AIBU to want to sleep train my 14m son when DH doesn't want to discuss it?

[Greywarden]

DH and I have one DC together - DS, now 14 months.

There was a time when DS used to settle himself to sleep in his cot most nights and then stay asleep until morning. Obviously we were amazingly lucky and chuffed. However, things changed completely when DS was about 10 months old. This was very much my fault - we took him on holiday and I didn't do a good enough job of recreating his usual bedtime routines. Since then DS hasn't slept through the night at all. DS will now:

• only fall asleep if cuddled up to me or DH. He will typically wake up crying when we try to detach ourselves from him and leave the room. He will not settle if left alone to get to sleep.
• wake up several times in the night, each time again only settling if he can fall asleep cuddled up to me or DH. This process can be quick if we're lucky but can also take hours before he can be left alone again.

I am doing 95% of bedtimes and 95% of the night wakings. I will admit that I do often give up and just end up spending the night cosleeping with DS on a mattress on the floor of his room after the first or second waking because I'm too exhausted to keep sooting him back to sleep and getting him back into his cot bed each time. I also do DS's morning routine / breakfast / getting him ready for nursery most days, with DH typically joining me to help out when I've already been up with DS for an hour or two by myself.

We both work full time in fairly stressful jobs. I feel on my knees from tiredness, yet DH constantly says he is exhausted despite getting way, way more sleep than I do. We have little sex life at the moment. I don't feel connected to DH because we are spending so much of each night apart. I'm pretty down. I love my DS and love cuddling up to him; I also don't mind doing most of the night stuff as I'm a fair bit younger than DH and know I do have more energy than him. Nonetheless, I would strongly prefer the current situation not to continue.

To the crux of the matter: I have told DH that I want to sleep train DS. I realised this would be controversial and I do appreciate that there are a lot of passionate opponents of sleep training. I'd done a fair bit of reading on different methods and arguments for and against and asked DH to take a look for himself to see if he's on board (I came to him with existing reading suggestions but also proposed he research it himself so that he doesn't worry that I'm giving him biased material, which was his initial concern).

DH totally shut down. Refused to read anything. Said it was cruel to sleep-train and wasn't going to happen to his DS. Was genuinely really upset about it and explained that it hurts him too much to let DS cry. Insinuated I clearly don't love DS enough and proceeded to take himself off to DS's room that night and sleep there with him. Refused to talk or come out once DS was asleep. The vibe was 'well if you won't look after him in the night anymore, I will.'

In the morning DH was shattered. He hasn't offered to have DS at night since, although ended up responding to DS's wakings before I did on one occasion when I was too slow to get up. The status quo has just continued as it was.

AIBU to think that my DH has been unfair to me and that we should sleep train our DS, or at least be able to have a detailed discussion about it without DH shutting me down? I know this might sound awful but I feel that if I'm the one primarily facing the consequences of DS not being able to settle himself, the decision on whether to sleep train should ultimately fall to me. But of course DH is important as the dad and I appreciate he feels strongly about it. Maybe I am being the unreasonable one here - I worry that I can't see the wood from the trees anymore and am being unfair. I also appreciate that I might be unreasonable automatically for wanting to sleep train at all, in which case I'd be grateful for stories of how other people have co-slept with their kids / helped them to get more independent at night without ruining their sanity and marriages!

YABU - DH is right not to agree to discuss sleep training further (either because sleep training is wrong in itself or because it is his right as the father to refuse to discuss the issue if he is strongly against it).

YANBU - DH should agree to discuss sleep training further or should leave the decision to you.

She wants to sleep train, not co-sleep, which is perfectly valid. Lots of people don’t like co-sleeping - whenever we took DS into bed with us, none of us had a good night.

yabu. Children don’t learn to self soothe from sleep training, they learn that mum or dad won’t come so don’t bother. It isn’t a nice way to do it and it’s cruel. A child cries because they can’t regulate their emotions and need their parent to soothe them. What’s what parents are for.

So… DH won’t let you co-sleep, sleep train or help you in the night.

He can get to fuck

It's not reasonable of him to leave you to do all the work and dismiss out of hand something that might lighten your load

It's also unreasonable of him not to listen properly or discuss properly

There are lots of types of sleep training, it's nit just leaving them to cry by themselves. For example the disappearing chair method

I sleep trained my daughter. She was like a different child afterwards and I realised that she had been really tired and grumpy as well as me, due to disturbed nights. Not giving her the chance to start sleeping well, wouldn't have beeb good for her either

Sleep training is hugely misrepresented as just leaving kids to cry. You have effectively sleep trained him- you trained him to fall asleep being cuddled. That doesn't work for you anymore.

Who cares what DH says- he's not doing the nights so why does he get an opinion. The face he did one as a statement is laughable. Get him to do a week and I'm sure he'll change his tune. Sleep downstairs so it's not your responsibility at all.

When he agrees to sleep train look at Lucy Wolfe- stay and support method. You don't leave them, just gently teach them to sleep on their own. There will be tears and because of his age it might take a few days but its not cruel. You'll be with him. There will be less tears in the day as everyone is much better rested.

