Thursday, September 1, 2011

Sleep Training using "Healthy Habits, Healthy Child" by Marc Weissbluth, MD

Sleeping has become a serious issue. I am now using a method I found on http://thehagaboaters.blogspot.com/.  Luckily I am a blog stalker because I have never heard of this book.  Honestly I read her posts on her experience several times for several weeks before I started it.  I just thought that I could not handle "cry it out." 

Basically I have been sleeping with William in our bed 3x a day. This is not a problem for me but I know I am creating terrible sleep habits for our son. I am not getting any time to recuperate from taking care of William either; I am with him ALL of the time. Like I said its not a huge bother because I sleep, watch TV, etc but it is not healthy for either one of us.

Night sleep was great then got harder then got ridiculous. I have been getting up every couple of hours to replace the pacifier. Then William learned to sleep on side and eventually fall onto stomach. He would wake up and cry to be rolled back. I then started to put him in our bed right as Rudy was getting up for work (finally I can just put him in with me and get some sleep) but this is bad as well.  I never let William fuss for more than a few seconds for fear of waking Rudy.  After getting up at least 10x I knew I had to do something. That is when I went back to the blog and got the gist of the method (had not bought book).  I started immediately with the first nap and bought book on my Nook during that time. 
 
First Day Recap (8/31):
 
7AM-Wake
8:45AM- Nap Starts
Cried until 9:08
9:09AM-Cried
9:11AM -Silence, Cry, Silence
9:13AM -Silence, Cry
9:14AM-Silence
9:47AM -Whimper, Silence
9:54AM-Crying
10AM-Took out of crib
 
I will not go into great detail of Dr. Weissbluth's method mainly because I inlcuded the link to the blog where she goes into more detail.  I will say you are not to check on baby if using "extinction" but I did the first two naps and learned why you should not check.  It makes it harder on everyone.  There is a way for me to "peek" on William without him noticing and I do this once there is silence. 
 
Nap 2
 
11:57 -Nap
Cried until 12:39
 
This was so hard!  Felt like an eternity.
 
12:39 Silence until Wake at 2:18
 
Bedtime
 
Dr. Weissbluth recommends a super early bedtime to get into a routine.  I decided to move up bedtime 30 minutes (yikes).  However, I did not do a third nap yesterday.  I am torn with the third nap business; more on that later.  So we did bath around 6PM, bottle at 6:45ish and in bed at 6:52PM.
 
Cried until 7:02PM
3:24AM Crying
 
I grab monitor, phone and go to guest room.  I have no idea how long William will cry he is used to me coming in immediately.
 
3:27AM Silence
5:11AM Fuss (Notice I use "fuss."  He is not wailing like he did at 3:24AM he is asking me to get him and put in my bed.  He babbles himself to sleep and I notice silence around 5:25 AM)
6:13 AM Cry-Start the day.
 
*William has been sleeping with pacifier at every nap (with me beside him replacing it) and at night whenever he cries.  With this method you can not check on baby so if spits pacifier out its gone for at least an hour for naps (which after an hour nap is stopped and wait for next nap time) and there is no time limit at night. 
 
*This is not easy but it has not been as hard as I thought.  We are only in Day 2 today so I am sure there will be bumps in the road.  I found it funny that his whole life we have been paci, paci, paci but William can sleep without it once he learns to self soothe.  I hope to keep updates the next couple of days. :)

1 comment:

  1. Very interested to see how it works out; I have always been a big believer in the "cry it out" method. Also interested to see what happens with the paci. My son is 2.5 and hasn't used his at all since he was about 4 months. Just was done with it. Now my daughter (who is 7 months), is still using hers and seems pretty dependent on it...guess every child is different. :-) Good luck!

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