Please help! Do I need controlled crying?!?

[Jenjii]

I have a 10 mo ds who sleeps through the night about half of all nights so I know things could be worse. However, on nights when he does wake it takes us usually 2 hours to settle him. He cries till he is picked up then immediately settles down and sleeps in my arms. He goes nuts when put back in his cot though no matter how long he's been held for. Like I said this typically goes on for around 2 hours till he eventually settles. I'm at the end of my tether with it as there seems to be absolutely nothing wrong with him. Doesn't want fed, changed etc.
if its relevant he usually settles fine at bedtime with a bf then into cot drowsy but awake. He naps twice a day for 1-2 hours. Just pop him in his cot and he falls straight asleep.
So my question is do I need controlled crying as I feel like all the picking up and trying to soothe just keeps him awake in the end?? If so how do you do it?
Thanks.

I don't think you need it, if cuddling settles him, why not just cosleep? Most people in the world cosleep, it's just our weird western culture that thinks it's normal to stick a baby in a cot in a separate room. If you can cosleep, it's a gentler solution than controlled crying.

You are probably right. Just really, really don't want him in my bed! Wish there was another solution.

If you're not comfortable cosleeping, don't feel like you need to do it.

DS used to take 3(!) hours to settle every night, we started controlled crying, it went down to 20mins in a week & now he's happy to amuse himself in his cot until he gets bored & passes out.
We went for the 2,5,10,15,20 min (and then if he needs it, reset to 2 min and repeat)...it works for when he wakes up screaming in the night too.

Good luck & I hope you find something that works for you soon.

I could't co sleep with a 10mo. Would drive me mad.

We did cc when our dd was 10mo - like yours she needed help settling but out tried and trusted methods were working less and less.

I thought the traditional 5/10/15 minute intervals were too long, so went in at 2 mins, then 3 until she was asleep. It worked incredibly quickly - maybe 15 mins crying on night one then none by night four. Think we were lucky though.

She's slept brilliantly since, we've never had to.redo it ( she's almost 3 now.)

She was much happier afterwards for getting enough sleep. Although no doubt someone will rock up soon to tell me i'm mistaken in that and her brains are in fact fried by all the cortosil (sp? Sorry, have newborn, am sleep deprived.)

What do you do when you go in? Do you pick them up?

Can you comfort him without picking him up? Snuggle him in, stroke his head/back & don't put on a light, say firmly night night, & shush him, play some soothing music if he has a favourite.

Keep to the same routine, nice & boring and if he's tired he'll drift off. The key is to do whatever it is you decide to do for a good week or two until it's routine.

It does mean a few nights hanging over the cot but stick to it & he'll settle.

I was told by my HV to make sure that mine had a late extra snack, something good & stodgy like porridge , banana or weetabix and then his feed to help him settle & stay asleep.

You don't need CC but if it feels right for you then do it.

Thanks for all the advice. Seems like my options are cc or co-sleeping. Ill talk to my husband about what to do. Something needs to change though!

Jen, when we go in, we ignore him (no eye contact), lie him down if he's standing/kneeling, stroke his hair once, put his dummy back in & reset the lullaby toy he has.

Hope you had a better night last night.

We picked her up, but only briefly, lay her back down and gave her dummy (i actually think dummy is important because it gives them an easy way to relax/comfort themselves).

How often does he have nights like this?
I ask because DS is an awful sleeper and wakes frequently (well he did, we've improved it drastically).

The only nights that it took longer than 5 minutes to resettle him were nights when he was teething or ill. Thing is, DS doesn't cry when teething, so I just thought he was having bad nights and then a day or two later a tooth would appear.

Sometimes he would teethe for a few days, then nothing for a few weeks then again a few days and finally a tooth. Really frustrating until I worked out why he wasn't going back to sleep easily. (which didn't help with my lack of sleep but did mean I felt less annoyed with DS )

Thanks again everyone. We did the cc last night when he woke around 3 and he settled within 10 minutes and slept through till 8 this morning. Just feel really bad now that it seems I've actually been winding him up and stopping him from getting back to sleep . He wasn't even crying that whole time, mostly just sort of shouting. Think mn might have saved my sanity!

Brilliant news!
Hope he (and you!) have a better night of sleep tonight.