Yes Mummy. To my surprise when we did it, we never got hysterical crying (which I'd braced myself for and was dreading). He was more irate and shouty, which actually subsided after 15-20 minutes when he started fiddling (sheet, stuffed dog, hands, mobile which was instantly taken down, never to be seen again) and humming irritably. He oscillated between these states, throwing in the odd cheesy grin and latest gymnastic feat, for about two hours before finally waving the white flag, sticking his fingers in his mouth and knocking off. We got this for about three nights in a row at one a fecking m. I did cave on night two because I was convinced he'd descended into hysterical crying, but DH assured me after the fact that he really hadn't and that I was somewhat 'coloured' by the preceding weeks of outrageous fatigue. I got back on the horse the following night, and within a week he was able to fall asleep in his cot within 5-10 mins with one of us patting, maybe kissing his lovely-smelling cheek occasionally and clutching his blankets so he didn't kick them off again and again and again.
When I say it's a work in progress, DS is at the stage now where your DC is - he wakes every 2-3 hours for a feed, which is only up to me, being the one with the, ahem, equipment. Prior to this he was awake 4-5 times a night and needed holding for half an hour or more before I could get him back in his cot, so I was getting 30 mins of 'sleep' between each waking. Hideous.
I'm not willing to start trying to drop the night feeds until after he's six months and we see what effect solids and nursery (starting 3 half days a week on Monday) have on him as he has proper, both sides feeds each time during the night, not just a resettling nibble the way some babies do. If that was all he did, I'd probably do more of the same to try and sort it. He feeds every 1-1.5 hours during the day so he is a hungry Horace and obviously needs the calories. He only naps for half an hour each time during the day, but this has also improved since starting training - they were previously only ever on me and he'll now have them in his pram or in his cot. I do still feed to sleep - the main difference is I can now get him straight into his cot or pram and know he'll stay there, even if he wakes up a bit during the transfer (much more so at night than during the day - I don't tend to push it so much during the day, prioritising the night sleeping). We haven't had one of his awful, awful one-hour-plus overtired tantrums since starting. Those really did upset me and were one of the reasons I decided to use an approach involving crying - after PUPD and plain old pat-shh didn't work - as I really didn't see how anything could be worse for him (or me) than that. I was also not going to last physically or emotionally to see if he'd 'sort himself out'.
So still a bit to iron out over time, but huge improvements on what it was and I've got a strategy which I'm happy with, and that he now recognises if I want to start addressing other areas.
