Out of curiosity

[theatokos]

[Poll #1398328]

Please feel free to comment!

Comments

[msmidge.livejournal.com]

I don't really understand the meaning of "sleep training." The only thing I've heard of in this context is letting the baby cry.

[ladyartemisa.livejournal.com]

sleep training is the nice way to say letting a child cry. whether in arms or by themselves. there are some more gentle ways to do it but to me they all suck. :p

[honeyrider.livejournal.com]

there are many methods of sleep-training that discourage letting the baby cry. dr. sears' "baby sleep" and elizabeth pantley's "no cry sleep solution" come to mind. both suggest responding to your child's cries.

[jesamin.livejournal.com]

Somewhere between 12 and 18 months, I actively night wean my kids and replace my boob with a sippy cup. The two big ones both started sleeping through the night around then and if they woke up, they'd reach for the cup themselves and go back to sleep. Then Charlie turned two and that all went to shit and she started waking up and begging to nurse a bazillion times but I refused and now she's back to sleeping through and waking up to nurse around 6.

[so-sporktastic.livejournal.com]

This, pretty much. I put a pack&play right next to the bed and started getting him to sleep in there. What used to be an hour-long saga of sleep is a five minute, "here's your sippy cup full of chamomile tea, goodnight, Ama will sit in the chair across the room with the night-light on" deal. I sit in my rocking chair and catch up with my laptop. Easy as pie. :)

[qibitum.livejournal.com]

So, fwiw, I bumped into something the other day that basically describes what R & I did w/S. It's not really what I would call "sleep training" at all, but rather was a way of helping him figure out how to sleep better/longer on his own:

http://www.handinhandparenting.org/csArticles/articles/000000/000029.htm

R's been studying/practicing the counseling philosophy behind this for a couple decades actually (as have I for the past ~8-9 years since we've been married), so we adapted our own path based on that thinking & our experience that it seems to work (ie, getting emotions out of your system *with supportive attention from an engaged listener*, rather than suppressing them & letting them build up).

Just putting it out there...

[miss-swamp.livejournal.com]

I guess it depends on how you define "sleeping through the night." They were doing the official 5-hours-or-more definition by 4 months or so on their own: 7:30-1:00 or so. But as you know, we did a modified Ferber (gave actual comfort, not just "check," but no food) around 7 months. That got us to 7:30-5:30, until recently.

[bloodfever.livejournal.com]

Ninja was sleeping from around 10.30pm to 6am (sometimes 5am) most of the time from 3 months, and we've had rough patches but has been doing it pretty much since. From 6 months he has slept from 8pm - 6am.

We didn't do sleep training of any kind, but we did stop offering food as the first method of comfort at night, trying pretty much everything first and using food as a backup plan (although even back then most of the time it only took one round of cuddle/pat to get him back to sleep). A bit harder for you to do with B since he knows the food comes from your person ;).

[seaivy.livejournal.com]

can't go by me. Son had multiple allergies - asthma - other things. Had a very special rare formula which was all he could eat. He wasn't that hungry during the day but woke up ravenous around 2am. You do what you have to do. Eventually he could eat real food and began to sleep through the night. He was always an early riser. 4am was up and at'em time. Somehow I survived until he was old enough to be up by himself. Fortunately he was always a careful child. Some books and toys in his room and some dry cereal to snack on managed to keep him amused til I got up at 6. No, he could not have all his toys in his room - dust etc.

My advice. just roll with it. Do what you are comfortable doing. There is no "right" way. No one solution is the one that "always" works or lasts forever. Just when you think you've got it solved things change.

[ewigweibliche.livejournal.com]

Right now we're in a really good place. He wakes once a night for a real feeding, sometimes (especially if he's teething) he'll comfort nurse a little. But last night he went until 5 am with out a feeding.

I was just mostly curious since I have such a wide array of mamas on my flist.

I Joined

[guidedmyself.livejournal.com]

Hey sis, Yup its me. I joined. Will set up Journal later.
Glad the little B is sleeping so well. Love ya!

Re: I Joined

[ewigweibliche.livejournal.com]

YAYAYAYAYAYAYAYAYAY!!!!!!

[lopezuna.livejournal.com]

We put our kid in his own room as an experiment at, I dunno, maybe 10 months. He magically went from waking 1-3 times per night (had to be breastfed to sleep again) to sleeping through 8.30pm-7am probably 2 nights out of 3. If I could go back in time, I'd definitely put him in his own room sooner.

[ewigweibliche.livejournal.com]

We tried to move B out of the bed an into the pack and play at 10 months. Hoo boy. Not a good idea. He sleeps much better next to us, and therefore so do we.

[seaivy.livejournal.com]

Our son NEVER slept in the same room with us. Because it wasn't the way things were done and because my husband needed his sleep. Yes, I know that sounds "anti-feminist". But it was true. He was working long odd hours and needed his sleep.

I think being in the parents room just adds to the problem for both baby and parents.

