What happens if you don't CC/intervene in any way?

[Manoo]

Have been wondering, what happens if you don't do any sort of sleep training at all? I am still breastfeeding my 18mo to sleep. Obviously I won't be breastfeeding him when he's eighteen.... So what happens in between? I am very curious to know!

[emkana]

By 18 months I still b/fed dd1 to sleep, both in the evening and during the night. We also c-slept. By two years she started to sleep through, but still fed to sleep in the evening. Three months later she preferred a bedtime story from Daddy to boobie from Mummy , and that was that. She now sleeps in her own bed in her room and loves it. I now b/feed dd2 to sleep in the night, and we co-sleep, but she doesn't wake up in the night. Will have to see how this develops.
HTH

[aloha]

I think it very much depends on the child. There is no 'one size fits all' answer....sadly!

[emkana]

I do think, however, that my story shows that you shouldn't necessarily believe anybody who says "Your child will never sleep through/go to sleep on his own if you don't sleep-train/put them to sleep awake"
It might just sort itself out, you don't have to teach every child to sleep.

[aloha]

It also depends on how disruptive their sleep is to you, your family, your work and your health as to how much you want/need to intervene. A child who zonks out immediately after being fed for a few minutes is obviously easier to live with for a longer period than one who wakes six times a night and stays awake and either wants to play or, if not played with, yells for hours and if in bed with you is excited and won't sleep so you get about 90mins uninterrupted sleep a night (um, guess which variety I had?)

[aloha]

I remember a conversation with a friend who told me she didn't mind night wakings. I was so shocked and disbelieving....and then she told me that her girls would both wake, feed (lying down) for five or ten minutes, then fall into a deep sleep for another three- four hours. I felt physically sick with envy! If I'd had two years of the kind of waking my son did, I would have been ill, or depressed, or both. It was torture. Dh can hardly bear to think about it still and it is making both of us quite ambivalent about our next baby (due in Feb) - very pleased to be having another child, but do have sick feelings of dread about what could be in store...

[Manoo]

oooo poor you aloha, that sounds no fun at all! i'm a bit similar to your friend in that our night wakings are pretty peaceful.
thanks for your comments, emkana, really interesting to hear what happened with you. i'm not currently struggling with our sleeping/feeding situation - just geniunely interested to hear from people who didn't do cc or pu/pd to see what happened, and it certainly sounds like there was a positive outcome in your case. reassuring to hear that toddlers can outgrow the need in their own time. we're also co-sleeping by the way.

[aloha]

To be honest, if I'd had an easy baby who woke but went back to sleep OK, I don't think I'd have done anything about it either. I know lots of babies just sleep longer as they get older, but I didn't see that happening with my ds (who is, despite it all, the light of my life!)

[Manoo]

to be honest a lot of my baby decision making comes out of total laziness (e.g. kept b'fing cause didn't get round to working out how sterilizer worked, co-slept cause hated getting out of bed at night etc, so is no suprise to myself that i'm too lazy to investigate/instigate sleep training!)

i've heard lots of people say if you get a rubbish sleeper first you'll get a good sleeper second - i'll keep my fingers crossed your bump is the sleepiest babe of all time!

[aloha]

We can but hope

[Fran1]

Manoo! you sound just like me. I have 2 yr old dd.

I have posted here a couple of times that i am pleased to say have finally given up b/f, then dd decides to try again, and here we are still b/f! Even when i am absolutely convinced my milk has dried up, she manages to get it back.

And i too have been too lazy to get out of bed - hence co-sleeping and b/f. And too lazy to sort any kind of sleep training.

I am not entirely happy with situation and have fits and spurts of wishing i could make more effort (but once i'm asleep i am asleep and theres no chance of sleep training my dd).

She now goes to sleep in her bed (without b/f) we read a couple of stories, and then have to wait in room until shes asleep. She normally gets up around midnight and climbs in our bed until morning, at which point i think she normally has a b/f, but like i say i'm sooo asleep it is not possible to always be sure!!!!

Isn't that awful?

Anyway, good to see i'm not the only one.

And i do pray for the day she sleeps all night, and i do worry how i'll cope with a no.2 and what if he/she tries to join all three of us in bed???

[lulupop]

if it doesn't bother you, then why not carry on as you are?

I, and a lot of my friends, have gone through the "I can't be arsed with / am too tired to try sleep training". I think if it's really bad, everyone eventually hits the point where you have no choice but to do it. If it's not that bad in your house, count your blessings and stick with what you're happy enough with!

Re the How will he stop BF to sleep?... have you seen that Little Britain sketch?

[elliott]

I do know people who haven't done sleep training (though I don't really know in detail whether they have intervened at all -i.e. I don't know how they dealt with night wakings). afaik none slept through while they were still bf (but most of them stopped bf before the end of the first year). One started sleeping through very reliably at about 15 months (about the same time as bf stopped). Others had kids who came into their beds during the night up to about hte age of 6 or 7. It didn't bother them, but I know I couldn't have done it!
Personally once I am back at work I can't tolerate even brief wakings for feeding - main problem is that even if the baby goes back to sleep, I don't!

