at the warfront

Hello, friends. How are you? I've missed you. I'm writing this while sitting on my couch, sporting red plaid pajama pants and three-day dirty hair, inhaling my second cup of coffee and cold leftover bread pudding. I don't have the energy for simple things like washing my hair and making breakfast, you see. Why? Because I'm [insert horror movie music] SLEEP TRAINING. So blogging, as you can understand, has sadly been at the bottom of my list. I haven't cooked up anything of interest, nor do I have any news other than...zzzzzzzz. This parenting stuff is kicking my ass.

For those of you with experience, any advice? I'm on Day 4 with my 6-month-old and he's now getting pretty good at falling asleep in his crib within half an hour, but can't seem to stop waking every 2-3 hours in the night. Sometimes he'll fall asleep after I go in and help him find his dummy, or shush him and rub his back. Other times, he won't settle unless I give in and nurse. This is the kicker, I know. We're working on it.

Any tips? 

(By the way, the melodramatic chick in the picture is totally me, minus the curlers. And the sleeping baby.)

Comments

[Anotheroneopens]

Borrow two older children- say 5 and 8-preferably noisy boys. Fill the bath- dip baby in, dry, dress and feed while two older boys get in bath and create havoc. Put baby down- persuade two older kids to get out of the bath, get dried, pyjamas on, brush teeth, read stories, stop fighting, STAY IN BED! At this point you will think- baby? what baby? Baby will be sound asleep and the least of your worries. If he does wake in the night it will be really nice to have that peaceful time with him! I'm sure you know where this advice comes from!

[Ashley]

Our little monster never took to sleep training! We tried for a couple weeks and it never worked. He goes down fine, but would wake up every 2-3 hours, sometimes more. All the advise I found was about getting baby to sleep, not keeping him asleep. My best advice, he will grow out of it when he is ready. I tried everything and all it did was make us more tired. We tried not feeding and he would cry for over an hour before going back to sleep just to wake up in an hour and want to nurse (not worth it). After 4 nights of this we just gave in and fed him so he would go back to sleep. Make sure he is getting plenty of milk and food (six months, right?) during the day and he will start to sleep better at night. Also, naps are the key. Once you get him napping well, he will sleep better. Hang in there. It gets better. My 16 month old still has 1 night feeding (every once in awhile he goes the whole night without) but sleeps 12 hours.