Let's all hold hands and cry it out

Not in a schmultzy group therapy kind of way but a "my baby doesn't know how to settle himself to sleep so I'm going to let him cry it out" kind of way. And yes, there were tears. Plenty of them. From Little Red. But mostly from me ( no, not really but I don't want to sound like an ice queen - I simply managed to dissociate myself from the sound).

Baby Daddy Nick and I were pretty over the fact that a) the wee peanut's cot was literally attached to our bed and b) we were still getting up (rolling over?) every 1-2 hours to either feed him or put the dummy back in. No rest for the wicked and all that but come on!! I was turning less into a normal, functioning human being and more into a mean devil zombie with each passing day. So! I figured it was time for some evasive action. I sat down with the lappy and did some serious swotting on sleep. Why I didn't think to do this sooner is beyond me but better late than never, right?

I made the executive decision to go with the "verbal reassurance" technique - pretty much the beginner's guide to "cry it out"/Ferber method - and go with it we did! I took the reins and insisted Nick sleep in the spare room and cook dinner so I could go full bore in tackling Little Red's night-time shenanigans (why is it when babies are concerned we women always seem to be made of steel and nails whereas men turn to custard and cuddles as soon as a tear is shed? I suppose us ladies are the alpha, after all). 

When I first had Redford I swore I would never result to this technique as I thought it was beyond cruel to let your poor defenseless bundle cry themselves to sleep. But now, when I weigh up my sanity with his tears for a night or two, my sanity wins out big time. So I thought I'd document the whole thing for y'all....

First though, a bit of background:

Little Red has always been a totally crap day sleeper but from 5 weeks started sleeping 7-8 hours a night. He even settled himself! Admittedly, he spent a lot of time in bed with us but who cares? I'd rather have solid sleep than the bed to myself. Then, wham! We hit five months and he started waking at 3am. Then he started to wake at 12am and 3am. Then it turned into bed at 9pm, dummy run at 10pm, comfort feed at 12am, dummy run at 1am, real feed at 2am, comfort feed at 4am, real feed at 5.30am and so on and so forth and you get the picture. He'd gone from self-sufficient wee man to clingy comfort feeder in the space of a week. I was not a happy chappy and neither was he. So in comes Ferber, we go sans dummy (cold turkey, I tell ya, it's the only way to go) and this is how it went....

NIGHT ONE:   Little Red has his bedtime bottle at 7pm and after 5 minutes of sitting and burping we sing our bedtime song (Hallelujah by Leonard Cohen but sung in the style of Jeff Buckley) on the way to the bedroom. We turn on the white noise (a rather serene mountain lake but I reckon it's actually a stream) and bubs goes down with Denver, Patrick and Sophie around 7.30pm.

This is Denver the dinosaur. He appears to have eaten a disco ball - his

tummy is reminiscent of Studio 54 come night-time.

This is Patrick. He's the firm favourite. The BFF, even. Fire and brimstone

shall rain down should you forget Patrick. 

 This is Sophie. She's French and rather exotic and has a good ol' squeak

when chewed on.Yay for squeaky things.

Anyway, where were we? Ah, yes. So Little Red is in the cot! Awake! I left the room and the crying began. Five minutes and I went in to verbally reassure him. Again ten minutes later and then fifteen minutes. Et voila! About half an hour after going down he was fast asleep and we didn't hear a peep (a very rare happening) until 2.10am. I was a little unsure what to do so figured I'd let him cry - I thought perhaps he'd go back to sleep - but after 45 minutes it was clear that he most definitely wasn't so I got up, fed him (he guzzled!) then put him back to bed awake. He then slept through to 5.30am so I bought him into bed with me and we snoozed until 9am. Bliss!

NIGHT TWO:   It was easier on the second night as we knew what to expect. The routine went as per usual (although we were still getting into the swing of a set time for bed) and Little Red was in his cot by 8pm. This time there was only 15 minutes of crying! He woke at 1.50am so I fed him and then he went back down until 5.20am. I fed him again and then tried to put him back in the cot but he wasn't having a bucket of it so up we got - a slight shock to the system being up that early, but hey, I ain't complaining!

NIGHT THREE:   We've now moved down to a 10 minute settle time, yay for progress! Down at 7.40pm with a wake time of 12am. I have to admit I felt a bit nervous with the midnight wake, it seemed he was back to his old tricks so I thought I'd wait a bit and see what happened and you know what? He cried for 10 minutes and then sozzled himself back to sleep not to wake until 5.30am - superb!

NIGHT FOUR:   Naughty Mummy forgot about Little Red's arvo nap so he was absolutely knackered by 7pm. He gulped down his bottle, was in bed by 7.15pm and asleep in less than a minute. He woke at 2.50am for a feed and then slept through til 6.45am. I'm really liking where this is headed....

So it's Night Seven tonight and goodness me have we come a long way from those disturbed nights. We've been doing a breast feed at 4.30pm, dinner at 5pm and then Redford's ready for his bottle by 7pm. He's still crying when we put him down but it's usually only for 5 or so minutes. Midnight feeds usually happen between 2am and 3am (after which I make sure he's still awake when I put him back down) and he's now sleeping til 6.30/7am.

It's utterly amazing how well this has worked. I was terrified upon starting that it just wouldn't stick, that I'd end up with a baby that never slept and a body and brain that was slowly idling down a path of insanity. All three of us are happier and healthier - Nick is refreshed when he leaves for work as he's not suffering broken sleep - even if he does manage to snooze on through most of it, I'm getting two solid blocks of dream time thus having so much energy during the day I resemble the Energizer bunny and Little Red is chilled out and just.... awesome! 

I'm pretty chuffed. We're all pretty chuffed. Long live happy, sleeping family times! 

PS. This technique isn't for every baby, but if you think you and your little tot can handle it - I highly recommend it. A few nights of yucky crying is well worth the results!