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Thursday, September 15, 2011

Sleep Training: Night 1

I just wanted to thank you ladies for all your help and advise on sleep training, I really appriciate it.

Nap time yesterday went great, I knew she was tired so I laid her in her crib and turned on her music box and gave her her bear that she sleeps with and then I walked out.  I could hear her playing around up there, she wasn't crying so that was good.  I went up 15 minutes later to check on her cause I didn't hear banging on the walls.  She was fast sleep, I felt like YES I could do this and night time will hopefully be this easy.


Boy was I wrong!!

Night time rolled around and around 7:30 I gave her a bath, we played for a little bit and then I layed her in her bouncer and gave her her bottle.  While she drinking she was kinda dozing off, so I though yes she's tired so I'll be able to lay her in bed and she'll fall asleep like at nap time cause she tired.  NO!  I took her upstaires gave her kisses and told her good night, I turned on her music player and this little light show on the roof and gave her her bear and then walked out.  There was no crying, so I was thinking I got this. I went in to put Kaylee to bed and read her a book and not even 10 mins after putting her in bed Keira started crying.  I went back in laid her down and walked out.  She got back up and was screaming at this point, it was breaking my heart but I stood my ground and waited 10 minutes outside the door.  She was still crying after 10 minutes so I went back in there to lay her back down and pat her back to try to get her to calm down. It worked and she was drifting off to sleep, so I bent down so she couldn't see me and she was ok, so I crawled out of the room and 5 minutes later she started crying again.  It was a weak cry and then quiet, weak cry and then quiet, she did that for about 10 minutes and then I didn't hear anymore crying.  I waited about 20 minutes before going in to check on her...she was finally sleeping.  It took her about 30 minutes to fall asleep, I guess that's not bad for the 1st night.

So I headed to bed around 10, lets fast foward to 1:30am, she wakes up. She was standing up in crib and talking like it was time to be awake.  I tried to give her her pacifier and lay her down but she flipped over and got right back up.  So I tried that a few times and tried patting her back, it wasn't working she was getting really worked up and mad.  While doing my research a little online too it said instead of making them a milk bottle give them water.  So I made her a 4oz bottle of just water and gave her that, she drank it and laid there for about 10 minutes after cooing and then drifted off to sleep.  All of that took about 45 minutes to get her to go back to sleep.  I don't know if that was the right thing to do by giving her the water or if I shouldn't have given her anything.  She woke up at 6:15am.  Its now 9am and she is about to go down for a nap cause she's already tired.

I don't know I guess I can say that the first night went ok, I don't know if you'd consider it a total success or not.  I guess I'll just have to keep at it and hope for the best, right!?  Its so hard not to slip back into what makes things easier, like picking her up and just rocking her so that you can go back to sleep.  But I know I need to be consistant and not give in to my temptations as hard as that may be.  I just hate seeing my baby upset and seeing her like that makes me want to pick her up and snuggle her.

Thank you guys again for all your help
Hopefully each day it will get a little easier and better

7 comments:

  1. You did great! And so did she!

    Honestly for the first night... that's pretty great. Just stick to it!

    And its so funny how she wont fall asleep at night by herself but will at naptime. She's just too darn smart!

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  2. I know I don't have any experience with this...yet...but it sounds like you did an awesome job! And I think that she did great too! :-) Keep at it!!! I also love reading this, it helps me get great ideas of how to deal with situations.

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  3. WOW! Great job! Each night will get easier and easier and keep the end product in sight - a full night of rest!

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  4. Hm....my best friend is having a hard time with her 9 month old son sleeping through the night as well, and he's not really teething a whole lot yet otherwise I'd say that was the problem. Her blog is http://demureprincess.blogspot.com if you want to look her up--she's got some great blog posts and I'm sure she'd appreciate advice and venting from a fellow mommy who is having a hard time getting her kid to sleep! :)

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  5. I think that's great for the first night- warning, she may get wise to the whole thing and it may get worse before it gets better- but hopefully not! It sounds like you did great and were consistent!

    And a tip that helps me with her crying is to know that she isn't crying because she is fearful or hurting, she is simply crying because she is protesting the change. She wants to be in control and will protest until she is used to the new way of doing things.

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  6. I think you did AWESOME! I was reading articles about it as well as our pediatrician told us that babies Sophies age and up (so Keira's age) so NOT need to eat in the middle of the night! So starting with water is good in case she gets thirsty. It is also okay to leave water in her crib...just not milk or juice (which I know you know haha) so if she is waking up because she's thisty the water should be fine for her and hopefully she will just get it on her own and fall back asleep!

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