sleep training... yep again.

We previously sleep trained Elsie just before she turned six months old (read about it here and here).  E was sleeping swaddled in the rock 'n play, plus she wasn't falling asleep on her own.  She stopped letting me rock her to sleep easily, and I didn't want to create a nurse/feed to sleep habit, so sleep training it was to break all those habits.  It sucked.  But it worked for a little bit.  Then we started having issues with her going down for naps.  It would take her 30-40 minutes to put herself to sleep, and sometimes, well, I kind of need her to take a nap when I need her to take a nap.  Sorry Elsie.  #secondkidproblems

So I started nursing her to sleep.  It started off just being here and there, when I knew she really needed a nap and she just wasn't going to sleep.  Then it started happening more and more for naps, and then after a while I felt guilty nursing her for naps and then expecting her to go to bed on her own.  And it was just easier when we were traveling so much because she always fought going to sleep in the pack 'n play.

But hey, it worked.  And for the most part it didn't really affect her night time sleep.  She has been pretty much waking once a night since that time.  And throughout the most recent month 5-7 nights of the week her once is at like 5am, and even makes it until 6:15am sometimes.

Except nursing her to sleep ISN'T working anymore.  She regularly wakes up when I try to transfer her to the crib, and at that point if I leave her she just screams.  If I try to nurse her back to sleep it doesn't always work.  So she is skipping/missing a lot of naps.  Not to mention I can't be away for more than a couple hours at a time and I ALWAYS have to be the one to put her to bed.  That isn't really conducive to any date nights or the like.  I've missed a few events I really wanted to go to simply because I didn't want to burden any one with trying to get her to sleep, nor did I want to leave her upset.

Which means it is time to break the habit once and for all (I hope).

We started the Ferber method (progressive waiting approach) on Thursday night, and it went over much much better than I expected.  Bedtime was hard for me to give up nursing her to sleep, because we almost never had any issues with it (other than me wanting to be gone a couple evenings).  And she was quickly drifting off to sleep so I had to cut her off.  I gave Elsie some snuggles and laid her in her crib with her owl.  When I closed the door she cried, so I set the timer on my phone for five minutes.  By the time it went off she had already calmed down considerably, to the point that I didn't feel I needed to go back in there.  And less than 20 minutes after I put her in her crib she was asleep.  Really?  Just like that?  I was thrilled.

Naps yesterday went pretty well too.  I never had to check on her for the morning nap, and she was asleep in less than 20 minutes again.  For the afternoon nap I could tell she wasn't as tired, and while watching the monitor, shortly after I walked out, she threw her owl out.  I decided to just leave it be, she was quiet.  But she kept getting up and reaching for it.  At about the 20 minute mark I decided to go in and get it for her.  She cried HARD when I walked back out, but again, only for a minute or two.  I didn't think she was going to fall asleep because she was just playing around, but right when I was going to throw in the towel and go get her, she fell asleep.  SCORE.

Elsie only slept about 45 minutes for that nap, so she was pretty tired come bedtime.  I had to work hard to keep her from falling asleep while nursing (actually I'm not really sure I succeeded).  When I laid her down in the crib she attempted to protest, but her cries lasted less than two minutes and I'm pretty sure she just passed out.

Where I am running into the biggest problem, is early in the morning.  Yesterday she started stirring around 5am.  She started fussing around 5:30am.  And by 5:45am she was pissed and wanted me.  In the past I would have gone in shortly after 5, nursed her, put her back in her crib, and she most likely would have gone back to sleep.  But the truth is I do want to wean soon (there are only so many more swift kicks to the jaw I can take), and once I'm done nursing I don't really want her up for the day at 5:30am.  In my ideal world both girls would be in their beds until 7am.  Yep, that's all I'm asking for, 7am.  On a good day I'd take 6:30am.  But before that just makes me not a very good mom.  Not because I need to sleep (well sometimes), but because I crave a little alone time in the morning.  To workout, or shower, or just freaking sit on my computer because I can and it's quiet.

Right now I'm going to try and avoid nursing her until 6am, and hopefully keep pushing that time back by 10 minutes or so every few days until I'm not nursing her until 7am (the earliest time I ever intend on serving breakfast).  But we'll see how it goes.  Naturally I sat down to type this post out and now it's 6:05am and I haven't really heard anything from her.  Good work Elsie, good work.

I know sleep training isn't for everyone, but I like to share our experiences with it, because if the child takes to it I believe it is a truly beneficial process for everyone involved.  My life changed dramatically when we sleep trained Ryann, and I doubt the change will be quite that dramatic this time around, but I am excited to have a little bit more freedom in my life.  And I honestly expected her to resist and scream a whole lot more, but Elsie surprised me.  Thank goodness.

sleep training update

After a little over two weeks I figured it was about time for an update on how the sleeping situation has been panning out around here.  The short story?  Elsie is putting herself to sleep, in her crib, unswaddled, but is not sleeping through the night and it isn't always without tears.  But we have accomplished the goals we set out to achieve.

