Baby sleep is tearing us apart

[Chachachanges]

I’ve nc for this as I’ve discussed this in detail with a close friend who i know is on here (hi!).

This might be long - apologies in advance. For background, DH and I have been together 13 years, married 4 and have 1 DS who’s 21 months. Let me just say upfront that my DH is a good man and a great father.

Our DS, whilst amazing, has been a truly terrible sleeper from day 1. It’s been hard, I can’t lie. I took the brunt of if for about the first 9 months as I was breastfeeding and only I could settle him in the night. That was hard, however, I think it’s almost gotten harder since DH has also been able to help settle overnight as he doesn’t seem to do very well with little sleep.

DH has been pushing to do controlled crying since DS was 6 months. I’m just totally against it and have refused to agree to that. (I believe every parent does what’s right for them, cc works for some families but it’s just not something I feel I can do).

I should add that I feel we have compromised and we did sleep train, however in a gentle way, removing boob as a sleep prop and doing shush pat etc to get DS falling asleep independently in the cot.

DH has seen a couple of his friend’s babies who’ve done cc and it has appeared to work. He talks about this all the time. I’ve pointed out the other examples of friends of ours who’ve done it where it hasn’t worked quite so well (still waking over night) but he doesn’t acknowledge this.

I get really annoyed by this as the sleep training we’ve done HAS shown results. DS stopped feeding to sleep, falls asleep by himself in the cot etc. But every time he’s sick, teething etc we go back to square one and I just know if we did cc it would be the same thing. I couldn’t stomach doing it over and over again.

DS has gone from waking every 2 hours at 12 months to maybe once a night now in averagr (sleeps through about 50% of the time). DH doesn’t really acknowledge this improvement - if we had 3 nights of sleeping through followed by 1 bad night, DH will immediately be sulky and bad tempered. If I pick him up on this then we end up in the same argument again about cc. We’re at an impasse about a 2nd child as we can’t agree how we’d deal with another poor sleeper.

I do understand DH point of view that I’ve unilaterally taken a decision which means we’ve been more sleep deprived. But, as I’ve referred to above, DS is a tough nut to crack in terms of sleep and I’m not altogether sure cc would be the answer to our problems. That, I think, is time - i.e. DS sleep is naturally improving every month that goes by.

I just don’t know how we resolve this. Before DS we never really argued v much and certainly never with raised voices etc. Sleep deprivation has taken its toll on our marriage for sure.

Not sure what I’m looking for here. Am I being hugely unreasonable? Has anyone else been here?

Bloody hell that’s long, apologies!

I agree with your stance on CC and never did it with either of my two. I think you are right that it doesn’t always work and any illness / teething will set you right back.

I totally get that sleep deprivation can break you, my youngest woke consistently every 2-3 hours for 18 months until I stopped breastfeeding, plus I had a 2 year old at home who didn’t nap once she was born and no family help. My DD2 wouldn’t let my husband go near her at night and she did carry on for the first hour once I stopped which was awful. Although she did sleep through after that, there has definitely been times when the children wake up through the night even now at 4 and 6.

I think the one magic bullet is time unfortunately. Most kids are fairly reliably sleeping through by 2-3 years and that has been consistent across my friends who have similar age children. Some get lucky, some are unlucky in terms of how kids sleep. Please don’t only have one child because of not agreeing about sleep - seeing my two daughters together is one of the true joys of parenting.
I think the only thing I would suggest is that you take the bullet on dealing with wake ups if you DH can perhaps let you have a bit extra sleep in the morning? This is what we do in our house generally, I’m not a morning person and can cope better with waking up than my DH.
Good luck, sleep deprivation is brutal!

I meant to say my eldest stopped napping when my youngest was born! My youngest stopped napping when my eldest started reception - I obviously upset the sleep gods somewhere

I tried cc with my now 6 year old...it was horrific & i lasted one night. Never again. She didn't do sleep until she was 2 - i was single & lasting on two 10-15 minute naps in a 24 hour period; i swore no more kids.

DS is 8 weeks old & the two are night & day. He will do 8-8 with a 30 minute wake up for a feed...i feel like i've won the sleep lottery.

I guess my point is you won't necessarily get the same, & actually i think oncr you've dealt with a rather bad sleeper & come out the other side, it's surprising how easy you can find another 'not so bad' sleeper. I thought the newborn stage would kill me as i now love my sleep, but even when DS was up every 2 hours for a feed it was heaven compared to DD!

Ha HRMumness, I often feel the same way about the sleep gods!

Thanks for your reply and reassurance that this will end at some point. I guess it’s hard for us to see the wood for the trees in the midst of it.

It’s the arguing that upsets me - we never really fought much pre-baby. Sounds like you had a tough time of it with sleep deprivation too, did that impact on your relationship with your husband?

