Cry it out - AIBU

[Chunkychips23]

(posting here for traffic and to get a general consensus on what approaches others have taken)

DH is desperate to do cry it out with our 18 month old, but I don’t feel that it’s the best approach - I have no judgement on those who’ve done it, I just don’t think it’s the right approach for our toddler. DC takes around 45-60mins to fall asleep at night, but sleeps through until morning.

Bit of background: I’ve recently had a baby and due to having a rough delivery and PPH, DH took over toddler care for the first week whilst I recovered. He completely changed DC’s routine, from nap times to meal times. As DH has the inability to literally just sit and exist, DC has been out on adventures all day everyday. Add all that to a new sibling, I feel that’s completely thrown him. Prior to this, DC went down to sleep with a cuddle and was happy to be placed in his cot and would drop off to sleep. He now also cry’s when someone leaves the room, which he never used to do. Again, DH is getting annoyed with this.

DH is getting incredibly frustrated that DC isn’t falling asleep independently anymore and needs someone to stay in the room with him until he falls asleep. I personally think he just needs more time to adjust to all the changes that have happened as it’s only been a couple of weeks. DH won’t hear it and thinks DC is doing it on purpose and trying to manipulate. The last time he tried cry it out, DC got so upset he projectile vomited and I stepped in, much to DH’s annoyance. He tried to do it again tonight and DC got very distressed, not ‘faking it’ as DH claims. Again, I stepped in and got DC to sleep.

Yes it is frustrating and DC is attention seeking, but he’s a toddler. He has very little emotional regulation and I think DH is being impatient and expecting too much for DC to just ‘get with the program’ after big changes. He’s roped his mother in to try and push me into leaving DC to cry until he falls asleep, so I’ve got both of them going on at me.

I think he just needs more time to adjust and I’m going to speak to the HV for some advice.

Am I being unreasonable by derailing his sleep training?

OP, so your MIL is a fair bit older than me, and from what I can remember the points she’s arguing do reflect parenting of the 70s-80s - much of which has long been shown to be unsafe, particularly sleeping on the front. Is she not aware of Anne Diamond’s campaigning after her own child died? It sounds as though she has paid no attention to developments in childcare in the last forty years.

You’re going to need some support if she’s overbearing and he is listening to her not you.

If he listens to his DM on childcare and tries to overrule his own wife your marriage is in deep trouble.

You really should have had this nailed, incl CIO if necessary, prior to the new arrival. At 18mo, 45-60mins is taking the piss somewhat, but it’s too difficult to address at the moment due to upheaval of new arrival so you need to suck it up basically until the dust settles.

YANBU your husband is an idiot. And probably didn’t help by changing the toddler’s routine at this time as other things have also changed for him.

My eldest went through a few phases when she was tiny of needing company to sleep. So I’d plonk myself down in her room with her until she went to sleep. We didn’t speak she just needed to know she wasn’t on her own. I’d move further away from her each night. If went well. My second child… I sat with him until he went to sleep every single night until he was 11. He has autism and it was the only thing that worked. I have no regrets. It was actually kind of nice. In the dark, in silence waiting for him to start snoring, scrolling through my phone.

DC takes around 45-60mins to fall asleep
Probably needs a later bedtime! Has he dropped his nap?

He was going to bed fine pre baby. No issues. This has all occurred after our newborns arrival and DH changing his long established routine, that was working.

That is because (as I'm sure you know) those are not the 'wrong things' at all.

In fact, how you did it, is how the majority of the world does it. It is generally a western/anglo thing to expect very young children to sleep on their own. An invention of Victorian households after richer families began to have multiple bedrooms.

For most of history, and still in most cultures, children are not forced to cry and be by themselves at such a young age. They all grow up fine, as you found.

This has all occurred after our newborns arrival and DH changing his long established routine, that was working

Sorry, may have missed this also, why has his routine changed? It’s important to keep the same to avoid these issues.

Wow your DH really needs to get a grip. Some kids can't be sleep trained at the best of times, and this is absolutely the worst of times as you know - his whole world has been turned upside down. If DH was a reassuring presence even if DC1 did take ages to go to sleep he'd start to get better over time as he realises things are OK. What your DH is doing is absolutely making it worse. When my DC were 2y and 2w I used to snuggle in bed with DC1 with DC2 attached to the boob. It made DC1 feel that she wasn't being displaced. If it were me even though it's a pain I'd do that for two or three weeks whilst DC1 gets used to things, then gradually retreat out over the next couple of weeks (sit by cot holding hand, sit outside door etc). I would remove DH from the process in the short term and ask him to do something else useful instead eg cleaning, making dinner etc.

