Sleeping babies

I’ve been waiting to write this post for ages and, to be honest, it’s probably a teensy bit premature. You see, instead of writing a post about all the problems we have with getting children and babies to go to sleep and getting them to stay asleep, I wanted to present you with a fait accompli, a success story akin to the breastfeeding one of just over a year ago. It is, however, still a work in progress, but I would like to share it with you nonetheless – after all, you might have some tips on how to keep it working well.

So, as you may know, I have a tendency to feed my babies to sleep. Never really plan to do so, but that’s what ends up happening. Which I don’t mind at all, generally. It’s quite easy to get up in the night, stick a boob in the baby’s mouth and feel your eyes droop for ten minutes until they fall asleep – then pop them in their cot and fall straight back to sleep (that oxytocin is great stuff, you know). It’s even easier to roll over and let the baby feed herself back to sleep while you doze yourself.

My happiness to keep this up lasts around a year, I suppose, and then I start wishing for other ways to get them to sleep, for the opportunity of evenings out with my husband without having to be back by a certain time to administer mummy milk. And, looking back, it seems to also be about the time when their sleep goes somewhat haywire, with extra night wakings and extreme clinginess. Something I’ve been sharing recently with my Twitter friend Kate.

This time, instead of climbing into her cot – perhaps because it wouldn’t actually be possible being a travel cot, though I think more because I’m a different person now – I embarked, about a week ago, on an experiment in that creature known as sleep training. I never thought I would do such a thing, but circumstances led to me giving it a try.

Eleanor had had a late nap and some late milk, just before dinner, which meant that, when she had her post-bath bedtime milk she did not fall asleep. Previously, I would have tried to keep feeding her, until it became clear (from kicking and screaming, quite possibly) that she was pretty darned full, then I would have taken her downstairs and played with her for an hour until she was ready to go to bed (or got Chris to do so).

Instead, I put her in her cot, switched Paolie (My Pal Scout) on and lay down on Rosemary’s bed with my book, facing away from Eleanor. I was expecting loud screams and to be unable to stay there for longer than a few seconds, because, boy do I hate to hear her cry and not do something about it. As it turned out, though, there were no screams. She did cry, but it was much closer to her trying to get to sleep cry that she uses in the buggy. She cried for maybe 5 seconds, then picked up a book and sat reading for a bit, before crying again.

It lasted about an hour, including the initial feed. The next night, I did it again, because she had another late nap. This time it lasted about three quarters of an hour. The next night, even though she hadn’t had a late nap, I tried it again – she did fall asleep while feeding, but woke up crying the second I put her in the cot. About three quarters of an hour again, and this time there was more screaming, but I held out for longer, saying ‘Shh, shhh, shh’. And I kept it up, introducing the same strategy during nighttime wakings, after discovering that they didn’t wake Rosemary up (how anyone can sleep through that, I don’t know!).

Now, at bedtime, she has her stories (always finishing with Schnitzel von Krumm, Forget me Not), then some milk, then I give her a kiss, say goodnight, and put her in her cot, switching Paolie on. And she rolls onto her side, snuggles down and goes to sleep. Not one scream. And she’s doing the same during nighttime wakings, pretty much. There have been a couple of instances where she wakes up a few times in short succession, but it just takes a little rock, Paolie and a few shushes and she’s back to sleep. Not two hours of playing downstairs or wandering the house with a screaming and kicking baby tearing our hair out and despairing at the continual lack of sleep.

It is truly miraculous. Really, it is. Maybe I’ll even work round to cutting out the nighttime wakings entirely soon and have the potential for nights away, not just evenings out.

How about you? Did you use any sleep training methods, or just go with the flow? Are you sitting there shaking your head at how we waited until she was almost 14 months old to do this or are you in pain at the thought of a baby (or toddler) crying for any time at all without proper comfort?

Of course, Sod’s Law would have it that, while typing this (very long!) post, Eleanor woke up three times and there was a fair amount of screaming and a fair amount of milk. In the end (hopefully it’s the end for the moment!), she went down awake and cuddled down and went back to sleep calmly, so I guess she was just thirsty or hungry.