My daughter just turned a year old last weekend. She is still getting up once a night. She will cry until we give her a bottle then she will eat a little and fall asleep. I don't like letting her cry it out, though I have tried a bit. I will go in after 10-15 minutes of letter her cry and she will be standing in her crib, which makes me think she will not go back to sleep until I take her out and give her a bottle. I'm pretty sure it's not because she is hungry. She also sucks her thumb, but this does not seem to soothe her enough to fall asleep in the middle of the night. I would love to know what it feels like to sleep an entire night through again. Any suggestions on how to get this done would be appreciated.
You have to let her cry it out. If it's something that is really wrong you will know by the cry or by how long she cries. These little people are very smart and if they can get you to come and visit them or hold/rock them they will keep it up. I spoiled my first child and she still isn't a good sleeper at 5! The rest of them do great because I learned the hard way with the first.
Best wishes,
J.
The book, The Baby Whisperer Solves All Your Problems By Teaching You to Ask the Right Questions was a life saver for us in helping us to teach our son to sleep through the night. Best of luck!
:) M.
I had the same problem with my 21 month old son when he was that age. You just have to let her cry. Eventually she will go to sleep. At first I would go in and calm him down. But it became habit with him. He would cry and cry because he knew I would come in to get him. It was really hard but I had to let him cry. I would lay there and cry myself because it was so hard listening to him cry. It took a few nights and he finally slept through the night. Now we close his door at night. I can hear him wake up, he cries, sees that his door is closed and he goes back to sleep. It does take a while and it is hard but it is worth it. I can't believe how much more energy we both have because we sleep through the night. Give letting her cry a try, you will know if something else is wrong by the sound of her cry.
I know that you do not want to let her cry it out, but when my daughter was six months old (and alot of parents do it as early as 4 months), I personally felt comfortable letting my daughter cry when she woke up during the middle of the night, and it broke the habit within two nights. In reality, she wasn't hungry, sick, in pain, etc. so there was no reason to interfere with letting her trying to get back to sleep on her own or to feed her. The school of thought is that as long as you are going continue to get up to tend to your daughter (i.e., holding her, feeding her, etc.) the longer the ritual will continue. My thinking was that it was better to stop the cycle then and instill good sleep habits before my daughter was mobile and/or could try to get our of her crib on her own. My daughter is the same age as yours and has been sleeping through the night for 6 months now. Good luck!
With my daughter I would go to her, lie her back down rub her back for a minute tell her I love her and it's ni-ni time. She never got formula or juice at night, I didn't want her teeth to rot. She got water, plain old water, no sugar either.
My neice is 10 months and is still waking up at night, my sister was giving her bottles and holding her, but she started 2 nights ago to just rub her back and tell her it's time to sleep. It has worked thus far, she just wants to be reassured that mommy is there.
It might take a few nights, but the battle is well worth it. In time your daughter will soothe herself back to sleep on the occasions she wakes up.
Hi J.,
My LO is a fair bit younger (7 mos), so we're still giving him an O/N feed. But I can share a technique that worked for a friend of mine with her 15-month-old. She and her husband used the methods in "Good Night, Sleep Tight" by Kim West. The approach offers a kind of middle ground: It still involves some crying, but someone (ideally, your husband rather than you) stays with the baby so that you don't have to leave her to cry on her own. The process may take longer than straight-up CIO, and will surely be exhausting in the meantime, but you might find it more palatable. The basic idea is that your husband (or whoever is up to the task) would sit next to the crib and offer a little comfort (a pat or reassuring sound) as needed until your LO falls back to sleep, then every 3 nights would move a little farther from the crib until he's partway across the room (where he could soothe with his voice but not with touch), then in the doorway, then in the hall. This allows your baby to know that someone is there for her, but that she will no longer get the bottle and attention she's used to. The author claims that babies cry differently when they are left alone than when someone is there with them; but do know that your baby will still cry with this method. I'm not sure where you live, but I know the book is available through the Mpls public library. Best of luck with whatever you decide--even here at 7 months, I'm desperate for a full-night's sleep, so I can only imagine how ready you must be to sleep through the night.
J. - I know that you don't want to hear this - but all the moms that have posted here are right. You gotta let her cry it out.
Your daughter knows EXACTLY what to do to get YOU to come to her. And it's working!
I had a VERY difficult time letting my son cry it out. It was stressing me out so much that I wasn't very pleasant to be around because I was tired and crabby. FINALLY, my husband and pediatrician convinced me that I HAD to let him cry it out and he would sleep through the night. It was hard.
After he was down for the night, I was NOT allowed to go into my son's room at all. My husband went in to do a quick console when he cried and lay him back down to bed. When my son realized that mom wasn't coming in and no food was offered, eventually the cries stopped.
It took 6 days for us. PURE HELL! I hated it. I couldn't stand it. I thought it was wrong to let this little person cry. But guess what? It stopped! On day seven, I SLEPT! AMEN!
Also, keep in mind that once you decide to do this - you have to stick to your guns. You can't "sort of" do it. It's all or nothing. And have your dh help!
You need sleep! Do it for yourself. We did and are soooooo thankful that we did it early on.
Do IT!!! And good luck!
D.
Sadly J. once your daughter knows you will get up with her there is nothing you can do but listen to her cry. I thought myself, being a first time mom, that was terrible but I am so thankful after a week of being tough with my 18 month old son I sleep all night with nothing but peace!!!
T.
It sounds like she is really just waking up for the contact with you. You might have to try multiple things in order to stop this but here is one thing...
instead of giving her formula/milk give her a bottle of water, still hold her while she has it. Then put her back to bed. Be sure you are not making eye contact or talking with her while you are in the room.
After you do that for a few nights, give her the water bottle in her crib. Just pick her up and lay her back down, give her the bottle and leave. If she cries let her cry a little before going in. Remember that there are different levels of crying. If she is wailing for over 3 minutes go in, if she wails but then calms a little let her go.
Once she is good with that just go in and lay her back down, cover her up and leave. While it is hard to let your little one cry (we've all been there) it really is in her best interest to sleep the night/self soothe. Like I said above, if she is wailing then by all means comfort her. Otherwise let her go. They say that it takes about 3-4 nights to have a new sleep routine/schedule kick in with a child so don't give up if the first night is hard (and it likely will be). I have always started these kinds of things on a Wednesday/Thursday night so that if it went horrible and I didn't get any sleep at least it was close to the weekend and I wouldn't have to try and focus on work.
Good Luck!
