To cry or not to cry....
K.'s sleep has been so horrible for the past almost-week. I know that he is still quite congested due to remnants of his cold, but still, this has Derek and I once again re-thinking our sleep strategies.
We've thought a lot about using a "cry it out" method. We bought Ferber's book awhile back and found him quite reasonable. I also did an informal poll amongst everyone I know with children and it turns out that with the exception of two people, everyone had either done a cry it out method, with great success, or they were co-sleeping and/or still struggling with sleep issues.
Yet the emotional part of me doesn't want to leave K. to cry. My worst fear is that he will vomit.
So here is what I am thinking - and I have not yet discussed this with Derek, so it may change. I think we should leave his bedtime routine as is, because generally it is quite simple to put him to sleep for the night, and we are frequently able to put him in the crib semi-awake. It is the night waking that is out of control. Sometimes it's no big deal, but sometimes it is frequent, and sometimes, like last night, he'll be up for TWO HOURS!!!!
So, I think we let him cry for graduated amounts of time up to maybe 10 minutes depending on how he does (like Ferber) but if he is awake and perfectly happy, we just let him be in his crib in the dark by himself and don't give him any attention for it. If the graduated crying doesn't do any good, we pick him up and put him down as soon as he's comforted (like "the baby whisperer). These are my thoughts about it.
It's amazing what drama it is, this sleep stuff.
We've thought a lot about using a "cry it out" method. We bought Ferber's book awhile back and found him quite reasonable. I also did an informal poll amongst everyone I know with children and it turns out that with the exception of two people, everyone had either done a cry it out method, with great success, or they were co-sleeping and/or still struggling with sleep issues.
Yet the emotional part of me doesn't want to leave K. to cry. My worst fear is that he will vomit.
So here is what I am thinking - and I have not yet discussed this with Derek, so it may change. I think we should leave his bedtime routine as is, because generally it is quite simple to put him to sleep for the night, and we are frequently able to put him in the crib semi-awake. It is the night waking that is out of control. Sometimes it's no big deal, but sometimes it is frequent, and sometimes, like last night, he'll be up for TWO HOURS!!!!
So, I think we let him cry for graduated amounts of time up to maybe 10 minutes depending on how he does (like Ferber) but if he is awake and perfectly happy, we just let him be in his crib in the dark by himself and don't give him any attention for it. If the graduated crying doesn't do any good, we pick him up and put him down as soon as he's comforted (like "the baby whisperer). These are my thoughts about it.
It's amazing what drama it is, this sleep stuff.
posted by Melissa at 10:10 AM
2 Comments:
Good lord, do let me know how it works for you. My 7 month old is STILL not sleeping well, and it's driving me slowly nuts. He only gets more and more upset if I let him cry it out, BUT HE DOESN'T NEED ANYTHING so it's not like he's starving or dirty at all. I think he's just engaging in an early-life battle of the wills with me.
J actually did throw up once. I felt terrible. We backed off of our attempts for a while but ended up in the same desperate place we started. We did CIO, and this time, fortunately, no one puked.
Ah, memories.
-Julie
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