"You'll never sleep again." It's one of the comments I heard most often while I was pregnant. To be honest, Jack has had a hard time sleeping since birth. Our first night home from the hospital, he would not sleep in the bassinet we had planned for him to be in. Since he hated being swaddled, he thrashed around until I picked him up and he fell fast asleep while I held him. The first 2 months of his life, he would only sleep in my arms - and I let him, because survival mode kicks in eventually so we could all get sleep. We finally transitioned him to the Rock n Play, and he slept well at night in it from 2-4 months, until it was unfortunately recalled. I wasn't ready for him to be in his crib in his own room so we tried the Pack n Play next to our bed. He hated sleeping flat on his back. To help with the transition, we ended up co-sleeping for a couple weeks so he could get used to being on his back. Shortly after, he started rolling over and would flip over to his tummy as soon as I put him down. After a ton of research, I learned that he could sleep on his belly as long as he was strong enough to roll over, so I stopped worrying about it and embraced however he wanted to sleep.
From 4-5.5 months, Jack slept pretty well in the Pack n Play, waking up about 1-2 times a night. Greg would get up to check/change his diaper and then I'd nurse him back to sleep. Around 6 months, he started waking up 4-5 times a night. At first I thought it was just his growth spurt and development leap, and we tried to power through. But after 2 weeks of literally no sleep, I hit my limit. Every time he woke up, I would be awake for at least 30-40 minutes getting him and myself back to sleep. I didn't mind one wake up but the 3+ a night was too much. Greg and I felt foggy at work, started getting short with each other, having headaches that lasted all day, and just felt all around sleep deprived.
After much deliberation and research, we decided to move Jack into his crib in the nursery and start sleep training. I cannot bear to hear my baby cry for any amount of time and really didn't want to do the cry-it-out method because I thought I wouldn't be able to handle it. I read about every sleep training technique in depth and we ended up doing the Ferber method. In short, we would put Jack down in his crib, drowsy but awake, and check in every 5-10 minutes to help calm him down. We only patted and shushed him, never picked him up out of the crib or nursed him to sleep, and tried to limit our time in the room to about one minute.
We made sure his room was ready: blackout curtains, monitor camera set up, and the Amazon Echo queued up to play "thunderstorms sounds." On the first night, we did our nightly routine - bath, book, boob, bed. He fell asleep nursing but woke up crying instantly when I placed him in the crib. I said goodnight, walked out of the room and closed the door. We turned on the monitor and watched the clock. It was absolutely heartbreaking listening to my baby cry. I didn't want him to feel scared - he was in a new environment and for the first time in his life, we weren't tending to his needs immediately. After a half hour of crying and checking on him, part of me started questioning if we were doing the right thing. But then I remembered how exhausted we both felt and decided we need to be consistent and give it a fair shot for a week straight.
Greg and I took turns checking in, but Jack seemed to get more upset when I went into his room to rub his back and offer his pacifier because I wasn't picking him up to rock or nurse him to sleep. The first hour was torture. But after about 30 minutes, he started taking breaks in his crying, and we extended our check in time. The breaks started getting longer and closer together, until he fell asleep. He only slept for 45 minutes and woke up again crying. It was my turn to go in so I softly stroked the back of his head and shushed him for about a minute. Within 15 minutes, he was sound asleep. 4 hours later, he was up again. I knew he was probably hungry, and I was beating myself up but held strong in not nursing him. It took another hour until he fell back asleep but his crying time was shorter and we checked on him less often as it seemed to get him more worked up. He slept for another almost 3 hours and woke up so happy and smiley in the morning. I was nervous that he was going to hold a grudge and be mad at us, but he was so sweet! I went in to get him and joyfully said, "Goooood Moooorning!" I picked him up right away and he nuzzled right in and we snuggled for a couple minutes before opening the curtains and nursing him.
The second night went amazing! We fed him a little organic oatmeal with his solids (carrots that night) to fill him up a bit more. We did our routine again (bath, book, boob, bed) and he fell asleep nursing. He woke up when I laid him down but I left the room. He cried for about one minute, and within 10 minutes he was out. He slept for 7 hours straight! Mom & Dad finally got some real sleep - it was glorious! He woke up crying at 2am and we both checked on him once in the 45 minutes it took for him to fall back asleep. After 4 hours of sleep, he woke up in the morning so cheerful! I made the morning a big deal again and fed him a few minutes after being awake to kind of delay the gratification of breakfast.
Night 3 went great - he fell asleep on his own in 20 minutes and slept 8.5 hours. He woke up one time but put himself back to sleep within 5 minutes, without us checking on him. By Night 4, he was a pro! He was sound asleep in under 5 minutes and slept over 11 hours! It's been about a week and a half since we started sleep training and he's been doing really well. He seems to love his crib and he understands that we won't pick him up until morning. We've had to check on him once or twice in the middle of the night when he wakes but he always gets himself back to sleep.
I'm sure there will be setbacks in the future (teething pain, sickness, etc.) but Greg and I are so happy we made the decision to sleep train. As hard as the first two nights were, it was so worth it. The whole family is sleeping better, and Jack's development has increased greatly. He was not behind on any milestones but he's getting stronger and more mobile everyday. I read that babies are unable to self-soothe until 4-6 months, and I think we chose the perfect time for Jack since he took to it so well. He went from only being able to fall asleep from rocking or nursing, to falling asleep on his own within 3 days. For anyone considering sleep training, I highly recommend finding a technique that suits you and your child, and sticking to it.
