get the chum to sleep through the night

We’re there! The chum is consistently in his own bed until 5 am or later. I actually am shocked that we’re there. But we are.

I know I’ve done a lot to help him learn how to do this but since I never did resort to letting him scream or anything grim like that, it seems like it happened without me. Our little sleep monster is finally growing up.

I guess a celebration is in order. How about a birthday party?

I feel I must note that he’s slept in his own crib until at least 5 for a week now.

If he can keep it up for another week I think I can actually (gulp) close this goal.

We had a week and a half of waking up earlier 2 or 3 and being wild for nighttime nursing, but now we’re back to 4 or even 5 for him coming up to join us in bed.

Almost ready to stop the 6:30 “please sleep a bit more” sip – we’ll see how that effects everything.

Since the last post, I’ve been continuing to nurse him for 20-30 minutes then put him in the crib and let him go down on his own. Some nights it’s quick, some nights there has been a long period of “Mommy!” “Mommy’s right here!” and standing right by him with my hand on him as he fidgets.

But since the last tooth has crested we’ve had a change. For the last 2 weeks, he’s stayed downstairs until 4 or later – twice even until 5:30 or 6! Of course that brings its own nightmare because then he doesn’t go back to sleep so 7 am is an unattainable dream. He has slept this late 12 out of the last 14 nights – even with Christmas wildness!

And here’s the other shocker – he’s asking to go in his crib himself after nursing a bit. I think the change has come from playing “go to sleep” in his crib during the day. Over and over he tells us how to go through putting him to bed, “Give a kiss, give a hug, tuck in, Mommy GO OUT!” then he lies there, pretends to sleep then jumps up and yells “Wake up in a morning!” After playing this many times, when I put him in his crib I would do this ritual too and now he’s taking the initiative. He sips, he stops and either I ask or he says “In the crib.” So I put him in, move way away to near his rocking chair and play Pokemon while occasionally telling him, “Shh. Bedtime.” and he’s falling asleep within 5 minutes.

We’ll see how this fabulous progress holds up when he loses nursing privileges…. but I never thought we’d get to this point without a major battle. So yay!

or on the weaning goal – it’s really part of both.

For the last 3 weeks, since my husband put him down twice, the chum has fallen asleep on his own every time except – the first night at the inlaws when we were both so sleep deprived we thought we were going to drop, and the 2nd on the first night of his latest cold when I was taking no chances.

The current situation is he nurses for about 20 minutes and then I put him in his crib – fully awake and usually negotiating – and he drops off there. I have to stand right by him and make reassuring shhhing and humming noises and really have to keep a hand on him most of the time but it’s massive progress.

We had tried this 6 months ago and had little success. I guess he’s more ready now.

I have to remind myself that the chum has always been slower than average in all of his sleep stages. I mean, this is the baby we swaddled past 6 months (25 pounds! We cut up a sheet to make a swaddling cloth big enough!)

So he’s coming along well. He’s self-soothing often when he wakes up at night. I think the next step is to stop using the monitor so he has to really be awake and pissed off before we get him. But I’m dragging my feet on that. Soon, I guess.

I actually have not read it – but have been given advice from it by others. DS1 didn’t sleep through the night until he was 15 months, and then it was hit or miss. And then at 2 1/2 or so we had night wakings again when we tried to move him to a big boy’s bed. I have learned to be thankful for the nights I do get…

Only 3 nights with 8 hours in his crib.

It’s looking up for this week though.

Last night we began, again, the process of getting the chum able to go to sleep in a way other than nursing, and with someone other than me.

Last fall, we had him pretty much trained and were able to go out to several events like grown ups. But we’ve had no events in forever and so he’s gotten out of the habit.

Earlier this month we went out for dinner and stayed out long enough for my mom to try to put him down – but no dice. He was having none of it and if grandma can’t get him to sleep, no one else will be able to.

But – we’ve got all these tickets events in the city again and there is no way he can not go to sleep if we’re seeing, say, dance in Berkeley at 8 pm – we’ll be home at 11! If we’re lucky!

So last night, my husband put the chum to bed while I went out – the idea being that he would realize eventually that I could not come in, as I was not here. Also so I didn’t have to have my heart completely ripped out with maternal guilt – hearing hours of screaming “mommy!” Thus the late night trip to the coffee house.

Well, it went better than the worst case scenario. I left at the beginning of bathtime, around 7:45, and was called to come home by 9:10. After a while he realized he should call for daddy and not mommy and that daddy was the one who was going to get him there. And my husband, saint that he is, kept his temper through all the yelling and crying.

But it’s not easy hearing about the chum’s pain and upset. I am way too empathetic and it hurts me so to feel him suffering. I know, I know, if this is the worst that the world throws at him, he’s the luckiest person ever in existence. But oh, how I wish there was a magic sleep cure and we didn’t have to go through this kind of hell around it.

He did 5 out of 7 nights in his crib for 8 hours.

Which is pretty great considering these molars are working through. So that’s something anyway.

Canines have poked through – no one is sick. Efforts can be made. This week I’ll be tring to put him in his crib a little bit awake (as recommended by our pediatrician) so he can practice getting that last little bit under by himself.

Stand by for plaintive calls for Sippy!