Sleep Training

Our sweet little boy is over 5 1/2 months old. Since birth, we have both been willing, ready and able to do anything to make him smile. One of the things we discovered (thank you 'Healthy Sleep Habits, Healthy Baby' book) is that sleeping babies really are happier. And happier babies equal smiley babies! So, when he was 2 1/2 months old, we started on a serious nap schedule with him. Thanks to the awesome addition of SuperNanny McKenna to our parenting team, we were able to get Jamisen on a 3-naps-per-day schedule. That helped a lot with his happy demeanor.

But, while he slept well during the day (even if some of those naps were short naps), nighttime was a different story. Many nights would go by with him not clocking over 2 hours without waking up and needing our comfort. His Doctor told us that we should consider sleep training. But still, 6 weeks went by after that visit before Chris and I decided that we needed to teach him this essential skill. The kicker was the night he woke up over 20 times and needed us to put him back to sleep. He needed the sleep. We needed the sleep.

We had a double date with another couple who preached sleep training to us. With their cheerleading and buoyed by the support of my entire book club (all Mothers), we started on a Thursday night (10 days ago Thursday night). I slept upstairs in the guest room to keep a good handle on the sleep training.

The plan was simple:

Baby wakes up, let him cry for 5 minutes
Comfort him at 5 minutes (put pacifier back in, 'shhhhhhh' verbally and hold his hands for 10 seconds, leave the room)
If he continues crying, let him cry for 10 minutes.
Comfort him at 10 minutes of crying (put pacifier back in, 'shhhhhhh' verbally and hold his hands for 10 seconds, leave the room)
If he continues crying, let him cry for 15 minutes.
Comfort him at 15 minutes of crying (put pacifier back in, 'shhhhhhh' verbally and hold his hands for 10 seconds, leave the room)

And so on...

Thursday - Jamisen woke up 9 times between 7:30 p.m. and 6:30 a.m. The longest he cried was 28 minutes. The shortest he cried was 3 minutes.

Friday - Jamisen woke up 3 times between 7:30 and 6:30 a.m. The longest he cried was 8 minutes. The shortest he cried was 2 minutes. The longest he slept was 6 hours 28 minutes.

Saturday - Jamisen woke up 6 times between 7:30 and 6:30 a.m. The longest he slept was 4 hours 20 minutes. The longest he cried was 15 minutes.

Sunday - Jamisen woke up 4 times between 7:30 and 7 a.m. The longest he slept was 5 hours 29 minutes. The longest he cried was 29 minutes. But, after that 29 minutes, he only slept for 17 minutes before starting up the crying for 12 minutes again so that might count as 41 minutes?

Monday - Up 4 times. Longest cry was 10 minutes

Tuesday - Up 4 times. Longest cry was 5 minutes.

Wednesday - Up 6 times (lots after 4 a.m.). Longest cry was 5 minutes.

Thursday - Slept a full 6 hours in one stretch but was up 7 times before 6:30 a.m. and he cried for almost an hour at 4 a.m. When he woke up at 6:30, I pulled him into bed with me in the guest room and we both fell back asleep, exhausted, for an entire hour.

Friday - This night was almost bliss. He only woke up 2 times after 9:30 p.m. I almost flew with happiness because clearly, the system was working!

Saturday - Then my world came crashing down. Up 4 times. Blah blah blah blah blah. Refer to previous Sunday.

Moral of the story? Either our son is stubborn or we aren't doing SOMETHING right. Either way, we are tired. But, as soon as he smiles in the morning (after we've propped our eyelids up with toothpicks), we don't care. We'll do it all again as long as it takes. And, judging from our son and his stubbornness? It might take a long long time.