For those with sleep trained LO's where you did some form of CIO... post-sleep training how do you deal with MOTN wakeups if they happen on occasion? LO sleeps through the night and if he cries a bit going down, I leave him and check occasionally if it gets bad. But for those rare wakings in the middle of the night (say, a noise disturbs him or thunderstorm or whatever)... if they cry, do you go to them right away? Or leave for a bit and wait? Please share what you've done and what your protocol is!
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We did extinction CIO with no checks, which worked a treat for us, but for MOTN, we always did a 5 minute rule (less if he sounded really distressed), because once I was confident he could fall asleep on his own, I knew that if he was crying out for more than 5 minutes, something was likely wrong.
Around 18 months we had a series of night where he had nightmares/night terrors and the cry he made was VERY different - I would go to him right away. Sporadically over the last couple of years there have been a few nights where he's woken with a whingey/on and off cry, and when thats the case he usually settles down before 5 mins is up. Now that he can adjust his own blankets and stuff its really rare that he'll cry long enough for me to go to him.
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@ScarletBegonia: and when you say you'd go to him.. What would you do to settle him? Or did you just do a quick hug and put him back down?
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@Goldengirl: again pretty dependent on how distressed he was. With the nightmares/night terrors (never really investigated cause they stopped after a short time), I'd have to stay with him and cuddle him back to sleep (he was still in a crib at the time) in a chair. Now that he's in a big boy bed, the very few times I've gone to him I've laid with him rubbing his back til he quiet, then gone through our normal going to sleep kiss/hug/twinkle twinkle routine.
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We usually waited several minutes to see if she would calm back down. If she didn't DH would more often go in than me, since if I went in she wanted to nurse. He would pick her up and rock her. That said... she just turned four and has been waking up almost every night for the last few months. So, yeah.
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@ScarletBegonia: aw. Yah LO is still an infant so there's only so much comforting can do which is why I don't always know what to do! I just don't want to create any bad habits if he suddenly goes through a bad phase... because that's what happened before and then we had to train all over again.
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@Foodnerd81: oh no! I'm sorry
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At this point if he wakes in MOTN, we usually think it is for a legitimate reason because it is rare, about 1x-2x a month. For the past 6 months he has only ever woken due to sickness (and thrown up in his crib / on the floor) or panic/nightmares.
We try to judge based on his cries. Like a pp said, there have been times where he sounds like he is an an absolute panic, terror mode. He is 19m. Lately we've had to lay down with him on the bed in his room, which isn't horrible because we need to transition him to the bed within the next 9 months.
Very, very, very rarely it is a whiny cry and then we just talk to him through the monitor, tell him to go back to sleep, we love him, and we sing.
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I go get her, pick her up, whatever she needs to fall back asleep. Once we did CIO (sort of... her crib was next to our bed) it finally sank in that nights are not for socializing, and DD only wakes up if something is actually bothering her.
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I can generally tell from her crying if she will calm back down or not. If it is a panicky or hard cry, she gets comforted.
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If he wakes up, we may wait a couple of minutes if he sounds fairly calm but generally he wakes up for a reason so we go right in, pick him up, and rock and snuggle until he's calm enough to put back in the crib.
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We usually go in, turn on the lullabies that he falls asleep to (it's on a 15-min timer) and rub his back for like 30 secs-1 min without taking him out of the crib. On the rare occasions that he's really agitated, we'll turn on lullabies than pick him up and rock him for 2-3 mins.
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@Mama Bird: How did the CIO work for you with the crib next to your bed? We are in the same boat and hoping to sleep train him next week. I’m going to start with his maps because it’s just him and I and then implement the same thing at night... wondering how one does this with the crib in our bedroom? Baby is transitioning to his own room next month since we are moving but our goal is to teach him how to fall asleep on his own. Thanks!
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I co sleep now, but when we had LO in his crib we would let him CIO during the first wake. If he woke back up later then we would go into his room. We always watched him on the monitor during the first wake and knew he was physically okay. Then, on the second wake DH would sit with him in the glider and if it was me I would bring him to bed. Typically, the MOTN crying lasted 2-3 minutes after the first night of training him again that he was sleeping in his crib. The first night back in his crib could be up to 5-7 minutes.
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