To be conflicted about sleep training

[Megank1989]

I’m in a really weird state emotionally about this. DD is nearly 8 months and she’s not been able to sleep independently for more than 30min since just before she turned 7 months. I’d been getting her down in the cot for 2-3 and even 4 hour stretches before coming to bed and bringing her in with me when she woke (which I was totally fine with).

But for the past almost 2 months it’s been a case of having her asleep on one of us downstairs before we go to bed as she just snaps awake as soon as she goes back down after her first very short stretch.

DH is now pushing for sleep training. I am absolutely against CIO so that leaves pick up put down. The issue is I’m not sure how DH will take the week plus it will be to get this working if it does at all. He’s been working crazy hours, taking calls at 10pm, and slotting in exercise for his MH which often interferes with bed time. So I’m very anxious around it all falling on me.

I’m also just genuinely wobbly about sleep training at all. I’m very happy cosleeping most of the night but this loss of an evening is undeniably trying. I’ve got 3 months left of maternity leave and can feel the clock ticking on my time with her. She’s our first and only so I’m also generally more relaxed about soaking in this time where she’s tiny and needs me as i’ll never live this again.

Ideally, I’d want her to go back to her longer stretch, then in for cuddles with me, with the time she stays in her cot just getting longer naturally. But she’s just not snapping out of this 30min block so I feel pushed into a corner a bit. Several of the antenatal mums have now done various forms of sleep training and I’ve got a real sense of guilt that I’m resisting it.

For background, I feed to sleep if she’s on/next to me but not as part of bedtime routine. She is also learning to crawl.

Having spoken to my DM I think it's also that some parents nowadays are more accepting of it. Back in her day they'd be filling babies up with formula and rice milk and doing sleep training very early on to try and guarantee a good night's sleep for the parents. She said they moved me to the other side of the house as soon as they could so they wouldn't hear me cry as loudly etc.

Whereas I wasn't willing to do any of that, I was quite content with feeding to sleep and contact naps. For me, I'd rather focus on connection and bonding and I'll catch up on sleep later! I went back to work 6 months post partum so it's been a tough ride, baby still wakes about 4 times a night but settles quickly after a feed (unless she is teething or ill). She did a single 6 hour stretch once back in December and decided to never do that again 🤣

We also used the disappearing chair method. Sat right next to them and put hands in, shushed etc every 30 seconds. Next night, a little bit further but and only hands in, shushing if they needed it… and so on.

Now 5 and 3 and both brilliant sleepers.

I KNOW sleep training isn’t for everyone but I think people assume it is CIO and it can actually be very gentle and supportive. My friend still co sleeps with her two year old and her husband has to go in for their 5 year old 3-4 times a night as she said they’d both grow into sleeping through when they’re ready. 5 years and she hasn’t had a full nights sleep or shared a bed with her husband. Sometimes you have to balance your own health and sleep too!

Agree with this. You are confusing her.
If you are going to sleep train you need ti be committed. Yes the baby will cry because it is new and uncomfortable. But it doesn’t last. They get used to it and they are happy, rested and more/as importantly, so are mum and dad.

I totally get how horrible it feels in the moment, but now that my kids are a few years past this stage, I can't quite see how a week or two of being left to cry for an hour would cause lasting psychological damage. We ended up doing a sort of interval CIO thing at 10 months with each of our two children, and both have slept well in their own beds since then.

Those contact naps won't be very enjoyable once she's on the move, FYI.

Once my boy started crawling, he was on the move and also trying to walk within 2 weeks. From the second he opened his eyes until he went to sleep it was non-stop moving. Couldn't even drink a cup of coffee. Genuinely. We had a massive play pen set up for him and it took him an afternoon to realize that if I put him there, I might leave so he refused it. What I'm trying to say is nap time is the only time I can catch my breath, have a shower, eat etc. Until they can walk properly, you have to be there on the floor with them.

We sleep trained at 5 months. Best thing we ever did. It's not perfect, teething, sickness etc interferes with sleep. And I breastfeed and he still wants a feed around 4am (he's 10 months), but otherwise sleeps 7-7.

My first is now nearly 4, he was always a terrible sleeper as a baby. I couldn't ever bring myself to embrace sleep training, I really don't think it would have worked with my son as he was very clingy and instead I fed him to sleep until he was about 18 months. At some point something just clicked and he's great now - I used to worry so much that I was doing something wrong but he just slept independently when he was ready.
My second is 8 months old, she had a really bad phase of sleep recently - up most of the night, waking up as soon as she's put down etc. She's not quite as clingy / boob obsessed as he was. Our bedtime routine had been bath, story, feed then rock to sleep but this last week I decided to change it and do bath, feed, story, then put her in her cot and rub her tummy until she fell asleep. Amazingly since I've started doing this we've been back to 2 or 3 wakes in the night but she'll have a quick feed and then go back down rather than be up for ages. I don't know if it's a coincidence but my friend has a baby who is a similar age and has been terrible at night for months and she's had a similar success with feeding slightly earlier in the bedtime routine. It could be worth a try.
Sleep deprivation is so so hard but I just really want to make the point that if you don't want to sleep train then that's fine and you aren't doing anything wrong or setting yourself up to fail. They'll sleep eventually! With my first stressing about what I was doing wrong was nearly as much of a mental strain as the tiredness itself, especially when you also have people asking "aren't they sleeping through yet?"

Edited to add - enjoy the contact naps! I missed them so much when I went back to work with my first.

Training a baby to give up home their parent is going to come back is just not something I could feel positive about or justify in any way.

I think we had about 2 grim night sleep training but as they're about to leave primary school I think we've been woken no more than once a year, I think your kids have a better life when you're well rested too. Don't think twice - although my wife left me to do it as she couldn't bring herself to do it.

