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I'm hoping @jape14: sees this post -- she ranks sleep training in her top 3 best things she did in life (marrying her husband, having her son, and sleep training).

Either way, we sleep trained and haven't looked back. It was hard, but I viewed it as a couple of bad nights to address the inevitableness that was A LOT of bad nights. What we were doing prior (rocking to sleep) wasn't working anymore and he needed to figure out how to self soothe. Learning how to self soothe has been huge for him and it also gave us freedom because after we sleep trained literally ANYONE could put him down if they just did his routine.

The biggest tip I have is to stick to your guns for 3 nights. I cried on our backporch looking at the monitor while we sleep trained, but (thanks to my husband) I stayed strong. It was 3 days of hell and then on the 4th night we put him in his crib and he was like "oh, okay, I know the drill now, no sense in crying!"

ETA: Good luck!!

Yes to all of the above. Sleep training made me a much better parent and my daughter soooo much happier. It also took us about 3 nights, with 1/2 the quantity of crying each night.

It really helped me to write down my plan and write down small successes, so I would stick to it when things got rough. I also wrote down some "mantras," like a rested baby is a happy baby. And when I couldn't take the crying anymore, I gave my husband the monitor and slept in another room with lots of LOUD white noise to drown it out.

My last bit of advice would be to remember that even once you train you'll still have some bad nights, but that doesn't mean it didn't work or you have to start all over!

And your kid may surprise you and do great right away!

I sleep trained my first lo at 5.5mo and now I have to do my second. I've been putting it off because it seems harder this time so I'm following for encouragement as well. Good luck and let us know how it goes!

I sleep trained DD when she was 10 months. I did checks. It took 2 nights. Three weeks later she started sleeping through the night all on her own. It was worth it! My DH and I say we should have done it sooner. You've got this! Good luck!

Sleep training saved our lives, and it's the best thing I've ever done as a parent. We started sleep training really early, little by little. She's 2 yrs old now, and goes to sleep on her own and wakes up singing and waits for us to go get her. She's still in a crib though.

@JLC53: you're doing great!!

You are doing great! We were in the same situation as you with both my babies at 9 months with the sleep props, but CIO worked for us. As many said, it took 3 nights, the 1st was okay, 2nd was the worst, and by the 3rd, they both figured it out. They both slept through the night ever since. It seems the in-person mom community I am in is very against CIO so I don't share about it much, but it was the best decision we made.

Great work! Just keep at it. I got the cold shoulder for a few days and it sucked. I also had a clingier baby too for a few days. She liked me and didn't at the same time, but she quickly returned to normal. My sister warned me sometimes the third night can be the worst. It wasn't for me, but just in case everything starts going great and then you get a rough night don't get too discouraged.

@JLC53: Good job! It will get better! When I started to let my daughter CIO, I was worried about it so I remember (jokingly) asking my 7 year old nephew if he remembered crying himself to sleep when he was a baby and if he got mad at my sister, Lol. He didn't remember and he loves his mom (and laughed at me)

@JLC53: How is it going now? We are trying sleep training tmrw night with our 9.5m baby.