[bloss]

My close friend who has never done sleep training has a 4 year old who is still up and down. The 2 year old sleeps better but can't be relied upon.

[snowdonim]

I b'fed and co-slept with dd2 for the first two years. We tried CC at just over a year but it was a complete nightmare and I'd never try it again. Dd found her thumb at about 18mths and gradually changed her loyalty from me to the thumb. Then I went away for two weeks when she was 2.5yrs and dh decided to try putting her to sleep in her cot. She settled without any problem, though tried it on once I was home again!! Co-sleeping wasn't ideal as she was a restless sleeper but it was better than nothing and now she is 8yo, it's obvious she is a child who simply doesn't need much sleep. I reckon she's only ever had more than 10 hrs sleep a day once or twice in her life.

[Homsa]

I totally agree that not every child needs sleep training, and I don't think breastfeeding to sleep is a 'bad habit'! I breastfed ds to sleep for over year, both in the evening and whenever he woke up at night. Couldn't be bothered to try anything else, really... He started to sleep through the night just after his first birthday, and I gave up breastfeeding a couple of months later. It was all much easier and gentler than I had anticipated.
It may be a coincidence, but for ds a change in sleep patterns always seemed to be linked to physical milestones, i.e. when he learned to crawl, his night wakings reduced from 3 to 1, and when he learned to walk he was too knackered to do anything but sleep for 11 hours straight!

[Wadey]

I have a 15 month old who wakes constantly through the night. (angry) makes me mad cause I cant stop him. Any suggestions??????????????????????????

[Fran1]

No

But i would advise you to try and go with the flow.

I have at times got myself very stressed and angry about the whole thing. But it doesn't help.

Once i accepted that i was crap at sleep training and happier to have dd climb into our bed, then life became a little more relaxing in our house.

We moved dd into a bed at about 14 mths cos she hated the cot soo much, and of course it meant she can get up and into our bed without waking us!!!

ONE lazy mother here.

[wordsmith]

LOL @ Little Britain sketch! "Bitty!!!!" Hopefully it won't get to that Manoo...

[Clayhead]

I have never done any kind of sleep training. dd (nearly 3) moved from bf to sleep to cuddled to sleep to having stories and dropping off after them. ds is 15 months and is still being cuddled to sleep. It all just seemed to happen gradually.

I think it's very personal, just do whatever suits you and yours and makes you all happy.

[Manoo]

thanks folks. good to hear what's been happening in other people's houses! i am mostly happy with the situation but tend to question it sometimes as all my friends with babies have done cc or pu/pd and now all have good sleepers. fran1 - good to know there's another 'lazymum' out there!

i haven't seen the little britain sketch. can anyone enlighten me?!

[lulupop]

little britan sketch is hilarious, but I think you have to see it to get the humour!

david walliams plays the grown-up son who repeatedly asks for "Bitty" (breastfeed) from his mum in restaurants, at family lunches, etc, and she always obliges.

hopefully this is not actually based on real life!

[LAMBda]

Maonoo - I breastfed my 2 to sleep and co-slept for basically the same reasons as you

Ds1 went through the night at 5 months at which point he went into a cot and ds2 at about 8 months. Ds2 went into his cot at about 5 months but when he woke in the night I feched him back to my bed for a feed and he slept the rest of the night with me.

So lucky me - I never had to do sleep-training or CC

[buba]

Glad to find out their are other lazy mums like myself! I b/f my dd until she goes to sleep then feed her when she wakes up in the night. She used to c/o sleep with us until we began to run out of room! She now sleeps in her cot which has a rail missing and is pushed up against our bed so she sleeps directly next to me so I can just lean over and feed her if neccessary in the night, but we still have plenty of space in bed. I've been told that it's a bad habit but I get a good nights sleep most nights and that's no bad thing!

[merrykittymas]

Glad to see I'm not the only one who's a lazy co-sleeping breastfeeding mum. DD has slept from 11-7 most nights since 6 weeks. She has a feed at 6-7 and goes straight back to sleep until 9.

Her last feed is at 11 and either she falls asleep on the boob or I turn off the light she moans a bit then drops off, I think she's come to realise that the light goes off Mummy and Daddy go to sleep and so does she. I wake about 5 times during the night to check on her and fix her covers.

I often wonder how I will get her into her own bed but right now it works for us. The biggest thing is telling other people you co-sleep, generally I don't cos when I do I get all sorts of comments like she'll still be there when she's 10 and the like :(

[Clayhead]

merrykittymas, I only tell people on here now as I got so fed up of all the stupid comments .

I did get better at ignoring them but then I just got angry so best not to tell anyone at all! I have no idea why so many people have such negative ideas about something so trivial.