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With my first sleep training didn't work... she was a very high needs baby and she would just get more and more upset, even CIO after almost two hours of extreme crying I gave in and never tried again seeing she wasn't calming down... at 12 months she was finally able to put herself to sleep which I discovered by accident when she wasn't falling asleep with me nursing or rocking so I put her in the crib and she went to sleep on her own... for her I think she just had to be ready and before 12 months she wasn't.

My second daughter is almost 6 months and much more relaxed. But what's worked for us is the pick up put down method. So put her down awake, if she cries pick her up immediately rock her a bit and put her back down. Just keep doing that until she doesn't cry when you put her down... I don't know if this would have worked on my first as I didn't try it but fingers crossed it's worked for dd2! First night it took awhile but each night since it's taken less time. Also I get to skip out on any guilt since if she cries I pick her right back up!

DS1 is almost 3 and he was an intense baby. He was colicky and had severe reflux, so there were medical issues, but his personality is also more sensitive and easily over stimulated, so basically his crying and his reactions to any discomfort was extreme.

What we realized with him was that he was just a child who needed a strict routine and a schedule. I went from thinking I had a very low sleep needs child to finding out after sleep training that he was the opposite - he actually had very high sleep needs. But he was so overstimulated and overtired that he was crazy.

His personality was such that CIO with checks did not work for him. We tried all the gentler methods first and they did not work. Staying up with him and holding him or tending to his every cry also did not work. His witching hour went for a minimum of 4 hours every night and very often went 6 hours. And never slept more than 20-30 minutes at a time. So DH was like we might as well do extinction because he's going to scream anyway.

He cried a lot the first few nights and it sucked. I had really bad PPD/PPA so DH took the CIO night watches. But by the 3rd or 4th night he slept for several hours and then he just got on a roll. We went from cat napping for 20 minutes to waking every 3 hours (glorious), to a 4 hour stretch, then a 5, then a 7....etc etc.

My kid who never slept very quickly went on to take 2+ hour naps and was sleeping 12 hours a night. And he was HAPPY when he was awake. He went from the hardest baby to the easiest and even now at almost 3, he is the happiest, sweetest, most well behaved child as long as he is well-rested. If he is not, he's 180 a different person. Even his daycare teachers cringe on days he refuses to nap or something because he's this crazy dramatic hyperventilating tantrum cyclone. He has a little more flexibility in his schedule now that he's a toddler (we can push naps or bedtime a bit), but for a very long time our lives revolved around his schedule. We did it very happily because yeah, sleep training and scheduling worked wonders for us.

DS2 is a MUCH more laid back baby and even when he's tired he's much more pleasant and happy. We hardly had to sleeptrain him - we just did drowsy but awake from day 1, let him fuss a few minutes before naps and bedtime, successfully used pick up/put down with him, and he's been an awesome overnight sleeper since 3 months. At 14 months, we're finding he has a bit lower sleep needs than his brother did, but he is obviously way happier when he's well rested too so we have both kids on a schedule.

Long way of saying, its worth it. As long as you know your baby is getting enough to eat during the day and not relying on calories at night, you are helping them be their best when they are awake by teaching them to sleep on their own and self-soothe. What method you use is totally dependent on the child, but I have zero regrets doing extinction CIO with DS1.