Except that for the majority this isn’t what sleep training is. You are describing one end of a spectrum. Tactics most parents adopt are somewhere else along the sleep training spectrum in terms of level of support given.

I found the No Cry Sleep Solution really helpful. It also helped my partner understand baby sleep needs. It's slower that most sleep training but it's quite empowering as you can choose what is an issue and just work on those bits with multiple ideas.

8 months is crap for sleep. I didn't sleep train and survived. Still have my 6 year old coming in with us from time to time. It really isn't a long time although it feels like it when you're in the middle of it.

You really really don't have to sleep train your baby. I've got 4 and I've never sleep trained, they absolutely will sleep eventually. There are tough stages but they come through them. If your DH is prioritizing everything else except actually helping at bedtime, he doesn't get to push for sleep training.

What is her day time sleep like?
My son has just turned 10 months and seems to have sleep trained himself, I was rocking him to sleep every night until last week he all of a sudden started pointing to his cot, so I put him in and he's been putting himself to sleep since then. I was also against sleep training
But I wonder if tweaking daytime sleep could possibly help

OP you don't have to do anything.

At 8 months I'd wonder whether it was actually separation anxiety rather than a sleep problem. In which case your contact naps are exactly what she needs! As you say, she obviously knows how to connect sleep cycles, so personally, I'd cosleep and ride this stage out.

But I don't believe in sleep training tbh. I think that babies do these things when it's right for them and you can't influence sleep long term with these techniques. Just that every baby is different, so some sleep well and some don't. To me, attitudes like @SErunner just don't make any sense

An update. After getting her down easy to start (which I thought might happen) spent 2 hours after first wake. By the end sat by the cot with my hand on her chest with intermittent pick ups. She fells asleep sobbing but awake again within half an hour. I was going to bed at that point so in she came. I’m going to keep at it, if only to get her comfortable being put in her cot awake, and maybe worry about duration later. I’m not really prepared to give up contact naps while I’m on mat leave as she’ll be getting plenty of independent naps once she’s in nursery. Plus she was having them back when she was going down at night for big stretches.

From one mum to another: this isn't your fault, you didn't spoil her or ruin her sleep etc. Baby sleep is fluid and everyone goes through this. You don't "solve" baby sleep. They will sleep well and then they won't. It's not in your control. Everything is temporary for years. You will still be talking about sleep at 3 years old.

Honestly, yes it will fall to you because DH is happy to walk away and leave baby crying and you aren't.

Don't think about 3 months time, it will change again by then and after working all day you may want those evening cuddles.

Are you actually bothered by the evening contact naps or is DH pushing this? Because if his only solution is that you sleep train the baby because he doesnt want to hold her every other evening because he would rather work, that's not very supportive.

Lol I didn't have room to move mine to " other side" of house. Dd1 got her own room when I moved when she was 10 months. DD2 ( my best sleeper) moved out of my room at 4 months and Ds was 5 months. Only one bottle fed at that age was DD1. None weaned until 6/7 months.

I do remember when DD1 was in with me. If she did start moving I stuck my foot out of the bottom of the bed and rocked her crib if it was too early.

Your mum may have a point about not rushing to pick babies up at the slightest sound which gives them a chance to self settle. Imagine if you half wake it in the night and instead of being left to doze off someone swoops in picks you up etc. Not conducive to sleep

I don’t think anyone has said she does have to? I was just replying as someone who has sleep trained with success. Of course it’s up to the OP. I do think she should stop the contact naps as they aren’t needed at that age, it doesn’t help in the long run in terms of sleep and nursery settings won’t do them so the baby will have a bit of a shock when entering childcare if that’s all it’s used to. But again, that’s just my opinion.

We’re all entitled to our own views, I respect yours and there is no need for you to be rude about mine. Gentle sleep training worked brilliantly for us and resulted a child who has settled to sleep independently since 12 months and slept through consistently since then too. She gets a good nights sleep, we get an evening together and a decent nights sleep too, and everyone is happier. It worked for us but there is obviously no obligation for others to do the same and there are of course other ways to achieve the same outcome depending on your personal views. I was just sharing my experiences.

Do you have a comforter? This was absolutely crucial for our DD getting to sleep. We introduced it much earlier on, but I wore it in my bra for a few days and nights so it smelt of me. But now at 2yr2m she still uses it for every sleep.
might not work in isolation but could work with a habit stacking method

Just trying this!! Also had it in my bra 😂

Just wanted to add our sleep training experience. We done a modified Ferber method at 8 months and we resettled the baby in the cot (without picking her up) every 5 minutes. It was really tough at the beginning, but after a week LO was going to sleep pretty much independently after his bottle and stayed asleep. It also flowed well into his nap of a day time, LO was a serial contact napper but she did start napping in the cot. It was a life saver for us as LO would only sleep about 40 mins a stretch.

I'm interested in this - do you remove the comforter once they're asleep? Trying to figure out how to square it with the safe sleep advice about having nothing in the cot

I started introducing the comforter from about 4 months for naps and then would remove once asleep, from about 6 months I would leave it for cot naps and then I think about 8 months I just left it in the cot. I felt comfortable with it based on how my baby slept and neck strength etc, but obviously it does go against guidance.

I plan on leaving it in, at this point she’s more than capable of moving her face away. She slept on her front for the first time last night anyway and stayed down until 12:40 after a false start. To update, I put her down both times in the cot and the second time she rolled over and went back to sleep with just some singing . Couldn’t believe it! I know I need to suck it up and resettle in the middle of the night after a quick feed but that’s already back to my preferred scenario of getting the first part of my night back! Let’s see how night 3 goes before I count my chickens.