Abby started sleeping through the night pretty early on, then she slipped back into one or two wakings a night for a while. Then, she started doing this really annoying thing where she would wake up and cry every time her paci came out of her mouth. If we put it back in right away, she would fall right back asleep (for 45 mins or maybe an hour) This meant that I was up and down all night. I was exhausted. So, this week we started letting her CIO at night. She had already proven to us that she could sleep through and that she didn't NEED to be fed at night.
The first night we did it, she cried 2 or 3 times, but the longest was only 16 mins. The next night she slept 12 hours without a peep (yay!). Last night she cried 3 times again - the longest was 25 mins. So now we're waiting to see what happens.
CIO is not for everybody. It's hard to hear your baby cry - especially when they do that "where are you?" cry. For us, it's much harder on Kyle than on me. Kyle has the instinct where he wants to go in and "rescue" her. I, on the other hand, am fine hearing her cry because I know that 1) she's ok - she's not hurt and that 2) it's for her own good. I do, however, recognize that we are lucky that she hasn't been one to cry for hours on end. 25 mins is much easier than 60+
Most of the time, when she cries, it's only for about 5 mins, and then she's back asleep. If we had never let her CIO, we would never have known that she could soothe herself back after just 5 mins. I was always at her cribside 15 seconds after she uttered the slightest noise trying to help. It took a little time for me to realize that I wasn't actually doing her any good - I was just teaching her to rely on me to get back to sleep instead of letting her do it.
Oh, and for anybody who is worried that I'm going to create some sort of trust issue - I'm not. :) Abby wakes up every morning with nothing but big grins and giggles when she sees us. She doesn't remember a thing from the night before - and she's well rested to boot.
Abigail - you have been a good sleeper all along and we are very thankful for that. I hope that you will develop good sleep habits that will last you a long time. I am proud of how well you are doing. You're such a very good baby.
2 comments:
one of my proudest moments was realizing that i had let my mind win over my heart.
you know me, i'm an emotional basketcase. and so the night it finally clicked that letting him cry wasn't hurting him...instead, it was doing what was best in the long run...was one of the best moments as a mother. and more than that...as a female. and emotional, erratic tornado of a female!
keep up the good work, you guys. i know it can be tough.
I'm glad it's working so well for you guys! Honestly, if we had never let Gracie CIO, she never would've slept. She wakes up every. single. time. she is put down, and we were in an awful cycle of never being able to put her down until she was so exhausted, she couldn't sleep. It's tough, but I agree, it's what they need (and I don't believe it causes trust issues, either, I think that's something we project on them when we're struggling with it.)
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