Crying It Out

I told you on Friday that we were going to be attempting to break Josie's bad sleeping habits this weekend. I was especially nervous because we'd somewhat tried this before and was never successful. It seemed that just when we were making progress, she'd get sick or have an ear infection or we'd be staying somewhere with a different atmosphere and schedule. It never stuck.

This time around we had no excuse for that because we were here all weekend and she just got over being sick so we knew she was healthy. Here's how it went.

Friday night: We put her to bed at 7:15 PM right after she got done eating so we knew she wasn't hungry or thirsty. We did the usual routine minus the bottle, gave her the pacifier (not battling that battle yet), quietly left the room, and turned on the monitor. Then we listened to her scream for two hours. I kid you not, she did not fall asleep for at least two hours. Don't get me wrong, we're not heartless. We'd go in ever 15-20 minutes to give her the pacifier or a sip of water, try to calm her down a little, get her laying down again, but usually it just made it worse. It was a long night, and we hadn't even gone to bed yet.

She woke up at around 2:00 AM wanting a bottle. We changed her diaper and gave her the pacifier. She screamed for an hour and a half. Of course I can't sleep through that, so I read a book in the living room while checking in every 20 minutes again (only made it worse of course). I was doubting this method, but since we were already in this far, I knew we couldn't just quit now, and I'm so glad we didn't.

Saturday night: Same routine, this time she screamed for an hour. That's half of the previous night! While it still felt like forever, we were so glad that there was progress. Instead of sitting inside during that hour, we brought the monitor outside with us and weeded the flower garden. At least we could be productive while we felt miserable. That night, she got up again, we changed her diaper, and she screamed for only 20 minutes which was definitely a big improvement. 

The one thing I was guilty about was that at bedtime, both nights she really only fell asleep after I rubbed her back until she was practically asleep. The real reason I was guilty about it was because I didn't want to just replace one habit with another.

Sunday: Thankfully, she did not need the back rub on Sunday to fall asleep. Instead, we put her down at 7:45 PM (nice and full after eating out), and she fell asleep right away for about 20 minutes. Then she woke up and just chattered and talked for an hour and a half. What in the world?? She wasn't crying but I don't think she fell asleep until 9:30 PM. She did scream a bit when she dropped her pacifier on the floor, but after a couple of minutes, I went in to give it to her and she rolled over and fell asleep right away. What a relief! No screaming for hours! And the best part? She woke up and let out ONE cry in the middle of the night before going back to sleep. That means we all slept through the night. After only three nights.

She did happen to wake up really early this morning, although I'm not too concerned about it. She'll take a longer nap today which is always nice for this blogger.

I'm so glad we stuck with it and hope that this improvement is a permanent change. I'm sure we'll have some setbacks, but generally she still knows we love her and wakes up grinning and giggling every morning.

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