Sleep Training Part 1

Up until recently, I've still been rocking Shelby to sleep at night with a bottle of milk. I know, I know. This is appalling to some and I think I just heard a gasp from a reader. Yes... It was something we both enjoyed: Shelby and I. Bonding time.

But it seems like since moving into the new house, Shelby has been having a lot of trouble sleeping. She was waking up hour after hour, crying and screaming. We knew she might need some time to adjust to her new house/bedroom but after 6 weeks, we knew it had to be something else. I took her to the doctor to verify that there was nothing physically wrong with her (ear infection, teething, etc.). Nope. Healthy as a horse. The doctor diagnosed her with a sleep disorder... A sleep disorder? Ok. I'll bite.

Lately it had gotten so bad that one of us would sleep with her on the futon or let her sleep with us... Or take her down to Mom's room and let her have a shift with her so we both could sleep a little...

I had heard about this "Ferber" sleep training. Bought the book and read as much as I could. Determined she had a lot of "sleep associations" (things that she depended on to sleep, such as rocking, bottle, Mommy, etc., and if she woke up in the middle of the night and those things were gone, she'd cry because she couldn't get herself back to sleep without them).

Monday we decided enough was enough. Even though I hadn't read all of the book, we needed to start sleep training her immediately. Neither of us wanted "one more night" of no sleep and we knew that Shelby could not be getting ANY quality sleep like this. Granted this probably should have been done when she was about 6 to 8 months old but we can't go back in time...

Here's a synopsis of Night #1 (Monday night):

We waited until late to get her to bed (as advised in the book). I rocked her until she was sleepy and drowsy. I gave her milk in her sippy cup (because that is what she is used to during the day) and read her some stories with her little boo boo bear... She had white noise on as well as her little music box on her crib.

When she was drowsy, I placed her in her crib. The screaming started immediately. It was heartbreaking to hear her cry like that but I had to stick to the schedule outlined in the book as much as possible. I walked outside her room (where she couldn't see me) and waited 3 minutes. Gosh, that was a long 3 minutes! Then I went in and comforted her for a minute or two. Then walked out and waited 5 minutes. Repeated consoling her after 5 minutes. Then did the same for 10 minutes. When I'd console her I'd pat her on the back, lean in the crib to hug her and talk sweetly to her. It was awful to see her so upset. She was so pitiful standing in the crib, almost asleep with her head on the top of the rail... reaching for me. That is so hard to not reach back out to her. HUGE amount of will power.

The first round took about 35 minutes or so (of going in and coming out) before she fell asleep. She woke up a 2nd time about 20 minutes later and that round almost went an hour. Ugghhh... It was awful. I felt so bad. BUT she slept from 12:45 until 8 a.m. without waking. That was a huge accomplishment.

Here's a synopsis of Night #2 (Tuesday night):

So last night she was good and tired. Rocked her while reading her stories and she was drowsy when I put her in bed. Immediately she started crying. Did the increments as described in the book and went in about 3 times, consoling her. During the 4th time, I sat on the floor next to her crib and kinda laid my head down on her big teddy bear showing her that everyone goes "night night". She had stopped crying and looked down at me then laid down in her bed to go night night. I waited about a minute and stood up and walked out. She wasn't asleep yet but I don't think she noticed that I left the room.

That was 10:30. She slept until 7 a.m. this morning. Didn't wake up during the night crying at all. However, first thing this morning, she woke up crying. I think she realized that "Hey, I forgot to wake up last night and scream again!!" :-)

It is hard to do this... hear her scream and cry but last night was much better than the night before. She's "retraining" herself to fall asleep on her own now and that is a good thing. We knew she hasn't been getting any quality sleep lately and that doesn't make for a happy toddler during the day OR night. Hopefully tonight will be just as successful. I think all three of us enjoyed that long night's sleep!