After a few days of pretty desperate attempts to put Autumn down for naps and bedtime, I am reaching out for some advice. I'm torn between trying to be the mom from the textbook who lets her baby cry herself to sleep and the mom who can't stand to listen to a screaming baby and picks her up right away.
So, since many of you are much better and more experienced mommies than me, I could use some wisdom... We've had our ups and downs, but the past few nights and naps have been pretty rough. If she wakes up at night she won't go back to sleep unless I put in her binky and tickle her back or feed her. At night she screams before bed time. She doesn't want to lay down in her crib, but she doesn't want to be held either. haha.
Pretty much this is an open forum for advice on any bedtime tips you might have up your sleeves... I am sure every mommy is different, I just haven't found what works best for us yet. I'll try anything you send at me until we find bedtime bliss.
3 comments:
When Kirra was around 7 months, we finally let her scream herself to sleep. She screamed for 2 HOURS! I finally couldn't take it anymore...and so I went and got her...thinking I had just enforced that she could scream and eventually I would go get her. But...the next night she must've figured that two hours of screaming wasn't worth it and we never had a problem again. That is, until we moved...and now she won't sleep in her room (because I am too tired to let her scream for multiple nights) and is sleeping in ours next to us in her play pen...so maybe I shouldn't be writing anything! HAHA! ;0) Good luck! It's never easy no matter what!
We are still battling with Sydney, but she is now putting herself down. So this next baby will put himself down at a younger age even if he screams. Just go in another room, put some earplugs in and let her cry it out. she'll get it. It's hard, but so worth.
What worked for us was letting our daughters cry for 10 minutes at a time. It is VERY hard! I hated letting them cry, but it worked for both girls & within a week they were sleeping through the night. The first few days were hard, but I have awesome sleepers now!
So what you do, is you put your baby to bed--make a fun routine out of it, bath, teeth, story, prayer, singing, and then say good night & walk out. Your baby will start to cry, set an alarm (I did it on my cell phone) for 10 minutes. If your baby is still crying after 10 minutes go in. DON'T PICK UP YOUR BABY! Just let her know you're there, you love her, and that it is time for bed & walk out. She'll wail harder once you leave, but stay strong, and set your alarm for another 10 minutes. After doing this routine for somewhere between and hour to three hours she'll finally go to bed because she'll figure out that no matter how loud she cries, you're not going to pick her up.
I know it is so hard, but we did this with both of our daughters-Caitlyne it only took 1 hour the first two nights, and then 30 minutes the two nights after that and then perfect sleeping the next week. Kimberly...She was my challenge! She cried for 3 hours the first night, 2 the next 1 the next and finally, slept through the night after 2 weeks. But I was strong and now both of my girls are awesome sleepers, going to bed by 7:30pm almost every night. And they sleep until 7:30-8am the next morning. Its heavenly!
You have to remember that if you know your baby is fed, in a clean diaper, and that everything else is ok, that sleep is a very important thing for them--and you--so you're not punishing your daughter, you're just teaching her how to calm herself & fall asleep.
Good luck! The nice thing for us now, is that Dan & I have the whole evening to spend together. You can do it!
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