When Attachment Parents Try to Sleep Train
My precious bundle of joy didn't sleep through the night until the day before she turned 8 months old. If you had told me that when she was born, I might have never let my mom leave. Our sleepless nights began during pregnancy, as I either needed to go to the bathroom every couple hours or as my stomach grew to the point that rolling over would cause aches and pains. I thought, surely my kid will be easy going because my mom said that I was! The other thought I kept having was that all the kids I babysat in high school were great sleepers. Parenting rule #1 - all babies are different. Don't compare kids. (Now I know that they probably weren't just born that way; those parents were just more experienced than I am.)
But with that being said, some advice really does transcend above the rest. Take, for instance, sleep training. When you hear that phrase, you probably think of the "cry it out" method. "I can't possibly let my baby cry herself to sleep!" Okay, first of all, sleep training doesn't mean that you place your child in his or her crib at bedtime and walk away until you get up in the morning. That's just laughable. You can sleep train without letting your child cry for any more than five minutes at a time. I'm living proof. Second of all, when you haven't slept through the night in a year between the third trimester sleep disruption and, you know, having the baby, you stop worrying so much about what might happen and you start giving new ideas a try. I'm a teacher who has moderate anxiety issues and enjoys exercise. That doesn't mix well with zero sleep. I was desperate when I tried this.
Our small town doesn't have many restaurants, but one little Tex-Mex joint has become a regular haunt for us because of Victor, our regular server, and the breezy patio. I don't go there for the food. It's a nice way to get out of the house without actually having to do anything, which is great if you have a little disposable income, and until we decided it was time to start trying to have a baby, we didn't. One Friday night, the family that sat beside us caught our eye because they had been there alongside us just a week or two earlier (and we have since become friends). We struck up a conversation and of course it revolved around our kids. Their toddler was a pretty terrible sleeper too, but they had tried the Sleep Sense program and had had immediate success. At the time, Madison was six months old and sleeping in our room in a bassinet for no more than two hours at a time each night. We had tried swaddling, soothing bedtime routines, white noise, cosleeping, and even solids at dinnertime. You name it, we tried it, but nothing ever worked. When we heard about Sleep Sense, we gave it a try. Spoiler alert: It wasn't exactly right for us, so we combined it with our pediatrician's advise and eventually found success.
We align a lot with attachment parenting. We also let her choose the activity when she's playing. We pick her up and entertain her ourselves when she gets bored. We cuddle the ever-living heck out of her. We let her choose when she eats. We even make her organic purees. We are the last people you'd expect to sleep train their baby, but we did it after talking with our friends at the restaurant. (The sleep training program they tried was a bit much for us; our friends made an informal contract with themselves that said that they wouldn't break from the routine, but we totally mess up our routine from time to time). Anyways...
Basically, the program starts with and revolves around a routine. The child has his or her own bed in his or her own room. The parents set a bedtime and a consistent routine, and start Night 1 off with that routine. There's not much else to it besides committing to your decision. After you choose your routine, you basically just have to decide what you're going to do while your kid is awake in the crib and commit to not putting the baby all the way to sleep yourself. The guidelines are that the kid should be put to bed at the same time every night in his or her own bed and that you shouldn't offer a sleep prop such as a pacifier or rush to put him or her back to sleep when they wake up. Other than that, you just kind of have to figure out what works for you.
Some options that I see for getting your baby to sleep during sleep training with minimal crying are:
1. Sit on the floor by the crib and pat her or hold hands
2. Sit in the room and gently talk to your baby to remind them that you are there (this makes Madison more upset though)
3. Set a timer on your phone and leave the room, coming back to lay them back down and pat them at regular intervals.
I tried all of these when Madison was six months old and failed miserably because I wasn't willing to follow the most important rule: Baby needs her own room.
When you think about how often we move and make noise when we sleep, it makes sense that a sensitive little one who doesn't know how to fall back asleep would be awoken several times a night and do nothing but cry. It's unfortunate, but that's just how it is. Think about everything else kids have to learn. You have to teach them not to hit, not to yell at people, not to lie, not to throw temper tantrums. They usually aren't born knowing how to fall sleep by themselves either.
After I failed at sleep training, I got really discouraged and really moody for about two more months until Madison had two straight weeks of waking up 4 or 5 times while I was home for summer break. At that, I decided I was done messing around. No more winging it and hoping for the best. She was getting her own room and we were trying it again. She happened to be turning 8 months old the next day.
We moved her crib into her room right in time for her afternoon nap, rocked her until she was nice and relaxed, and set her in the bed. She fussed for several minutes, but we always went back in and offered her the pacifier that she'd spit out. (Sleep Sense doesn't recommend pacifiers because it's just something else that you have to help them with when they wake up, but I use one anyways.) After two or three tries of this, she ended up falling asleep as soon as she had her pacifier. She napped for an hour straight, which was a record, and we had hope again for the evening.
