How did it all start?
About 2.5 yrs ago my sister in law was telling me about the "sleep training" she was doing for the second time around with my niece after success with her first born. I, childless at the time, was very confused that you had to train your kid to sleep? Or that it was possible. She saved a book for my naive future self.
Somewhere around Maddy's 4th week of life I stopped pumping in the middle of the night. I didn't have the dedication, the knowledge, nor the sanity to continue waking every 2 hours to hook myself up like a cow, while my child slept blissfully for 7-8 hours.
Then around 7 weeks, it was a miracle. Maddy slept from 6pm to 7am,
in her swing. The first night I woke up in a panic at 6am thinking OMG I didn't hear Maddy, a mere two feet away from me, cry. I must have slept through it! But then....
Then she did it AGAIN!I was hooked. The girl had tricked me! She could sleep, I just needed her to sleep in her crib! The next day I ran to Barnes and Noble and bought 4 sleep training books, one at each end of the spectrum. I stayed up ALL night, as Maddy blisfully slept in her swing, researching how to train naps, feeding schedules, bed time routines.
And then it all went to hell. I tried to get her to stay up xx amount of time, take xx amount of minute naps after xx amount of time. I'll admit it now, I drank the punch of a self proclaimed sleep expert. It was a bit ridiculous and in my honest opinion was an unachievable solution.
I cried to my mommy friends that I had NO idea what I was doing. I was horrible parent for even trying to sleep train, and needed to know what the hell was wrong with me ? They bought me a beer and told me...
NOTHING! I was doing nothing wrong, Maddy was perfect, and quite normal.
So then I read the books AGAIN and after 4 days of writing down everything that Maddy did, we came up with a plan. Three nights later, lots of coffee and one sob fest phone call to my sister in law, Maddy slept through the night.
Note.... I'm not going to get into the specifics of how we came up with this plan and why I think it worked for us, but if you've got more questions shoot me an email.
Easy-peasy right? WRONG! Crying it out has only gotten harder and harder. It still works, and I'm still a believer. Most days it only takes 2-5 minutes before she is out, but some days... oh dear, some days we go 1 hour+ . For the most part when these battle of the wills occur, I can look in her room to find her playing with a toy and "fake" crying.
The rough days include tears. And the tears, oh my the tears. Here's a picture of Maddy, full on sob fest. Do you see the tears dripping from her chin?
Pathetic, I know.
Crying it out has been a game of trial and error, full of long term successes and epic failures. I wish I could say it was (IS) easy, but I'm slowly learning no parenting choice is easy.
About 30 minutes ago, I picked up my daughter from her crib, who was sleeping, just to hold her. I missed her and wanted to snuggle. It was a ricky decision, that thankfully didn't result any tears. Instead she softly babbled, hugged my chest and fell quickly back asleep while I sang her a lullaby. It was worth the risk because I know these moments are fleeting.
(sigh)
The only thing that has come easy, is the love.