Also I think the 'they learn that you don't care / won't come' is bollocks. With both my kids when they were sleep trained, if they cried we would still go in, and it was for things like they'd had a nightmare, leaked through their nappy or were ill. Not just that they'd got into a habit of thinking they needed us to be there for them to get to sleep, which was the case before.

He wasn't too old or feeble for his cock to work, was he?

He therefore does all night, every night whilst you get some sleep.

Also, wanted to add. We did a form of sleep training. I couldn’t leave DD to cry so I tried shush pat. I stroked her face, rubbed her back and never left her. She fell asleep after 20/30 mins or so. She was upset but she knew I was there the whole time so wouldn’t have felt ‘abandoned’. Took two nights and she was fine.

Normally, parenting decisions should be made together. When it comes to sleep however, the parent who doesn't do the get ups doesn't get to say no to sleep training, if they are against it they can take over all get ups and early morning wake ups. You don't get to get more sleep than your partner and tell them they can't support your shared child to learn to get better quality, more restful sleep, that's not really how it works!

Your DH clearly hasn't done much research, or has looked at biased sources.

You can either educate DH (get him to read the chapter on sleep training in Crib Sheet for starters) to put his mind at rest, or do it anyway.

I am lucky DH and I are both pretty clued up on evidence based parenting stuff and how to research properly, but if he was against it it would be a case of 'you've got one week to look into this via actual evidence-based sources, then I'm doing it' or 'okay doke, you're now responsible for our child overnight'.

Long term sleep deprivation isn't something to mess around with for adults or for children. For little ones it leads to a whole host of behavioural and cognitive/learning issues. For adults it can lead to mental health problems, crashing your car, losing your job, divorce... getting you all to sleep properly is an urgent priority. And don't buy into the myth that you can just wait and see and your kid might eventually learn to sleep! He might, but he might not. And for many parents you simply can't physically cope that long. The older he gets the harder it gets, so crack on. It's the most loving, kindest thing you can possibly do.

If DH did not want a child HE was responsible for stopping pregnancy.
pregnancy is a natural outcome of sex. You don’t choose to HAVE a child, you choose NOT to have a child and if that was his choice he needed to take responsibility himself for his choice

he failed to get a vasectomy or wear condom I assume? He certainly failed to abstain from sex don’t he! Well he then also be chose to take a the chance you would become pregnant if your method ms failed, and by 50 he should now that no method is 100%

STOP with the “my fault , my responsibility “
Martyrdom! You BOTH played a part in you getting pregnant, you bc are BOTH responsible for raising that kid and the shit difficult times it takes

so, he doesn’t want son in bed, he doesn’t want controlled crying . Have you c asked him his plan then? What actually is he suggesting to help his son to bc sleep? His ds lack of sleep will be affecting DS too. You are too knackered to continue and the lack of intimacy and his seemingly unwillingness to be accept there’s a problem that needs to be solved , WILL end up in divorce

if he cannot come up with a suggestion that doesn’t involve either or both of you being sleep deprived, tell him tough shit. He has no solution so you will try the one thing you’ve not yet tried . Tell him to go stay somewhere for 3-4 nights if he can’t cope and is not prepared to involve himself in a solution

stop taking on the responsibility by yourself.

This! Sounds like he's shutting down all possible options which is really unfair to you.

I’ll probably get roasted, but as you have written your YANBU to include leave the decision entirely to you, I felt I needed to vote YABU.

First, it’s not your fault your DS no longer sleeps through the night. You did not cause this in anyway. It is entirely normal for DC at different stages to go through phases of nighttime wakefulness.

Second, sleep training is harmful. Your DH has every right to object to it being used.

Third, lack of sleep is also harmful (to you). You have every right to not want the status quo to continue.

The issue that should be discussed with you and DH is how do we handle this without sleep training? He doesn’t want to discuss sleep training, that doesn’t mean he isn’t open to discussing other solutions:

• Splitting night time wakings more fairly, either turns based or shift based.
• Going back to co-sleeping where DS bed is in your bedroom
• Splitting bed time routine more fairly.

Sleep training will only last for a few months anyway because from age 2 you will have to deal with nightmares, night terrors, and then it is school years with stomach bugs/bed wetting and all sorts. Then teenage years and you are on late night call for taxi service or waiting for them to come home safe in the wee hours. That’s my biggest issue with it, it’s harmful and it is a short term thing.

You need to find a better balance because parenthood comes with little sleep, and he isn’t pulling his weight.

If your DH doesn't want to sleep train then he needs to do 95% of the night wakings so you can sleep.

I say that as someone who is totally against sleep training. My DH would have chosen sleep training, I didn't want that, so I did the brunt of the work. That's how it goes.

The person putting minimal effort into something while the other busts a gut doesn't get to dictate how things are done.

If the child is in the same bed with you, then I’m not surprised he can’t sleep comfortably.

also
“Other stuff like DD's clothes, appointments, toy organisation, paying the nursery and applying for free hours, just seems to have been what I took on automatically..”

This isn’t entirely your fault either. Even when I’ve given the school or surgery or any official my DH’s contact details and listed him as the primary contact….it seems everyone thinks the mum is the one to call first. So society has in a way imposed this on you as the mum. You and your DH have to consciously divvy things up and hold boundaries for things to be fairly split.

