up rocking him back to sleep. Suggestions? If we get him up for the day at 4 then he’ll end up with a super early 6am nap and I’m afraid he’ll get stuck in this cycle!
admin / watermelon / 14210 posts
@kristin — you can try sticking to cio for a couple more days. it can take them a little while to sort it all out. waking up at 4am is too early… i think 5am is the earliest you should get him up. we had super early wakeups and it took a while for our schedule to fall in place, but the actual training part didn’t take too long.
good luck!
guest
This blog post & sleep journal have been great! I’ve been referring back to it daily as I was preparing to start Ferber. I have a big boy who has been doing some damage to my shoulders with all the rocking and bouncing to go to sleep. Once he hit what I’m assuming was his 4 month regression, I knew it was time. We’ve been at it for 2 nights now, which haven’t been too bad. He’s fallen asleep after less than 30 minutes both nights (around 8:00) and his first wake up has been right at 1:00. He doesn’t cry, just talks to himself. I get up and feed around 1:20, lay him back down after burping and he’s fallen asleep on his own, without crying by 2:00. My question is this though – in the past he’s gone until 3-4:00 before waking up and being fed. So, should I be letting him try to go back to sleep/CIO until a time closer to that before feeding? Or continue feeding at this first wake up since we’re not having trouble going back to sleep at this time? The goal is to get him to drop this feeding on his own eventually, but if he doesn’t, then we’ll wait until he’s at least 5-6 months before trying to night wean. Any suggestions are much appreciated. Thanks!
guest
How old was lo when u night time sleep trained???
admin / watermelon / 14210 posts
he was 4.5 months but he was a big baby.
guest
@Mrs.Bee do you know how Charlie was soothing himself back to sleep? Finger sucking?
guest
@Mrs.Bee
I’m surprised y’all survived as long as you did!