Feel like CC is breaking my heart!

[VioletShmiolet]

DH and I decided after much consideration that CC was our only option to help DD sleep at night. She is 10mo and has never slept through. We have tried everything and were resorting to rocking her to sleep in her car seat and co sleeping which wasn't helping any of us!

So I researched Jo Frost's CC technique, which has timed 'checks' at 2, 4, 8, 16 and 32 minutes, and we started 4 days ago. The first evening took an hour for her to self settle, the second took 30 mins, the third took 23 mins and then last night took 39! She was very upset from the moment we put her in the bath and she normally loves bath time! She then refused her milk and just kept crying. I gave her calpol as she had been a bit sniffly all day but she was so upset that I can't help but think it was anxiety as she knew what was coming next.

DH and I feel like the worst parents in the world and would love someone to tell me its going to get better. I would consider stopping but her night sleep has improved dramatically with only 1 or 2 wake ups and she self settles within a few minutes.

Has anyone had experience if this before or have any advice?

Hi,

I've been doing cc on & off with dd for the last month (she's now 1). If she's ill I don't do it, but just do whatever to get her back to sleep - feed, rock etc - but if she's not then I do preservers.

Yes it can be utter hell - I & dh have day crying & literally pulling our hair out whilst listening to her cry so I do sympathise.

Just so you know, sometimes babies regress after 7 days of trying any sleep training.

I've had to resort to feeding dd at night again - she's just come out of hospital & is clearly unsettled so don't want to do cc at this point.

I think it does get easier but I'm still waiting for that to happen

Hi,

This website has lot about using crying methods - www.troublesometots.com/cry-it-out/

I don't know, but the longer night like last night may well be an extinction burst like she talks about here - www.troublesometots.com/extinction-burst/

Hope they are helpful. It's so hard. All we can go is try and parent our kids the best way we can. 10 months is a long time for all of you never to sleep well!

Hope it gets better soon.

If you don't like it then don't do it.
I would restrict the time though. Maximum of 15 minutes. That might help you cope and there's no evidence that leaving babies for longer is more effective.
Things will change though over time. Promise.

We have been struggling with cc too with our 10mo. Mainly because he seems to regularly be teething/ill/we are away, then his big sis started school so we didn't want to disturb her, etc etc. hence we've let it slide...

It was miraculous at first though, so I'm confident it's a useful tool. But I know for a fact that I couldn't handle leaving him for longer than five minutes. In fact I went in every two minutes on the dot. That way I was confident he knew we were still there, but I kept the interaction almost non-existent- just laid him down, said 'night night' and left. It still worked (before it went tits up as outlined above! But that was down to circs rather than technique- or so I tell myself...)

Maybe consider tweaking to time intervals you are more comfortable with?

Have you looked at gentler options. It's sad if shes dreading bedtime.
We have used a tweaked cc with our dd which worked.