Alright, the longer story.

Elsie is all over the place with this whole putting herself to sleep thing.  Sometimes she doesn't fuss one bit, and only takes 10-15 minutes of just kind of rolling around and rubbing the sheet to put herself to sleep.  Sometimes she still screams like crazy and I have to go in a couple times to rub her back.  And sometimes she just sort of complains but eventually goes to sleep without any assistance from me.  Thus far it is hard for me to find any correlation between something going on prior to a nap and her crying episodes.  It is definitely more difficult for her to go to sleep quickly when she gets over tired, but I still have a hard time gauging her sleepy signs.  She'll be yawning and rubbing her eyes after 90 minutes, but if I lay her down she is pissed and doesn't fall asleep until the two hour mark.  So I don't know.

Nap length is also a place where we are struggling.  I know this is the point where I believe we ended up forcing Ryann in to a two nap schedule to try and help consolidate her nap hours, but Elsie just doesn't seem ready for that yet.  She doesn't freak out when I keep her up longer than two hours, she is really a good baby and takes it, but I can tell she is tired and I just feel bad.  So we're still doing three naps.  Unfortunately sometimes she only makes it 30-40 minutes, and then she is just grumpy.  I usually let her fuss for 10 minutes if she wakes up before the hour mark, and sometimes she'll go back to sleep, but not always.

quite the view to wake up to... on the to-do list, figure out where to mount the camera

Bed time can be touch and go too.  She either needs to fall asleep nursing and be sound asleep when I put her down, or be fairly awake.  Drowsy doesn't work for her, if I put her down pretty drowsy that is when she cries the most.  It is so incredibly sad.  Where I've seen the most improvement is the middle of the night.  That is the one time where she almost never fusses or needs any help from me.  In general I have to feed her once, sometime between 3:30am & 5:30am.  I much prefer 5am or after (obviously) because then I can just get up and go run or get something done when she is back in her crib.  And those nights she usually sleeps until 7:30-7:45am.  On the days when I feed her between 3:30-4:30am she is up between 6:30-6:45am.  There have been a couple nights that she has gotten up twice, and one night where the poor thing really did try to put herself to sleep after I fed her, for over an hour, and just couldn't.  So I ended up going back in and nursing her a bit longer until she was asleep.  I felt so bad.  But really the middle of the night has been pretty good.

I'm hoping that we don't ever really need to deal with night weaning, and that she just does it on her own.  Plus, I really truly don't mind the 5:00-5:30am wake-up, because at least then I can go run knowing that she won't need me for another three hours.  And I don't have to deal with pumping.  Because I hate pumping.

Aside from freeing me from spending hours trying to get or keep Elsie to sleep, my favorite part of this whole ordeal has been seeing the positions she ends up sleeping in.  She instantly seems older and bigger to me, not all swaddled up on her back.  For the most part she sleeps on her belly.  Occasionally she falls asleep on her side, and once on her back, but she never sleeps as well like that.

As much as I hate this process, I still maintain sleep training Ryann was one of the most beneficial things for our family, and I hope that in a few more weeks I feel the same about our experience with Elsie.  I know that there will be many things that might bring sleepless nights, but for the most part I am confident that Elsie will be able to be more independent in the sleep department. 
  

boo sleep training.

I know I know.  You're probably thinking either A) this girl talks about her kids' sleeping habits too much or B) if you don't like sleep training (in our case, a cry-it-out method) why are you doing it?  Well if Elsie would let me rock her to sleep, in a reasonable amount of time, and actually stay asleep, unswaddled, in her crib, then you better believe I'd be in that glider snuggling my baby.  But it just wasn't the case.  She was still sleeping partially swaddled in the rock 'n play and needed me to rock or nurse her to sleep.  Honestly it still wouldn't have been that bad, but I can't just ditch Ry for 20+ minutes here and there to get Elsie to nap.  And Elsie gets so sad and pathetic when she is tired.

So Sunday we went all Ferber on her adorable, unsuspecting little self.

uh mom?  what the heck is going on here?

Bedtime went pretty much as I suspected.  E cried and cried and CRIED.  It was so sad.  Elsie is a really good baby, she tolerates and puts up with a lot, so we rarely hear a real true cry from her.  My heart was breaking.  I quickly wanted to give up and go get her, but I told myself I was committing to three nights, and if after three nights things didn't look much better than screw it.  We'll figure something else out.  I went in at the appropriate intervals according to Ferber's book to rub her back and try and soothe her a bit, but my presence did nothing for her.  She just continued to scream.  After about 35 minutes she finally calmed to sad, pathetic little sobs, and by the 40 minute mark she was asleep (about 9:15pm).

