Sleep Training - Night 1

We took Abigail to the doctor on Tuesday because she's been having such a difficult time with her sleeping & crying so much, that we wondered if something was physically wrong with her. Our pediatrician took a good hard look at Abigail & reported back that she is a wonderfully healthy baby girl! She's not even teething at the present moment. So...that means her sleep issues are purely behavioral. The doctor told us that almost all babies go through this phase around 6-8 months. They learn that when they cry, you will come back to them & pick them up. If Abby had her way, she'd be attached to my hip 24-7, literally! And sleep is boring, she'd much rather be playing with mom. So, as parents, we have to teach her that bedtime is not bonding time with mom or dad & sleeping is her alone time & her crib is a fabulous place to be! HA!

I'm going to try to document all 10 days of sleep training on my blog. And hopefully we can make it the entire 10 days!!! That is SUCH a long time in babyland.

After much research, talking to 2 pediatricians, and many, many google searches, we came up with a plan of attack for sleep training. We decided to go with Ms. Pratley's method, laid out in her book, The No Cry Sleep Solution .  I also read Richard Ferber's book - he uses a cry-it-out method. For now, we'd prefer a more gentle approach. Abigail's such a happy baby 90% of the time, I can't stand to make her cry several nights in a row, even if that is the fastest way to do it. It seems a bit harsh. I'm not ruling it out though. If the gradual approach doesn't seem to work, we'll have to re-evaluate our strategy.

So maybe I should be a little more organized about this, to help explain what we're trying to fix & then to help us all follow progress or regression, whatever the case may be over the next 10 days :)

The Problems:

• Taking ~2 hours to get little miss A to sleep each night.
• Seems to get a 2nd wind & surge of energy & being wide awake 45 minutes after falling asleep: see first bullet.
• Abigail only wants mommy to help her to go to sleep.
• Abigail seems to have forgotten how to go to sleep unless mom holds her until she is completely 100% passed out.
• Waking in the middle of the night & not going back to sleep unless it's with mom.
• Uses a pacifier to sleep - which seems to be an issue for night wakings, so the book suggests we slowly wean her off the paci as a sleep crutch.

The Solution:

The general idea is to have her fall asleep in such a way, that if she wakes in the night, she can go back to sleep in the same way. So we need to get her to sleep without any assistance from mom & dad, so that when she wakes in the night, she can easily get herself back to sleep.

The Plan:

Bedtime Routine:

• Quality time with mom & dad. Lots of snuggles, have her snack while we eat dinner, more family play time (but not rowdy).
• Change into PJ's. Abigail HATES wardrobe changes, so it's best to do this well before bedtime.
• More cuddle time with mom - important to help ease the separation anxiety.
• When she shows signs of being tired, usually around 7:30ish, we will move upstairs to her room.
• 2 books with dad (with mom sitting next to them)
• Turn the fan in her room on for white noise
• Rocking, nursing & shushing with mom. Also, using her sleep blanket as her "snuggly" item - an item she can snuggle with & know it means bedtime. This is supposed to help her transition from the pacifier. Again, I'm skeptical.

Phase 1 of Sleep Training:
In the 1st phase, our goal is to do our normal routine & do everything the way we have been, but just try to get her in her crib sooner. So, instead of rocking her until she's passed out & moving her without waking her, move her to the crib while she's still slightly awake & have her fall asleep in the crib. So the plan of attack is as follows:

1. Rock & soothe Abigail to the point where her eyes are shut mostly & she is relaxed.
2. Sway her to the crib, away from my body, so she gets used to the idea that she's not snuggled up with me. Wait until she's calm again.
3. Place her gently in the crib while still holding her. This is hard for me cause I'm short & it crushes my tummy to bend over her crib side. But a little suffering for the greater good is ok, I suppose.
4. Remove arms around her & shush her, rub her back, rock her with hands until she falls asleep in the crib.
5. While she's in the crib, use the gentle pacifier removal method so that she falls asleep without the paci.
6. if she wakes & fusses/cries, pick her up & do it all over again until it works. If either of us gets upset or if I lose patience with it, abort mission & put her to sleep the way we know works.

OK - so that's the plan. According to this book, we should see improvement after 10 days. At that point we should look at our sleep logs & see if there's anywhere we need to change our methods in order to achieve sleeping success.

Night 1:
Yesterday, Abigail only took 2 naps at daycare, per my instructions to her caregiver. Her last nap ended at 1:25pm & she only slept a total of 2.5 hours yesterday. So, it makes total sense that she was crabby & by the time 6pm rolled around, she was exhasuted and rubbing her eyes, and laying her head down on anything she could. I decided it was late enough & went ahead with the bedtime routine without Brandon (he wasn't home from the gym yet). It worked fine. She went to sleep in her crib without much fuss. Probably because she was so incredibly exhausted. But then, after about 30-45 minutes, she woke up. I tried for about 30 minutes & she got mad and started crying. what the heck!? isn't this the "no cry" sleep solution? Why is she crying & crying, even when I hold & soothe her?
Anyway, I got incredibly frustrated & called for Brandon to come help me several times. Well, he was busy taking care of stuff downstairs & didn't hear me over the monitor. Brandon finally came up & tried to help, but Abigail continued crying. Finally I came back, picked her up & she instantly stopped crying. She was WIDE awake.
I cannot tell you how frustrated I was at that point. I had decided Abigail was too stubborn for this gradual method & was trying to talk myself & Brandon into letting her cry it out. We discussed & re-evaluated things for about an hour, while Abigail played energetically until 9pm. Finally, she seemed tired again, so we decided to start the entire bedtime routine over.
Brandon read her 2 books, I nursed & rocked, etc.  I decided not to try to the pacifier removal since we were trying to change so many things at once (naps, bedtime method, actual bed TIME being way off). It took a few attempts, but eventually I was able to get her to go to sleep while laying in her crib! YAY! I was back in bed by 9:25, so it really didn't take very long at all.
She slept until about 1:30am. I got up, nursed her, rocked, etc. Put her down while she was still slightly awake & she went back to sleep instantly. She then continued to wake up every hour or so for the rest of the night, but each time I was able to get her back to sleep in her crib, not in my arms. And we did not have to bail & take her in bed with us! At 4am when she woke up, I sent Brandon. He was able to get her back to sleep on his own - which is a BIG improvement. Before, she would have just cried & cried until I came in.

So over the next 10 days I'm going to try to focus on the positives. The positives from night 1 were:

• She went to sleep in her crib at bedtime & at each waking.
• Brandon was able to soothe her back to sleep.
• She woke up happy :)

Sleep training blogs over the next several days SHOULD be much shorter. I'll just review the evening's progress, or lack thereof, whatever the case may be.

Wish us luck! I'm sure things will get worse before they get better. I'm praying this method works for us! We all need more sleep!