letting my lo cry it out for the first time right now...words of encouragement anyone?

[lou19]

My daughter is 11 months and I am at my wits' end. She used to sleep with the boob but lately she has been biting me A LOT and still not going to sleep. doesn't want to be rocked, doesn't want to be sung to. So I just her put her in her cot and walked out. It's been nearly half an hour and still hysterically screaming. Feel on the brink of tears myself. am I a monster for doing this?

Do you feel happy about it? It doesn't sound as if you do. How much support are you getting? How long has this phase (which is what it is, it will end!) been going on?

Of course you aren't. It is a hard choice to decide you need to leave them to cry. It is no good to either of you though if you are stressed. Much better to close the door and walk away.

Personally- letting a child "cry it out" doesn't work for me. I don't criticise anyone who does do it though- each to their own. I suppose if I were you I would go out and take DD with me, to the park or shopping. In the hope that when she got home she would be tired enough to sleep. I often do this with my DD (although she is only 7mo) and she will sleep in the car. My OH lets her cry to fall asleep but only a wimper cry rather than a hysterical cry.

You posted this an hour ago... I'm interested to know how long she cried for. Did she fall asleep or did you go into her?

I think it is better to stay in the room and slowly each night go further to the door. That way she won't be scared. Don't leave her on her own, I don't think it will work.

Is this nap time? I always had a contingency plan if possible for naps (still do sometimes at 2.2). If she didn't sleep in her cot after 20 minutes or so (I didn't leave her actually, but she also went through a phase of not wanting to be held, rocked or even fed to sleep) I would go out with pram, sling or car, just so the sleep would happen.

I prefer doing controlled crying, rather than leaving a baby to cry it out. I started with leaving DS for 2 min, then 4 min, then 6 min, then 8 min, then 10 min etc, going in and giving him a cuddle in between. It took 2 nights to have him settling himself and sleeping through the night and he never cried for longer than 40 minutes in total.

thank you for your replies. sorry I started the thread then walked away, but after 45 minutes of incontrollable sobbing I caved in and went in to her. She did not sleep for the rest of the afternoon but she does not seem tired anymore and seems in a good mood. confused.com. I on the other end was so traumatised that I just had to take a walk!belinda, I usually let her nap in her buggy at 1 o'clock every day, she goes down no problem. when she is at the childminder's (2 days a week) she goes down in the cot on her own but she does protest for about twenty minutes (he says he does not let her get hysterical). In the evening she goes down with the breast, but she wakes up a lot during the night to feed. Plus she started biting me at every feed so really confused about whether I should wean her off the breast, too. basically I'm at a bit of a loose end. Don't want to stop breastfeeding and don;t really believe in crying out, just feel like I am running out of options. [sigh]

lou - sorry, I could never encourage anyone to do this to a baby.

45 mins unrelieved distress is not kind to anyone, let alone a baby who has no ability to reason or ways of understanding why.

There are other options - call one of the bf helplines and talk through them and you will find something that does not mean you are doing something you don't want to do :(

The reason you feel so desperate and stressed about cry-it-out is because you know the effect on your baby :( You love her and you don't want to upset her - so don't!

You need to look at ways of stopping the biting (she could be teething), weaning of feeding for naps and sorting the night wakings. It sounds like you've been ground down.

Can you take her out for some naps? If you feel like it's getting too much, pop her in her pushchair and take her for a walk.

Day naps are a lot harder to teach than bedtime wrt self settling IMO - DS didnt until similar age to your DD and that took months and is still hit and miss at 2! plus he's better for his nanny than he is for me!

Biting wise - is she biting at the start or end of feed? When she bites what do you do? I found pushing DS into the boob made him let go and saying no or putting him on the floor for a few secs worked. He only did it a few times.

Night feeds - you could try reducing the times of feeds by a minute at a time to get her used to not to being hungry. But she might be teething hence waking for feeds - try having a look for any sign of canines/molars and give a bit of calpol after the first night waking (I found DS needed it more then).

I do think she is teething, but the whole wanting to sleep with us thing and increased breastfeeding is also related to having started going to the childminder's two full days a week. my god what am I going to do when I start full time in January!I think that's what's stressing me out, plus I feel guilty for leaving her those two days so I am less resolved than I would normally be...think I will stick to buggy for day naps until I've got a handle on nightime sleeping, then maybe she will be more willing to sleep in her cot during the day, too.

My instincts tell me that she needs a lot of patience, reassurance and support and that this needs to happen gradually. I just feel under pressure to take drastic measures, and that pressure is a mixture of outside, well-meaning individuals, and my own feelings of tiredness. Willfeedback on my efforts!

On that case go with your instinct. I didn't do any thing quickly with DS - there were plenty of backward steps! But you do get there in the end.

lou :(

Please, do try to ignore (hard as it is) the outside pressure. Of course it's well-meaning but no one but you has to be there to deal with the feelings you get when your daughter is so upset :(

Sounds like you need a strategy to deal with the biting - as Tiktok says the breastfeeding lines will help with that - and with regards to her needing you because you're at work - well that will fade with time, reassurance - and you being there. Sometimes these phases of them being really high needs when things change (ie when you go to work) just take a few weeks to settle down. It's soooo tough when you are so tired but all the studies say that just going with it as best you can is the quickest way to get them to cope with how their lives are changing.

It sounds like you have a good strategy for day naps. January is a way away yet, and she will be a whole 2 months older (that's about 1/6 of her whole life!) so just focusing on what's happening for now and try not to worry about what may happen in the future.

There are other options to help teething, too. As well as the traditional remedies which we all know about, amber teething necklaces work for many, as do homepathic treatments. You may be open to these things or they may be totally wrong to you - but I thought I'd mention them :)

Another thing you can do with the pain is ibuprofen if she's really in pain, as well as paracetamol. Don't give it at the same time - it should be staggered - but it could help if she's got swollen, sore gums.