Please. She's 7.5 months and it's no longer working for us, and probably hasn't for a long time.
I need ideas on how to stop, not involving CIO. I tried that last week and she got so worked up she barfed everywhere.
Help!!!!!
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So it may involve some crying, but that doesn't have to mean CIO. You could try doing the routine, putting her in the crib, and then just sitting next to her. Occasionally, reassure her verbally, or pat her a little, but make sure that she falls asleep by herself eventually. She might not get so worked up if you are right there.
I know the pick up/put down worked for a lot of people, too.
I would read the No Cry Sleep Solution- it has a ton of different tricks to try.
Whatever you do, give it at least 3-5 days. It takes a while for something to work, and consistency is super important.Good luck!
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Following because we are working through this right now. No Cry Sleep Solution suggests starting by unlatching before baby is in a deep sleep. If she roots around, you relatch for a short time and repeat. It can take a while but we've been trying with some success. Also like @Silva: mentioned, sometimes I can get LO to fall asleep with me just being in the room, maybe patting her. This never used to work but has a few times in the last week or so since I started trying to unlatch her sooner.
We've had a lot of stops and starts with this so I can't say how well it's working yet. I am committing to trying to be more consistent with her this week. We had shots and a cold that set us back but I guess there will always be something like that going on.
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I eventually had to do CIO, but before that, I think one thing that helped was moving the actual feeding nursing to the living room, before going in to her room and getting ready for nap. So, regular, full nursing session in the living room, lights on, then go into her room, change, sleep sack, lights down, sound machine on, and comfort nurse to sleep. I feel like it helped at least break the association of really eating and going to sleep, though it kept the comfort sucking.
Sitting next to her crib with her never worked for us-- she got more upset that we were there and not picking her up than if we just left her. Does she nurse to sleep at night too? We had an easier time breaking the habit at bedtime, got her used to falling asleep on her own, then a few weeks later tackled naps. But like I said, CIO was the only way we could do it.
Does she have a lovey? That could help too.
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Is your husband around to help for evening routine? We ended up having my husband do the bedtime routine for a week and that helped get her out of the habit of nursing to sleep. We did have to help her fall asleep after she was in her crib by holding her hand or leg or foot while she tried to fall asleep. She cried when we weren't holding and rocking (or nursing her) but at least we were there. She didn't get super worked -up because we were right there in the room with her, touching her.
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@Foodnerd81: good point re: night time nursing. Nighttime nursing stopped working for us first, and so we worked on that. We didn't really have to do any work on naps after we stopped nursing to sleep at bed time.
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@mediagirl: he is!
Our usual routine for night is bath, pjs, husband reads, I nurse her. We are thinking of doing nurse, bath, pjs, read. I guess I'm just wondering how she'll actually fall asleep... I'm scared it'll result in a much later bedtime!!!! And me eventually going in and nursing anyways. Ugh.
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Maybe we should start with nighttime and then do naps after that gets sorted out?
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@sslm: honestly, it takes a few nights. and you do get less sleep. we had to commit to 5 days. we decided if it wasn't better after 5 nights, we'd go back to doing what we were before. but i was so desperate for something to change, that we gave it a try.
i know lots of people nurse to sleep at bedtime, but not for naps, so its definitely possible. maybe try for a few days just working on naps? Again, she might be really tired & you might have to be housebound to just focus on the naps.
sorry its so rough- i know the days when S doesn't nap well are excruciating. you need a break! -
@sslm: I found it much easier to do bedtime and just do whatever it took to get naps in while we worked on bedtime. For us that meant nursing to sleep, long walks to sleep, and sometimes me sitting in her room in the dark with her attached to me for 45 minutes-- anything to keep her from being completely overtired come bedtime.
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Silva's advice is what worked for us. We gradually moved further and further away until we were out of the room. There is a book called the Sleep Lady Shuffle that goes into detail on this method. There was definitely crying involved but at least we were there to reassure her and make sure she wasn't getting too worked up (I've also had issues with her throwing up, so I understand how scary that it). First 3 nights sucked, then it got better.
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We JUST (literally in the last 2 days) were able to do this for naps. We used Ferber's method of modified CIO but there was really barely any crying--35 minutes for nap1 day 1, 6 minutes for nap2 day 2, 1 minute nap1 day 2, and that's it. Since then, no crying!
I think whatever method you choose you need to be consistent. That means not going in and nursing to sleep just because LO is crying/not sleeping--that will only prolong it. Most people do night time first, or naps and night time at the same time.
I would kind of get used to the idea that there will be SOME crying though, whatever method you use--you're changing things up for your LO and I'm sure she's not going to be happy about it and will let you know--and that's ok! Crying is her way of expressing herself, it doesn't mean that you're hurting her (obviously crying/hysterics for hours on end is not the same thing).
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@hilsy85: Yeah, I think I am being realistic in that I know she'll cry, I'm just not comfortable with her getting to the point of projectile vomiting!! So do you just put him down in his crib at naptime and he goes to sleep?
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@Chastenet: How long did you have to stay with her before she fell asleep? My girl is stubborn and I worry we could be sitting in there until midnight!!!
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@sslm: I nurse him, then we read a book, then I put on white noise, put him in his sleep sack, sing him a song, and put him down. It's basically the same as our night time routine. I seriously did not think it would work--I thought he would cry for an hour and that it would take weeks to work. But it has gone so well!
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@Silva: Thanks. That's where I am at right now, desperate!!! I'm glad to hear success stories though. I think naps are the biggest problem, so I'd like to focus on that, but then I feel like nighttime isn't great either, and at least then my husband is around to help, so maybe that would be easier on me mentally? Ha. Ugh.
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@hilsy85: How do you ensure he doesn't fall asleep during the nursing part?
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@sslm: If I see he's starting to, I'll talk to him, stroke his cheek or sit him up while he's nursing. The first time I did it, he got annoyed and didn't want to nurse anymore and cried a bit, then calmed down during the book.,
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@sslm: I think the longest was 1 hr. But it may have been a bit longer. The worst was one night when she refused to lay down (the sleep book I read says to only lay them down once if they stand up, then after that just let baby stand so it doesn't become a game)- she was so determined not to lie down and go to sleep that she fell asleep sitting up. Then her head kept falling and she would startle and wake herself up. I think that was the longest night of crying, and she did eventually fall asleep laying down.
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@Chastenet: ok that doesn't sound too bad!!!
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@sslm: check out no cry sleep solution. PP have summarized, but it's a gradual approach. It worked really well, long-term, for us to stop rocking to sleep.
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@scg00387: Thanks, I will!!
So I tried something new last night, I still nursed her as the last step in the routine, but I woke her up before putting her down. Then I sat in her room with her until she went to sleep, which only took 10 mins! Progress!
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@sslm: that is great! We still nursed to sleep, but woke her up, for about a week. Then we switched to nursing at the start of the routine. I felt like it went more smoothly because she already knew how to put herself to sleep!
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@sslm: that's great!! I could never do that because she would get a second wind from the nursing snooze. You must have timed it better than I did. I bet if you do that a couple of times, then put a short book in after the nursing, you can make the transition pretty seamless!
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