That’s pretty normal for small children- and he’s really only a baby himself still- to be clingier and more demanding when a big change happens. Nothing bigger at that age than a new baby! You can’t fix what isn’t there. It is frustrating when everyone is knackered and you just want him to go to sleep but your husband has got to calm the fuck down and not turn bedtime into a battle ground. Basically he needs to do what you say here. IMO you’re in the right.

DC is due to start nursery in a couple of months. I was gradually changing his routine over time as we’ve got months to do it, to be inline with what nursery does with nap times etc. DH decided it wasn’t fast enough and should be done immediately.

That and his bloody mother got in his head again.

I’m usually the one to say yes to sleep training (not cry it out but gentler methods). But with a new sibling in the house and a change of routine it definitely is not the time to do so.

Honestly, I think this is a mistake. With a new baby I would do everything I could to keep the toddler’s routine the same.

When he starts nursery he will just have to adapt because starting nursery is requires him to adapt in pretty much every area. You can’t prep for that. Especially not nap time unless you can borrow 10 random kids and put them all to sleep at once on your living room floor…

Sleep trained the eldest by the time second one was born is what I did. Obviously if a child was distressed then I'd have dealt with them but that's a tad different than spending ages each night laying with a child to get them to sleep

My DDs dad was in the Army so often not around so there wasn't 2 people to manage to get kids to bed. . That seems to be a fairly recent recent thing

I can put both to bed by myself by lying with both of them. My mum.managed 5 of us without anyone being left to cry

I agree with this. I breastfeed but I’d feed the baby first and then hand him to my husband who has always got our second born off to sleep at night since a newborn even if it was just in his arms for the first part. 18 months on, the baby is still so demanding of my attention all day that it’s nice to lay next to my eldest and it just be the two of us again for a while and listen to him chat before he falls asleep, it’s an important time of the day for us.

In the early days I would then would go into my own bed usually to catch up on sleep and my husband would bring the baby in when it was time for the next feed. If I’m honest he does sound really cold with your toddler though so I’m unsure if he’d be as willing to help with the baby?

I do (ironically) love it when parents in real life and online confidently assert that their methods "did no harm"!

Especially any comment MIL made about weaning (she was badgering me to give my child baby rice before he was even born). Didn't do your two any harm, no? That'd be the man I live with who'd have developed scurvy if left to himself?

Lying with both of them? What seperately? What do you do with the other one then I while you are laying with the first?

I didn't say id left mine crying for hours merely I couldn't be spending half hour ( at least ) PER CHILD laying there till they went to sleep

I lie with both of them, read stories, sing, listen to audiobooks, move the smallest to her bed once they're asleep.

Why couldn't you spend half an hour with them?

Because I had another 2 that needed attention. .

But if they could get in bed themselves and go to sleep, could they not occupy themselves in any other way? Or when babies and toddlers all snuggle together? If you can leave them to try you can surely manage to juggle then

I'm not sure my 4 year old could be trusted to totally behave while id left her to lay with her sister. And definitely the 1 year old ( very mobile) couldn't be left unsupervised while I spent half hour laying with the eldest.

And even when number 3 joined the mix I would need to be helping with homework, collecting elder one from clubs etc . Spending half to an hour minimum every night laying on a bed cuts into the evening somewhat

Does DH stand for dickhead here?

Surely it’s to be expected that a toddler who can’t articulate having been displaced will need extra reassurance, not a whole new routine and distant parenting.

In fairness though we discussed approaches pre DC so we knew we were mostly on the same page and agreed on important stuff like this.

Yeah I do know that, I'm saying if you had a child who legitimately couldn't sleep you'd have to make that sacrifice. Because you can't make a child sleep. A child with seizures and a diagnosed sleep disorder and vomiting reflux can't be left to cry. And no amount of being left to cry leads to that child sleeping. You'd lie there and you wouldn't just lie for an hour you'd lie for 3 and you'd breastfeed your infant while calming a marauding 4 yr old. Because as well as not sleeping they'd scream and fight and disturb the neighbours.

Anyway that aside once you can't leave one child to cry you realize how they benefit from not being left to cry and you move your life around accordingly

It’s a quite a we’ll know fact that the cry out method does more harm than good to a child mentally.
please don’t let your child cry it, it breaks my heart