Greetings from down under! I've been reading the thread but not posting for a while due to lack of Internet / time difference / general laziness but thought I'd just stick my tuppence in on the non sleeping TBs in case it is of interest to anyone....
I can't remember who mentioned the millpond book up thread but I read that then panicked and decided to throw some money at the problem (non sleeping / newly co-sleeping baby, which I made worse by refusing to let her cry and get away with murder when we were saying with friends). So we are 3 weeks into a program with them and I have weekly calls to talk about next steps. They are a bit too into controlled crying for me here in Oz for me personally so rather than go local we just skype the lady in London.
Anyway we had to fill in a detailed questionnaire and keep a diary (and still are keeping a diary), and we have been doing gradual withdrawal but there are really 3 main strands
- Em was hungry doing BLW which was probably causing half the problems so we had to make a real effort to get food in her during the day. She now has breakfast, lunch and a snack as well as 4-5 BFs in the day. And the nappies show that stuff is going in. By god I miss BF nappies.
- We have been spacing the night feeds out starting at every 2 hours and now are up to every 3 1/2 so she feeds at 7pm before bed for no more than 5 mins, dream feeds at 11, wakes at 2.30ish for feed then sometimes wakes at 5, sometimes 6. Next step is to reduce the 2 am feeds by 1 min a night until she learns there is no point in waking up for them (this will only work if she is getting enough calories during the day)
- Gradual withdrawal to help teach her to self settle. So we only go to her when she is upset (crying escalating rather than just awake) and every 3-5 day what we do to settle her changes so started with rocking, then holding, then patting stroking in cot (no picking up), and now on patting / stroking for 10 secs then nothing for 10 secs). Next sitting next to cot and shushing , then in door way etc etc. This is all in the book in detail. (Book is WAY cheaper on kindle btw)
It's working as she is now taking 5-30 mins to get to sleep (as opposed to 3 hours) and will go for at least 3 hour stints (as opposed to 20 mins). She is also in her own cot in her own room though I am sleeping on a sofa bed in there as we don't have a bed yet. But it's SLOW compared to cc and it's still just me doing it all partly because I am a control freak and don't want DH to spoil the progress we have made and partly...oh nope that's the only reason.
Anyhow, I would recommend as we would never have figured out the food thing. I have to go as my 72 boxes of crap / worldly possessions from the UK have literally just arrived and I have to tick each box in individually. They offered to unpack but our new house is teeny and I have no idea where to put anything. But it means I will have 72 cardboard boxes to get rid of eventually.
Every day I think I am crazy to have done this and have a little sob inside. But that's a whole other post.
Hope you are all fast asleep and get to read this after a full nights rest 