Once the day drew to a close, we took our failed bedtime routine and modified it a little based on what we had recently observed in Madison. On our anniversary, some friends who are very familiar with Madison came over to keep her while we went to dinner. It didn't go so well, but once we were home and had her in bed, she slept until 2 AM and then until morning after that. With that, we decided to make her bedtime a little later - 8 PM. Even though sleep training had previously failed, we had continued to be consistent with the bedtime routine, so Night 1 wasn't so bad.
Bedtime routine starts way before bed:
5 PM - Eat some solids and have play time
6 PM - Play time and walk
7 PM - Bath time
7:30 PM - PJ's and story time (or just cuddle time in the rocker if she's exhausted)
7:45-8 PM - Baby is in her crib with a paci and we leave the room
8 PM until she falls asleep - We check on her at regular intervals, using my phone's timer
*Most of this advice was given to us by our pediatrician before we even heard of sleep training. This isn't from the Sleep Sense program that my friend purchased; it's just a mix of advice from our pediatrician and what Madison likes to do in the evenings.
Y'all. It works. She slept through the night for the first time in her LIFE when we moved this party to her bedroom.
The second night, she slept through the night without crying at all at bedtime. The timer wasn't even needed.
The third night was the 4th of July, so when she woke up at 4 AM, I attributed it to fireworks. It wasn't that loud, but it was still enough to wake her.
--
We are on the fifth night now, and she is still waking up at 2 AM sharp. She'll only go back to sleep after nursing, which we honestly kind of expected because she isn't weaned yet.
--
Update: We are in the second week, and she goes back and forth between sleeping through the night and waking up in the wee hours of the morning. It doesn't appear to be related to what she eats at night or how long we leave her sound machine on. Last night, it was off and she woke up around 4 AM, but sometimes when she wakes up the machine is still going. I'll be more consistent about leaving it on the "ocean" setting all night long to make sure that's not a factor.
--
Hopefully, this post gives you some hope if you're struggling with your little one. But if you're like me, this post will only make you more upset because it involves your baby being away from you at night. As desperate as I was, I never once wanted to just stick her in a room and leave her there. Once I tried it though, I felt like all my anxiety had been silly. Madison only thinks she needs me at night. Other than when she's hungry (because she's still pretty young), she doesn't even know that I'm not there.
As she gets a little older and this sleep training thing is more solid, I'll update the post.
For now, I'm calling it baby steps. We're just about there.
But with that being said, some advice really does transcend above the rest. Take, for instance, sleep training. When you hear that phrase, you probably think of the "cry it out" method. "I can't possibly let my baby cry herself to sleep!" Okay, first of all, sleep training doesn't mean that you place your child in his or her crib at bedtime and walk away until you get up in the morning. That's just laughable. You can sleep train without letting your child cry for any more than five minutes at a time. I'm living proof. Second of all, when you haven't slept through the night in a year between the third trimester sleep disruption and, you know, having the baby, you stop worrying so much about what might happen and you start giving new ideas a try. I'm a teacher who has moderate anxiety issues and enjoys exercise. That doesn't mix well with zero sleep. I was desperate when I tried this.
Our small town doesn't have many restaurants, but one little Tex-Mex joint has become a regular haunt for us because of Victor, our regular server, and the breezy patio. I don't go there for the food. It's a nice way to get out of the house without actually having to do anything, which is great if you have a little disposable income, and until we decided it was time to start trying to have a baby, we didn't. One Friday night, the family that sat beside us caught our eye because they had been there alongside us just a week or two earlier (and we have since become friends). We struck up a conversation and of course it revolved around our kids. Their toddler was a pretty terrible sleeper too, but they had tried the Sleep Sense program and had had immediate success. At the time, Madison was six months old and sleeping in our room in a bassinet for no more than two hours at a time each night. We had tried swaddling, soothing bedtime routines, white noise, cosleeping, and even solids at dinnertime. You name it, we tried it, but nothing ever worked. When we heard about Sleep Sense, we gave it a try. Spoiler alert: It wasn't exactly right for us, so we combined it with our pediatrician's advise and eventually found success.
We align a lot with attachment parenting. We also let her choose the activity when she's playing. We pick her up and entertain her ourselves when she gets bored. We cuddle the ever-living heck out of her. We let her choose when she eats. We even make her organic purees. We are the last people you'd expect to sleep train their baby, but we did it after talking with our friends at the restaurant. (The sleep training program they tried was a bit much for us; our friends made an informal contract with themselves that said that they wouldn't break from the routine, but we totally mess up our routine from time to time). Anyways...
