ugh i hate that phrase "sleep training" but here goes.
after over two weeks of terrible waking and little sleep, i told trav we have to be diligent in lucia's sleep training starting NOW. she's six months old almost. in every book i have read they say anything goes up until 4 months, but by 5 months, babies really start to develop patterns and are aware of their surroundings. by training, i by no means want to imply that we are going to be militant, but we are going to teach lucia and learn ourselves how to put her down relaxed BUT awake so she can learn to fall asleep on her own without being rocked. of course i still want to allow myself that "luxury" of rocking her to sleep because i love it so, but i also don't want to cheat her out of her being able to "wind down" on her own and relax in her bed watching her aquarium and chilling out.
i just started tonight. 10 minutes ago. she's wide awake and most likely getting ready to chuck her pacifier (i'm watching her on her monitor).
i plan on going in and soothing her when she fusses and trying to avoid picking her up. now if she cries, that is a different story. but walking back and forth to soothe and reassure her is my plan for the night. i'm exhausted but i have to do it.
i wanted to start last night but i was really sick. of course. my immune system SUCKS. so trav was great and got up with her each time to rock her (we normally take turns). i only got up once to feed her as i normally do. other than that it was all trav. thank god i married such a great man. not that parenting duties should not be split equally. it's just i know a lot of women who aren't as lucky as i am in the husband department. but that's another blog post for another day!
i should add, last night i could not lay flat on my back without my ears and throat hurting pretty badly. it was strange. a few nights ago, every time we put luci down on her back, she would cry it seemed in pain and i couldn't figure it out. i wonder now if she was hurting like i was last night? yet another reason i do not want to implement "crying it out." how do we know in this first year of life, with all the growing, teething and developments, that while our babies are crying, it's because they are indeed in pain?
i'm so torn about this "training" and want to continue to rock her to sleep as it's been so easy thus far. however with her frequent night wakings as of late, i feel like i need to move forward in her development and help her learn to self soothe. i think it would be easier right now to continue to rock her every time she wakes, however i am afraid her night wakings will continue or increase and we can't function if that is the case. i'm also torn because i do think they wake for a reason, even if the only reason is to to be near us. i don't want to deprive her (or me) of that. but again, i have to stress, i want her to learn to self soothe.
i read a lot of natural family parenting books which i love and live by, but many are strong advocates of the family bed and co sleeping. we do not do this. not that i'm against it, i think it's a wonderful thing, it's just not something we wanted to do. in these books, they are strong advocates for answering to a baby in every night instance, which in theory sounds wonderful, but after only a few weeks of bad sleep, we need something else.
i think how nice it is to chill out in my bed, to unwind after a long day before i go to sleep. i try to relate it also to lucia and think she'll find it nice too when she figures it out. that she doesn't always need mommy or daddy to rock her down. that lying alone is nice and soothing too.
am i crazy? i hope i am doing the right thing. i am going to try this tonight for one hour. that is my limit. if it doesn't work, i will pick her up, rock her and try this method again tomorrow. i'm too tired to be super hard core tonight, plus babies don't need "hard core."
i'll post again to record how this went. so far it's been 30 minutes and i've went in to soothe her 9 times. more later...
3 comments:
you're not crazy. Asher was like that too and then he just wasn't. I started puttig him down just priorto sleep and then I'd play his lights thing in the crib and he was cool, some times...other times, not so much. So Steve or I would go in and pick him up rock him in our arms to calm him down and then lay him back down. Shushing him but not picking him up never worked for us. As soon as Asher saw us, he wanted to be held. So we held him for a bit, but never too long. One thing that helped was putting his fav. toy in his crib so he could play with it.
95% of the time now, Asher goes down without a hiccup. If he's still awake, he'll play in his crib or 10-15 minutes and then fall asleep.
I don't like the cry it out thing either. Naps are still a challenge for us. Today in fact I had to go back into Asher's room about 5 times before he finally calmed down and slept.
The whole co-sleeping thing...I love it. Asher and I do it every morning and I thought we'd do it all night for a long time, but it didn't work for Asher and it didn't work for us. All 3 of us are so much happier not bed-sharing or co-sleeping. You have to do what's best for your family and not worry about what the books say. You're a wonderful mother...never think other wise.
I hope things go well. remember it probably won't get better over night so just don't get discouraged. I'll be thinking of you.
thanks kim! it seems like i was just thinking of you going through sleep issues with asher and now he's a little prince. we just have to keep telling ourselves "this too shall pass."
yeah, although I'm really starting to hate that mantra! :-)
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