First of all thank you for all the kind messages everyone has sent in support of my sleep trainingΒ which we have been doing the past five nights. All I can say is that we’re making progress. We’re not quite there yet, but I do think that we’re turning a corner and that there’s a light at the end of the tunnel.
We’ve been doing bedtime as normal, usually aroundΒ 5:30, and he goes down without a fight. We use a sleep sack or swaddle him from the chest down, give him a binky and a lovey, and usually lay him on his side. I usually never use my monitor but I did use it in this instance to make sure he wasn’t suffocating or stuck in the crib slats or anything.
On two of the past nights he woke up again in the evening around 7:30 or 8 and I nursed him just because I was still awake and I felt like I could nurse and I wanted him to get the extra nutrition before we all went to bed. Maybe I shouldn’t have done that, I was just using my mommy instinct. Then, each night, whenever he woke up between the hours of 11pm and 3:30am, I would shush him once and then let him cry it out in his crib without picking him up.Β These crying fits would happen anywhere from 1-3 times per night, and he would cry from 10-20 minutes until he settled himself back down without my help. Then, if he was up by 4:30 again, I would nurse him and that would be the start of our morning.
The funniest part of all of this is that my DOG woke me up more times than Oliver this weekend. Criminy.Β I think she got sick at the boarder while we were in Paris so she woke me up about 9 times to go doo doo. So, while no one around here is sleeping continuously through the night, I feel like we’re making progress simply because of the fact that Oliver has learned how to settle himself back down to sleep without my help, which is a very, very good thing.
A few more days and I’m hopeful that we will start to see big payoffs! Thanks for letting me share my story/personal rant. I hope I didn’t bore you too much. :)
xoxo,