Basically, the program starts with and revolves around a routine. The child has his or her own bed in his or her own room. The parents set a bedtime and a consistent routine, and start Night 1 off with that routine. There's not much else to it besides committing to your decision. After you choose your routine, you basically just have to decide what you're going to do while your kid is awake in the crib and commit to not putting the baby all the way to sleep yourself. The guidelines are that the kid should be put to bed at the same time every night in his or her own bed and that you shouldn't offer a sleep prop such as a pacifier or rush to put him or her back to sleep when they wake up. Other than that, you just kind of have to figure out what works for you.
Some options that I see for getting your baby to sleep during sleep training with minimal crying are:
1. Sit on the floor by the crib and pat her or hold hands
2. Sit in the room and gently talk to your baby to remind them that you are there (this makes Madison more upset though)
3. Set a timer on your phone and leave the room, coming back to lay them back down and pat them at regular intervals.
I tried all of these when Madison was six months old and failed miserably because I wasn't willing to follow the most important rule: Baby needs her own room.
When you think about how often we move and make noise when we sleep, it makes sense that a sensitive little one who doesn't know how to fall back asleep would be awoken several times a night and do nothing but cry. It's unfortunate, but that's just how it is. Think about everything else kids have to learn. You have to teach them not to hit, not to yell at people, not to lie, not to throw temper tantrums. They usually aren't born knowing how to fall sleep by themselves either.
After I failed at sleep training, I got really discouraged and really moody for about two more months until Madison had two straight weeks of waking up 4 or 5 times while I was home for summer break. At that, I decided I was done messing around. No more winging it and hoping for the best. She was getting her own room and we were trying it again. She happened to be turning 8 months old the next day.
We moved her crib into her room right in time for her afternoon nap, rocked her until she was nice and relaxed, and set her in the bed. She fussed for several minutes, but we always went back in and offered her the pacifier that she'd spit out. (Sleep Sense doesn't recommend pacifiers because it's just something else that you have to help them with when they wake up, but I use one anyways.) After two or three tries of this, she ended up falling asleep as soon as she had her pacifier. She napped for an hour straight, which was a record, and we had hope again for the evening.
Once the day drew to a close, we took our failed bedtime routine and modified it a little based on what we had recently observed in Madison. On our anniversary, some friends who are very familiar with Madison came over to keep her while we went to dinner. It didn't go so well, but once we were home and had her in bed, she slept until 2 AM and then until morning after that. With that, we decided to make her bedtime a little later - 8 PM. Even though sleep training had previously failed, we had continued to be consistent with the bedtime routine, so Night 1 wasn't so bad.
Bedtime routine starts way before bed:
5 PM - Eat some solids and have play time
6 PM - Play time and walk
7 PM - Bath time
7:30 PM - PJ's and story time (or just cuddle time in the rocker if she's exhausted)
7:45-8 PM - Baby is in her crib with a paci and we leave the room
8 PM until she falls asleep - We check on her at regular intervals, using my phone's timer
*Most of this advice was given to us by our pediatrician before we even heard of sleep training. This isn't from the Sleep Sense program that my friend purchased; it's just a mix of advice from our pediatrician and what Madison likes to do in the evenings.
Y'all. It works. She slept through the night for the first time in her LIFE when we moved this party to her bedroom.
The second night, she slept through the night without crying at all at bedtime. The timer wasn't even needed.
The third night was the 4th of July, so when she woke up at 4 AM, I attributed it to fireworks. It wasn't that loud, but it was still enough to wake her.
--
We are on the fifth night now, and she is still waking up at 2 AM sharp. She'll only go back to sleep after nursing, which we honestly kind of expected because she isn't weaned yet.
--
Update: We are in the second week, and she goes back and forth between sleeping through the night and waking up in the wee hours of the morning. It doesn't appear to be related to what she eats at night or how long we leave her sound machine on. Last night, it was off and she woke up around 4 AM, but sometimes when she wakes up the machine is still going. I'll be more consistent about leaving it on the "ocean" setting all night long to make sure that's not a factor.
--
Hopefully, this post gives you some hope if you're struggling with your little one. But if you're like me, this post will only make you more upset because it involves your baby being away from you at night. As desperate as I was, I never once wanted to just stick her in a room and leave her there. Once I tried it though, I felt like all my anxiety had been silly. Madison only thinks she needs me at night. Other than when she's hungry (because she's still pretty young), she doesn't even know that I'm not there.
As she gets a little older and this sleep training thing is more solid, I'll update the post.
For now, I'm calling it baby steps. We're just about there.
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