Elsie continued to be restless for another couple of hours, which was not surprising at all.  I'd be a little out of sorts too, if I went from sleeping all wrapped up in an upright position to completely free on my belly (she immediately rolls to her belly when she is put down).  Thankfully she never truly woke up and required me to come back in there until 3am.

She woke up at 3, and was fussing a bit here and there.  She seemed to be trying to go back to sleep, but couldn't.  And her fussing was starting to escalate.  So I decided to feed her.  She has been waking between 3-5am for a feeding for quite a while, so I assumed she was legitimately hungry.  Plus, I'm not sleeping training in the hopes of her sleeping through the night.  That isn't something I'm concerned with yet.  I just don't need an hour+ circus trying to get her back to sleep.  Anyway, I made certain to not let her fall completely asleep nursing.  When she was done, I rocked her just a little, gave her a kiss, told her I loved her and laid her back in the crib.  I was tense walking back to my room, expecting another 40+ minutes of tears.

But she didn't cry.  Not at all.  There was maybe a peep or two while she tried to figure out how to get comfortable, and it did take her at least 20 minutes to fall asleep.  But she didn't cry!  I was so incredibly thankful for that.  She slept for just over two more hours, and woke up for the day around 6:20.

There were still lots of tears for naps on Monday, but for each one it took her less than 15 minutes to fall asleep.  Unfortunately she only slept for half an hour.  The third nap of the day I decided to give her 10 minutes to see if she could fall back asleep, and she did at the nine minute mark.  It was only additional 40 minutes, but she needed sleep.

Elsie's thoughts on sleep training...

Monday bedtime went very similar to Sunday, lots and lots of tears.  Part of the problem, I think, is she is falling asleep nursing, and then is ultra pissed when I lay her down because I don't wait until she is out cold.  That time it only was 30 minutes of crying before she was down for the night, so an improvement I guess, but she was also more worn out from barely napping all day.  She did wake again around 3am.  I watched her try to go back to sleep for about 15 minutes, but she was starting to get more and more worked up.  I went in to change her diaper and feed her and she had pooped.  I'm sure that is part of the reason she couldn't sleep.  But after she was fed she went to sleep by herself with minimal resistance, and slept until 7:30.

The first two naps on Tuesday were the same as Monday, took about 10 minutes for her to go to sleep, and then she slept for about 35 minutes.  For her third nap she actually slept about 90 minutes without waking up.  I was thrilled!  But bedtime was still awful.  Not quite as bad as the previous two days, but still 25 minutes with a significant amount of tears.  And the middle of the night didn't go quite as well.  She woke up very upset around 11:30pm.  I tried to give her a few to see if she could figure it out on her own, but she just got louder and louder.  I decided to feed her and lay her back down.  She didn't fall back to sleep quite as easily as the other two nights, but she did manage to go back to sleep.  However she woke again at 4:30am.  This time I changed her and fed her, and laid her back down.  Again, more fussing than the previous two nights, but she still went back to sleep without me coming back in the room, and was out until 7:45.

This morning nap didn't go very well at all.  Her cries were much more intense than yesterday during nap time, and it took her a good 20 minutes to fall asleep.  And she was only asleep for maybe, 5-10 minutes.  We had a play date planned, so we left the house.  She fell asleep in the car on the way home and slept for about 20 minutes.  Maybe an hour later she was rubbing her eyes like crazy, so I decided to put her down for another nap.  She cried hard for another 15 minutes before finally giving in to sleep.  She woke up crying 40 minutes later.  It had been three hours since she last ate, so I decided to just get her up and feed her.  She passed back out.  I know I should probably have kept her up, for the sake of her learning to put herself to sleep without sucking, but I felt so bad because she was so tired.  So tired that after about 15 minutes without her squirming at all, I was able to carry her from our family room to her room and lay her down (in the rock 'n play, whoops) without her flinching.

So I'm not really sure where to go from here.  I know we're only on day three, and we have three habits we're trying to break (swaddling, sleeping in the rock 'n play, nursing/sucking/rocking to sleep) so I need to cut us both some slack.  But with Ryann I saw a significant improvement by the third day of the Ferber method.  I'm sure it is harder with Elsie because not only are we changing up the situation entirely, but we don't really have a set schedule.  What we do changes daily.  Nor does she have a consistent wake time.  I wish someone could tell me exactly what to do.  I keep hearing just do what works for your family, but I'm not really sure what works for us, you know?  I hate hearing her cry, it hurts my heart so much, but spending so much time rocking her doesn't work either.  I guess I'll give it a few more days and see where we are at.  If it isn't getting better, well... I don't know.

And because I regularly get asked on instagram, we use this monitor.