Hand baby over to him, take yourself to the spare room (if you have one) and get the best earphones you can buy. If he won’t discuss methods to actually get some rest, he can sort it himself.
Posts like this irritate me.

@WolfFoxHare -fair comment,mine was useless.
@Greywarden
i prob do judge sleep train as leave to cry-and never would i ever.
So, what does bedtime look like just now. ?
Routine is key-i think. so
say you have dinner. then what? can you fit in 15-30min walk? in winter we used to do you tube excercise things\dance routines cos sorta burns up the energy.
no matter if a dook in n back out, skiddle, in with dad,bathtime. ..once out do sort of baby massage wi cream..jammies..
supper.
teeth,tuck teddy in,
story.kiss goodnight and usully theres music on in here,but if not or restless i played children hypnosis storys(again you tube/ge appropriate.)or classical music.
you gotta stick to the programme.n adapt accordingly.rule of thumb = they jump clothes sizes every 3 mths so your up aginst rapid development.is always easier if ma n da on same page

I sleep trained my son at 5 months and then at 8 months (when separation anxiety hit). Thank god I did - I'm a much better mother for having some sleep and both times he would wake up in the morning looking super happy and almost immediately got more sleep himself. It also gets harder to sleep train the older the child. It feels horrible at the time and society now puts a lot of guilt on parents for it - but don't listen to people who talk about the psychological damage it causes - the only study that every showed an impact was in the context of children who had poor attachment behaviors/lacked sensitive caregivers during the rest of the time as well. Both I and friends of mine have done it - their kids are much older, lovely and very connected with their parents and my son is a delight who shows all the signs of a healthy secure attachment to me. Saying that - completely understand it is a personal choice.

I did it with mine. Took two nights. Problem solved. He is being ridiculous.

"Sleep training will only last for a few months anyway because from age 2 you will have to deal with nightmares, night terrors, and then it is school years with stomach bugs/bed wetting and all sorts. Then teenage years and you are on late night call for taxi service or waiting for them to come home safe in the wee hours. That’s my biggest issue with it, it’s harmful and it is a short term thing."

This is absolutely nuts. It is just not the case that as soon as you have a baby you can forget about sleeping properly ever for 21 years. Even if your 2 year old might have a nightmare sometimes, it won't be every night (though it might feel like it the odd week) and there are 10 months between now and then in which the child can grow and get the benefit of good sleep, and you can relax and clear your sleep debt and maybe read a book or do something else in the evenings. Then, if your child has a stomach bug and wakes you every single night between the ages of 5 and 16, what the hell are you feeding your child and don't you think that should be addressed? Same with teenage years: the odd late night doing a bit of taxi-ing is nothing like every single night of shredded shrapnel sleep that the OP is suffering. This is the nutsest thing I have ever read on here.

To me, babies are part of a family and the reason human babies are so dependent is that they develop for such a long period. They thrive on lots of different ways of doing things - it all takes too long for one way to be the only way.

Sleep training varies but we did Ferber at something like 10 months. It made a big difference. I'd read '3 in a bed' and was all set to co-sleep, but it was horrendous, none of us slept that way and my dh had an illness made worse by broken sleep so that was out the door pretty fast.

I think having had the argument about it you are going to have to reopen the discussion. Find a version you like the look of and say that you need to talk about it again. This is a 14-month old; she was in a better routine before; provided he won't sabotage it, I feel pretty sure it will go well.

So your husband doesn’t want to sleep train, doesn’t want to co sleep but also doesn’t want to do the night wakings 😂 yeah he doesn’t get a say, there’s three solutions right there but the only one he’s happy with is the one where you run yourself into the ground while he trots off for a full nights sleep, nope, he’s selfish and he doesn’t get to unilaterally decide that you don’t deserve sleep and he does, knob

This lady helped us massively with our 2.5 year old
no judgements
i was worried about sleep training and couldn’t do cry it out/controlled crying etc
but she devised a child and family centred plan
i think she might be able to help you as she provides support via WhatsApp and online video calls
www.sleepfix-coach.com/?fbclid=IwZXh0bgNhZW0CMTEAAR2KS6hUY12cpGdajZbvvuIN2RuAjsu8pxOCAIa8bL-Px8eCVcMNeuiTvEg_aem_r33YevKBG2erBCKq3FmtJQ

And she does a free discovery call where you can just talk to her to discuss the issues and advice and whether you want to book a package with her
she is absolutely lovely
now my almost 3 year old is settling for bed with me just sat next to him and sleeping throughout the night 90% of the time

Your dh either comes up with an alternative solution or he does the nights.

@Greywarden the solution is simple. Your DH sleeps in what is now your DS room. You and DS get a good nights sleep in the double bed. Eventually it will resolve itself, no child co sleeps forever. You have to more creative about when you have sex, presumably childcare is involved if you are both full time, add on an hour here and there. There are ways and means. But at the moment your DH is doing zero compromising so you are going to have to force his hand. He has to agree to be part of a solution that doesn't lead to you being run ragged