When LO was 6 months old, we decided to try sleep training. We had just moved her bedtime up to 7:30, her bedtime routine was set, and I was tired of spending over an hour rocking and nursing her to sleep. Naps were completely trash; she averaged about 40-60 minutes per day. We had moved her to a crib in her own room at four months, and we had switched from the swaddle to the ZipadeeZip fairly recently.
If I had bothered to read about infant sleep at all before having LO, I probably would have spent ages doing research, comparing methods, and drawing up pro/con lists based on my (zero) experience. Instead, we were sleep-training on the fly, and I had no time to pore over the dozens of books at the library. I was hunting for a method that fit our (loose) criteria, but still had a fairly good chance of working. Here’s what I knew:
– We didn’t want to do extinction: I knew that I couldn’t handle hearing her cry for more than about 30 minutes without checking on her.
– Co-sleeping wasn’t working: neither Mr. O nor I could manage to co-sleep any longer; our sleep was terrible. Little Oats was getting more and more squirmy, also.
– I didn’t mind nursing to sleep: When it worked, it worked well. But I knew there would be a day when she wouldn’t nurse to sleep any longer.
– Little Oats needs her space: she had always done better when she had some time to herself to settle in.
– We wouldn’t sleep train for wakeups: LO was only waking up twice per night, and it was so easy to just nurse her quickly and put her back down. I’d much rather wake up twice for five minutes than listen to her cry for ages.
Given these criteria, we settled on the cry-it-out method with checks. This is sometimes lumped under the ‘Ferber’ method of sleep training, but I hesitate to give it a label because we really went with our gut. Our idea was this: we would put LO down in her crib after stories, prayers and nursing. If she had fallen asleep nursing, excellent; we knew she’d stay asleep. If she was still awake, we would get ready for some CIO. It usually took her a minute or two to start crying, but as soon as she did, I set my phone timer for 7 minutes. Initially we would check at 7, 10, and 12 minutes, bumping the time up as the days went by. I’d read that we could see results in as soon as three days; and I was seriously praying that would be the case.
Once we’d decided on a method of sleep training, I knew it was just a matter of time before we would have to implement it. We were arriving back from vacation shortly after Little Oats turned six months, and we figured that was a decent jumping off point. Chances are, her sleep would be terrible after sharing a bed with Mr. O and me for a week, so it couldn’t really get much worse.
We chose a night to start (a Thursday, because Mr. O would be able to help with wakeups over the weekend), mapped out our plan of attack, and set about our bedtime routine. Little Oats listened intently to her story, nursed like always, and went into her crib awake. We heard her babbling over the monitor, and I almost relaxed.
And then the crying started.
I set my timer for 7 minutes, and started in on the cinnamon bun recipe I had saved for this occasion. I knew that the folding, kneading and mixing of a new recipe would distract me enough to get us through. There’s something unnerving about hearing your child cry and knowing you can fix it instantly…but not fixing it. It was at this point that I quickly realized why so many people are against CIO. But I knew we had to give it a chance, so I focused on my recipe, and took a few deep breaths. The timer went, and Mr. O headed upstairs to check on her. A few rounds of Jesus Loves Me later, and she was calm (but still whimpering). I set the timer again, this time for 10 minutes. And by the 5 minute mark, there was silence. (Times like these I kick myself for not getting a video monitor). She had fallen asleep, and she stayed asleep for 4 hours straight!
The next night was much the same. We put her down awake, she cried and I set the timer. We waited 10 minutes, checked on her, and set the timer for 12 minutes. By the 3 minute mark, she was sound asleep again. By night three, she was crying for 5 minutes total before falling asleep.
I wish I could say that sleep training resulted in sleeping through the night. I’m sure for some families, that’s exactly what happens. For us, it resulted in a baby who was content to go down into her crib awake, and who was able to put herself back to sleep when she woke up (sometimes…if she chose to).
It didn’t last for long…the nine month sleep regression was coming…but for the time being, we had a peaceful little girl who didn’t dread bedtime. And two parents who were thrilled to have their evenings back again.
This method worked well for us. We did end up having to re-train at about 10 months, but overall we are very happy with the choice we made.
How did you decide if/when to sleep train? Did you have to psych yourself up for it, or was it easier than expected?
apricot / 364 posts
Glad you found a method that works for your family. Getting evenings back in that in that first year is glorious.
guest
Good for you! We did something very similar with our son at 6 mo and it has worked wonderfully. At 18 mo he never cries at bedtime or nap time. And will rarely wake at night. Totally worth it for our family and we’re all happier for it. Baby included!
persimmon / 1386 posts
We did CIO at about 8 months. She cried for 45 minutes the first night (with checks). Every night since she has cried for less than 2 minutes and is then out, usually for the whole night. She was never a bad sleeper, but doing CIO has made her an even better one.
pomegranate / 3053 posts
That is wonderful! I sleep trained my boys around the same time which was 5.5 – 6 months. I practiced a similar method except my oldest wasn’t flipping around so I just sat in the glider at the top of his crib where he can’t see me and just heard him cry while I read parenting books (really poor choice of book, if you ask me!). It was brutal but I was worried that since he can’t flip over he’d choke on his spit if he spit up. It happened once and only once, thankfully. It took about a full two weeks to actually get him to sleep a good stretch before waking up to nurse. After a while “I” had to wake him to nurse around 4 A.M. until we stopped nursing. With my second, I have to say it was much easier. I have to say that it didn’t take much effort with him and he was a good sleeper. I don’t think I had to re-train after the first time with both of them. There were, of course, times where they would not nap and cried for maybe 5-10 minutes, but night time was always relatively easy…. until I had to read the same book a zillion times and sing a zillion songs before wanting to go bed.
pea / 18 posts
This post is so timely for me. My DS just turned 6 months so I’m working up the courage to do this. I think we’re going to do the same – CIO with check ins.
blogger / pear / 1563 posts
Wow! That sounds great! We never really had issues with Little falling asleep, but it’s so hard when they wake up in the middle of the night and you just want them to go back to sleep immediately!
blogger / pomegranate / 3491 posts
@Mrs. Pinata: Ditto – C was always pretty good about falling asleep. Staying asleep was harder for us.
Glad you found a method that worked for you guys!
grapefruit / 4187 posts
We sleep trained later than I thought we would, but only because DS kept getting sick at daycare and I didn’t want him to CIO when he was truly feeling miserable otherwise. So at about 6 months we stopped going in for night wakings and it took about 2 nights before he was totally sleeping through the night! And he never really gave us a problem at bedtime, but we would also let him cry at this point upon the initial putting to bed. Honesty it worked so great for everyone I am a believer in CIO!
pomegranate / 3225 posts
That’s great! I think it’s important to share “positive” CIO stories, too, so people aren’t afraid to try it because it’s not always as terrible as you hear.