And a tip for later which seems to contradict what I am saying. Sometime after age three they wake in the middle of the night and want to get in your bed. The doctors then insisted you take them back to their room. Again and again. That way led to no sleep for everyone. Our solution was to have a quilt and pillow on the floor on my side of the bed (which was also near the heat). Son would just wander in and settle down to sleep beside the bed. After awhile I didn't even wake up. Eventually he didn't need to do that any more.

[msmidge.livejournal.com]

My son who's 2.75 just started doing this--I'll have to set up his nap mat in our room and see if that helps!

[ewigweibliche.livejournal.com]

I remember my sister and I doing that - waking up in the middle of the night. I had horrible nightmares and was repeatedly told to go back to my own room. I lay much of the blame for my anxiety issues on this. My sister got away with the little blanket next to the bed thing because she was a sleep walker and couldn't "control herself".

I really enjoy bedsharing with B. For a few months when he was 4-6 months he did better next to the bed, but after that he's been sleeping more soundly with us.

[keypike.livejournal.com]

My Mom did this for me too (blanket & pillow on the floor next to the bed).

[sapphire-kittum.livejournal.com]

Jayden started sleeping through the night from 7 weeks to 6 months, by himself. Then he went through a big phase where he woke every night at 2-3am, just for boob. We started to train him to sleep through the night at around 11 months, as I was going back to work. It went well. He was cranky when he woke up at 2-3am and realised that he wasn't going to get the boob, but he settled down after about 20 minutes. This went on for 5 nights, then he started sleeping through the night again.

Now, he only wakes up during the night if he is sick, poor baby.

[ewigweibliche.livejournal.com]

I am sure my feelings would be different if I had a different job, with stricter or earlier hours or more demanding tasks. Maybe if I was a single mother. As it is, I have the luxury of being able to be more flexible in time, spirit, levels of sleep, etc.

[readthisandweep.livejournal.com]

I'm struggling with the concept of 'training' & 'baby' since in my view (I'm old remember...) the baby time is largely about instinct.

Babies are small animals - they cry if they're hungry, in pain, uncomfortable or bored. So you feed 'em, change them & play with them. By & large a baby makes her/his own routine & forcing anything is unwise.

Babies in with parents is a matter of choice. As seaivy points out, things were different in 'our day' lol! My babies slept in their own rooms after six weeks & thrived. But unlike most mothers in those days, I carried mine in a sling quite a lot. I liked to have them close.

I was lucky - happy babies & no horror stories. There is IMHV, far too much interference from self-important 'experts' nowadays, & an obsession with weight gain & milestones etc. So long as they can tie their own shoelaces & go to the loo unaided by the time they go to school, they'll be fine.

[seaivy.livejournal.com]

LOL thank the goddess for velcro! In a house of right handers my left handed son couldn't tie his shoes LOL

[readthisandweep.livejournal.com]

One of mine was left-handed & I had to threaten teachers who insisted he must learn to write with his right (so to speak.) Can you imagine that kind of barbarity these days?

[ewigweibliche.livejournal.com]

My mother was born a lefty and had that trained right out of her! But I am a lefty and was allowed to be so!

[ewigweibliche.livejournal.com]

I agree with you. I do not think babies ought to be trained. Perhaps gently encouraged? But not trained.

We also wear B. Eventually he'll be too heavy for me, but for now I can do it happily!

When B came home (B was born 6 weeks early, spent one month in the NICU) the hospital assigned home health nurses to come in twice a week... every other day? something like that, to track B's weight. I had to ask them to stop coming because it was too stressful. B didn't grow much for the first couple months, but then..... voila! Now he is above the 50th percentile! All in his own time.

[miss-malloreee.livejournal.com]

We started using CIO at 6 months, but there were times before that that Anna would go all night (6-10hrs) without a bottle. She actually slept 6+ hrs from 6 weeks until 4 months & then started getting up at night 2-3 times until eventually she was waking up every hour, which was why we started CIO. During the time she was waking up a million times a night was also when my PPD peaked, we moved & we switched her formula.

[keypike.livejournal.com]

I think it was around 7 months when we did our 'sleep training' (which, fwiw, does not equal 'cry it out').

Our sleep training consisted of removing the soother from the nightime routine, adding a 'lovey' (stuffed animal in our case), and eliminating the middle-of-the-night feeding. The first night we just didn't give him his soother, and when he woke up we didn't give him a bottle (just went in and patted/shushed him until he went back to sleep). I was amazed at how quickly he went back to sleep, and it's been like that ever since.

He sleeps from 7:00 p.m. to anytime between 6:00-7:00 a.m. now (although we don't get him up until 6:45....if he wakes up before 6:45, he babbles to himself and plays with a crib toy that makes music, has buttons for him to push etc).

[hrafntinna.livejournal.com]

I am told I was sleeping through the night in well under 6 months. If you'd ever seen my father's reaction to being woken, this would make perfect sense to you.

[ewigweibliche.livejournal.com]

I am not surprised in the slightest.

Also, I miss you.