How does DH think CC is going to help? does he realise that potentially you will lose your 3 night good/1 night crap streak?? CC can take some kids a while to crack and ir is fucking heartbreaking ime & as you pointed out, it can only take the smallest thing to send you right back to square one

Based on my own statistical sample of 2, sleeping through 50% of the time is good going at 21 months 👍🏻. When you have two there are always points at which the baby has to be left to cry, I think that’s the reason my younger one is better at getting herself to sleep. But she still wakes maybe 20% of the time (she’s now nearly 3.5). Babies and toddlers are hard work, and from the outside everyone else’s babies look perfect and easy. That’s not the reality. Sounds like you are doing great.

I did CC with both successfully, in my case only took a few nights each time.

I think you are being hugely unreasonable as in your dh is equally a parent, however you have made a decision and are unwilling to compromise. You have effectively overruled him. I would say this no matter the subject.

If it’s making you so unhappy why not go away for the night & let him try it himself?

Look - I think you are looking for MN style reassurance that as a mother you can make the decisions and CC is terrible.

But reality is - like with most points of disagreement in a marriage - it’s rarely B/W. Same with this one.

Sleep deprivation does cause all kinds of problems. And by now - you also have H resenting you. And in his place - i’d be very reluctant on another baby unless you are willing to show flexibility.

Like with all issues - cc crying can be horrible if taken to extreme. And can be modified if you were wiling to find a solution.
I remember having those conversations back when kids were babies:
Ok - cc crying is terrible, kid cries for ever and it’s not good. Agreed.
How about if you start with just 1 min of crying. Can you take that?
Because surely - you’ve had a baby cry for a min during the day?.....

What I found was that it’s like a philosophy - or religion - it’s not about actual impact on a child who won’t be hurt by a little cry.

OP - this issue will go away as your baby grows up a bit more. But as you go - so many more issues will pop up where you are H will disagree. And - if you continue to be 100% sure of your way being the right one and continue to override your H - eventually the resentment may destroy the good relationship you had.

Your dh has an equal say on how to raise your child, so a discussion I a good place to start rather than a flat out no.

For what it’s worth I did gentle CC with my dd (single parent so no help in the evenings and I was shattered) and she now naps/goes to bed a night within 2 minutes and no crying. She might wake up once or twice in the night and self-settles. Best thing I have ever done, and I was hugely against it before I tried it!

The thing your DH hasn’t learnt that teething which continues until all molars are through, night terrors, illness & sometimes even the full moon can ruin a night’s sleep for the toddler.

My eldest I did cc as he didn’t sleep at all & nothing worked & it worked the first night BUT he has night terrors so we have to disrupt his sleep pattern, if he’s ill he’s up &
Sometimes his brother will wake him up. He’s now 3.5 & I’d say sleeps 12 hours about 5 out of 7 nights a week.

His brother is 1.5 & I didn’t do cc as he mostly slept apart from teething, illness & leaps. He mostly sleeps 8-6/7 so it just shows every child is different.

But you know your child & you’re absolutely right that certain things will disrupt sleep no matter what.

I am very against cc. We had an awful sleeper in dd1. Breastfeeding at random times throughout the night. Co sleeping.

Once night weaned she began to sleep through at 22 months. Now almost 3 she will still occasionally come into our room and go to sleep.

If you are getting 2 nights of sleeping through and one with wake ups I'd say that's totally normal. Does your DH sleep through every night or does she sometimes get up to use the toilet?? That's what normal sleep is like.

How long is Ds awake at night if he wakes up. This is maybe the key. If he wakes and is asleep again within 30 mins then your DH has totally unrealistic expectations of sleep with a child. If he's awake for longer then I'd work on this.

It sounds like your DH is angry that is sleep is being interrupted and is grabbing something to blame. Something he can fix. Rather than accepting that when you have a kid they sometimes wake up at night.

You have done sleep training which has meant he is now sleeping through most nights. I doubt cc would have much different results.

Good luck.

I have done CC with one of my DC but I don't think it will help in this situation. I actually think 21 months is too old to do it. Plus your DS can self settle and does sleep through a fair amount so it doesn't feel like you need an extreme solution. Although I should tell you that my other DS (no CC) still doesn't sleep through consistently at nearly 4 years old! He did at 21 months though.

I didn’t really do controlled crying, popped in every minute/2 minutes for a little stroke until he went off to sleep.
He has always been a good sleeper though and will happily go in his cot and go off to sleep at 10 months old.
I put him down to bed at MILs the other night as we were having dinner there, he screamed when I put him in the cot and I was desperate for a wee so ran to the loo first and by the time I was done he was fast asleep.
Have you tried leaving little one for just a couple of minutes? So not controlled crying but maybe they’re so overtired they just need a minute to settle down. I feel for you though, no sleep is crap!

We have the exact same discussions but I have now put a stop to it! I have said caragorically that I won’t do CC and I will therefore deal with consequences.

I do all night wakings and move into the spare room when my DS wakes.

It’s not ideal but I litrally can’t be bothered to argue over it anymore :)

Not sure if this is the right thing to do but I’m sick of arguing? :)

At 10 months ds had never slept in a cot alone. Been in hospital most of it with lights /noise +me 24/7!!
Did cc - with a flask and magazines at the ready on the landing!!
He slept through on the third night with honestly not much crying!!
He is 17 now and not traumatised because he cried a bit and I didn't rush in!
Give it a try, as pp said it's up to dh to make decisions also.
He had no back to square 1 episodes with teething either.

