Sleep training when sharing a room?

[vvviola]

By sleep training I mean something fairly gentle (not quite sure what yet!) rather than CIO or CC.

DD2 (almost 1) shares with DD1 (aged 5). She's a pretty dreadful sleeper - we solved one of the problems (undiagnosed allergies) and things began to improve - went from waking every 45 minutes for bf, to waking every 3 hours.

Then she got sick and has been sick in one way or another for about 6 weeks. We're just at the end of her 3rd antibiotic and she's back to waking every hour.

Now that she is well again (or at least at the weekend when I am sure she has recovered), I need to do something. But she shares with DD1 so I don't want her too disturbed. We don't really have an option to rearrange rooms.

Anyone got any suggestions on how to sleep train when sharing a room (and EBF - she's a bottle refuser). Any ideas that don't include DH's involvement in the middle of the night too - he's great, but we've learnt with DD1, that he's better at daytime/evening stuff & taking pressure off me elsewhere than dealing with crying baby in middle of night.

Bumping in case the evening people have any words of wisdom. It's morning here and we had another night of hourly wake-ups. Until now, when we're trying to get ready to get out the door for school/creche/university & she's been fast asleep for 2 hours!

Last gasp cry for help....

Hi. I have no advice but an hourly waking bottle refuser. Just wanted to offer my sympathy.

Thanks civilfaulty.

I probably wouldn't be quite so desperate to sort out the sleep if DH could do the 7 to midnight shift and let me get some uninterrupted sleep!

Oh dear :( Could you try sending older kid to stay with grandparents for a week and then blitz it with the baby? Or move older kid in with DH for a week and you share room with baby, and blitz it that way? I don't have any magic answers, unfortunately - if I did I wouln't be up several times a night myself! good luck

beyondcrazy MIL just wouldn't be up to having DD1 for a week & doesn't live nearby so it would have to be in school holidays.

I could move her in with DH & I could sleep in her (tiny!) bed. But we had to do that recently when DD2 was very sick & it really unsettled her.

I suppose one option might be moving DD1 & myself (dismantling cot & me sleeping on camp bed) into the playroom downstairs and hoping that any progress we make will transfer back when we move back to our own rooms.

We have just done some gentle sleep training with our 18 month old. She was waking 6 or 7 times on a bad night co-sleeping with me and breastfed to sleep. I really do'nt know how you've coped going into your DD's room to settle her every hour. (am amazed your DD1 sleeps through this!)

What worked for us is having DH settle my DD to sleep in the evenings. We put a toddler bed in the main bedroom and I'm sleeping downstairs. We tried to establish a routine and copied it every night then DH took her up to bed and read a story and she resisted a bit the first night and there was some crying. However, DH never left her and it only took about 40 mins or so to get her to sleep. The next night she went straight to sleep. She has stopped waking up in the night or she occasionally stirs but goes right back. I never thought it would happen.

On nights since it has been trickier to get her to sleep esp when very hot but DH takes DD out in buggy until she is drowsy then can transfer her up to bed.

Your DD is probably waking up out of habit so you can introduce new habits.

Jay Gordon has a method that can be used to nightwean and is very gentle but I definately suggest using DH if you can if only to break the pattern for a few nights.

drjaygordon.com/attachment/sleeppattern.html

Gilberte DD1 sleeps like a log! We had a thunderstorm last week that was literally over the house and was shaking the whole place, and she didn't budge . But I suspect any extended crying would disturb her (I take DD2 out of the room into the sitting room when she wakes and don't bring her back til she's asleep)

I've been reading about the Jay Gordon method & I think we'll start it next week (when I'm on break from lectures), but I still need to figure out the logistics.

DH isn't great at middle of the night stuff, but is brilliant at taking up the slack in other ways, so I'll probably try to do it myself & then get him to start settling her in the evenings once we've got the hang of it a bit.

Well my DH didn't do any of the night settles for 18 months but I think me clumping around in the night trying to resettle DD and my general mood after 18 mths of sleep deprivation got him down in the end. He had some time off work so we just worked on the getting to sleep bit first. He has hardly had to get up in the night at all- and night weaning happened with almost no crying.

Possibly camping out downstairs with your DD2 might be a good idea if you can get a campbed/sofa for you and a travel cot/mattress for her. I think if you stay in the same bed, she'll keep waking to feed.

I wish you luck with whatever you do.