It’s worth a try. Your baby is not going to be traumatised by it and even if it doesn’t work or you and your husband can’t hack it, you can say youve given it a go rather than an outright ‘no’.
My parents did controlled crying with myself and my brother (twins) and within a couple of nights we were sleeping through and we are the most loving family! It really didn’t do us any harm!

I tried it with my 6 month old when we went through a bit of a regression and he’s sleeping great again now and wakes with a beaming smile so he can’t dislike us that much! Really what have you got to lose?

Oh OP! We've been there too! Horrible isn't it?

Our DS didn't really sleep very well until about 11 months Im afraid to say. He didn't really get the hang of it in the beginning, I think due to colic.

We tried sleep training and it didn't really work. What resulted was an exhausted baby, an exhausted and emotional mumma and Daddy having to pick up the pieces.
We stopped that (I tried Tracy Hogg, Baby Whisperer).

Read Gentle Sleep by Sarah Ockwell Smith... seriously, so so good. Very flexible. Very supportive of your choices.

Interestingly, she mentions a controlled crying experiment. She said they monitored the stress levels of mum and baby during the controlled crying. On the first night, both baby and mum had high stress levels. On the second night and third night, the stress levels for mum decreased as baby cried less. On the final night when baby 'slept through', mum's stress levels were down completely. However... baby's stress levels remained the same throughout all of those nights. They concluded that even though Mums stress was significantly lower, Baby was still stressed but had just learnt that Mum didn't come in anymore or respond to cries.

It's totally up to you. It's totally up to any parent what they do in regards to their child. But for us, we couldn't do it. And I think your instincts are something to be trusted...

To be honest it looks like you are over the hump with the sleep issues now and on the home straight. Regardless of the ethics I don't think there's any point throwing in CC curveball now.

Wrt the issue of compromise with your husband - actually I'm of the school of thought that there are some issues with parenting which you can't compromise on, really. And also areas of parenting where one parent deserves the greater say in how things are handled. If the mother is doing the BF, the father doesn't get to wade in with their opinions about feed spacing etc. Likewise if the mother is bearing the brunt of the night wakings and nighttime parenting - then her opinions on the best way to guide a child towards sleep count for more.

It sounds a bit like your husband is annoyed generally about lack of control (I can empathise as small children decimate this aspect of your adult lives) and is focussing on this sleep disagreement as a lightening rod for his frustrations. i don't think that's a good enough reason to put your child through CC.

RightyHoChaps i've read similar & it broke my heart. It reminded me of a conversation i had a few years back with manager of an orphanage in Malawi - they cared for babies orphaned through AIDs. He said that when babies first came in from other, usually overcrowded, orphanages, they rarely cried. Even if in discomfort or being hungry, they were silent. They put it down to the fact that with so few carers & so many babies, crying had literally no impact on getting seen to; babies were put on a schedule & seen to when it was 'their turn'. That was a soul destroying conversation even though i knew it was through necessity not the cares being cruel

Why does every poster that is militantly opposed to CC automatically assumes that baby cries for hours on its own?
And feels abandoned as a result.
And then liken them to orphanages in poor countries?

Plenty of other ways of doing it.

No different to parents praising CC because it worked for them. Research shows babies stress when ignored. The orphanage anecdote is an extreme but it's well studied that if you ignore a baby crying regularly for long enough they give up trying at some point

Having a baby/small toddler is hard. It does get easier on your relationship as they get a bit older. But I would say that I think your dh needs to manage his expectations. Kids aren’t machines where you just put in the right input and the desired output pops out the other end. Those friends with toddlers who sleep better are just more lucky. They haven’t done things ‘better’. But a 21 month old who sleeps through 50% of the time is amazing! My first didn’t sleep through once til she was 3.5 and still wakes occasionally at 5, as do most children. My 2nd (ebf) slept through most nights from 10 weeks (despite being ebf, co sleeping, etc). They’re just different (and the good sleeper is very much the exception!). Can you take turns so you each get a really good night of sleep several days a week while the other does the nights? At least until everything gets easier which it no doubt will soon as sounds like he sleeps quite well.

@Pissedoffdotcom
Most things if done to extreme can do harm.
Research you site - only measures a certain time of crying. And measures stress at that time.
It did not then link any long term ill effects in children development to the short term stress they experienced while learng to fall asleep in infancy.
It also didn’t test different length of crying periods, etc....

As to the crying itself. What of toddler tantrums. Or older kids distress at cut down screens time? Should those episodes of crying and stress be avoided at all costs?

The orphanages stories - I find - are always used for dramatic effect. And to prove the near religious convictions. Babies in those orphanages are deprived of normal human contact and develop attachement disorders.
It’s way beyond crying to sleep.

Hi all, apologies I haven’t been back, we’ve had visitors and I haven’t had a moment. I need to go through and read everyone’s responses. Just want to say that I didn’t want this to get into a bundight about whether to do cc or not... More how people have managed fundamental parenting differences with their other halves...

Back in a bit