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Sleep

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Original poster

How to do controlled crying

46 replies

KikiShack · 30/03/2014 18:31

Hi, just wondering if anyone can point me to a good resource about how to do controlled crying.
Please don't tell me not to do it, DP and I need our evenings back and I need to be able to go out occasionally without feeding DD to sleep first then doing about 15 stealth transfers until she settles for 40 mins before waking god knows how many times before actually sleeping a decent stretch.
Questions I need answering are basically about what to do re naps.
DD is 6 months old and very happy and healthy and can sleep till 4am after a dream feed, maybe longer, and I'm happy to keep this one nighttime feed up while she needs it, in case anyone is worrying she's a little 6 week old or something!
Surely some of you have done it with success, please point me to where you read up on preparation!

OP posts:

notaflamingclue · 01/04/2014 15:34

jaybirdsinginginthedeadofnight I couldn't give a monkey's!!

It worked for me, I know my DS was fine, I feel no need to justify my decision to anyone else. I do however accept that it won't work for everyone. It wasn't my first choice either, but it was the only thing which has worked.

NaturalBaby · 01/04/2014 16:07

I read a lot of books then asked the HV. She did a home visit, 2 week sleep diary, wrote out a plan, came back 2 weeks later, sorted. Ds was 7 months. We had to follow the plan for every single time he needed to sleep so no more sleepy cuddles in the afternoon. I had to do the put to sleep routine every nap time. He had a comforter and a dummy so I would give them to him, say night night then go out. After a bit I would go back in to give them back to him, say night, go out etc. Putting him to bed had to be very quick and simple - just go into the room with him to put him to bed and that was that. No stories, cuddles, feeds in there.

Nosleeptillbedtime · 01/04/2014 16:24

Jaybird, I regard what we did as controlled crying. I know different methods work for different babies as I have a ds who has given the finger to most of the rules and guidance and targets that exist. Isolde's method was cry it out, not controlled crying so I responded to the ques op asked imo

Nosleeptillbedtime · 01/04/2014 16:28

Jaybird, just reread your previous post, again that is a cc method, just as I think ours was, not cry it out which was what I was responding to.

Original poster

KikiShack · 01/04/2014 17:11

Thanks for all the replies, it's very interesting to see the different views, I'm not surprised there are some differing ones.
l also find it hard to believe CC is cruel for all babies, my SIL and a cousin both did it with their DDs, SIL's was only 4 months and both girls are very healthy, happy, secure confident little babies so it certainly didn't seem to harm either of them. I think it's probably cruelest for the parents.
I can see how to do it at nighttime but what did people do for daytime sleep- if a baby is crying for an hour before each nap then that's a lot of the day gone in crying, so the routine will be all off and surely they'll be massively overtired? This last couple of weeks I've been working on the nap routine so DD's body knows when to sleep, but it's all been in the buggy or attached to my breast- she seems to do most of her daytime feeding at the beginning of naps now, plus a big feed before bed. I'm not sure how to change this if I'm putting her straight into her cot for each sleep.
Any nap tips much appreciated!!

OP posts:

jaybirdsinginginthedeadofnight · 01/04/2014 18:18

As we were sorting DD's nighttime I took her out in car or buggy for naps. Then once nighttime was sorted I tackled one nap at a time using the same method, as she's now nearly 2 she's making moves to drop her nap - I'm soooooo sad

nosleep my bad thought you were referring to CC as inhumane

Nosleeptillbedtime · 01/04/2014 19:42

No problem Jaybird. Thanks for the cake! I love cake!

Original poster

KikiShack · 01/04/2014 20:35

Jaybird that sounds ideal, I'd love to keep our snoozy cuddly naps for a while longer. So it didn't confuse your DD to have one behavior for bed and another for naps? We have a fairly good consistent nighttime routine (bath, massage, feed to a lullaby album while constantly whispering about how it's bedtime, what a good bedtime girl she is, then lightshow with silence) and a very sketchy nap non- routine (when I remember I say 'it's time for a nap minikiki, time to go to sleep) then sing a tuneless rendition of the everly brothers classic 'all I have to do is dream') so she should have some awareness of the difference.
I just fed her to sleep as usual, waited until she was deep asleep and transferred her, then 35 mins later she woke and whinged then started crying, I left her until she went into proper crying mode and set the timer for two minutes, just to see. She was silent and asleep before it finished. She then almost immediately started softly whining again, building to crazy crying. Again silent before the two minutes were up. This has given me resolve! Not sure what I'll do next time. I guess it depends on how long until the next wake. And we need to sort the feeding to sleep situation out, but this had proved she can settle herself easily and quickly, which is great.
Coincidentally she SLEPT THROUGH THE NIGHT for the first time last night. We moved her into her own room about a week ago and its made a dramatic difference.
I am full of hope now!!! But will probably back down tmrw evening, we'll see...

OP posts:

jaybirdsinginginthedeadofnight · 01/04/2014 20:51

DD's naps were never great and rarely in her cot, hence my extreme exhaustion from not only getting no sleep at night but having to walk (and keep walking coz if you stopped the motion of the buggy for even a second she was wide awake) for at least an hour a day! So when we started sleep training the goal was not only to get her to sleep at night but nap in her cot too.

I did a mini bedtime routine for naps using the word naptime instead of bedtime, into sleeping bag cuddle on my knee for 10mins as she watched a wee programme called tiny beats (music based) then up to cot! I know I know no screen time before sleeping but it seemed to relax her. DD loves her cot now which is great, but it's not at the same time! She won't sleep anywhere else now apart from cot at home, cot at my mum's or in the car. So if we are visiting DH's family we have to time it so we are driving home at nap time. Sorry went off on a bit of a tangent there

NaturalBaby · 01/04/2014 22:02

If you do it for bedtime you have to do it for nap time. It's confusing for baby otherwise - sleep time is sleep time. Until you get the sleep routine sorted then you have to be consistent and do exactly the same routine every time your baby needs to go to sleep. Once we got it sorted then one cuddly nap time ruined the whole night - it was back to square 1!

RiverTam · 01/04/2014 22:07

jesus christ, I would not do what that early poster said and just park them out of hearing and shut the door till morning, that's awful!

having said that, we did cc quite early on. We started timing at the first wail and our timings were 1, 2, 3, 4 and 5 minutes, no more than 5 minutes. Took about 40 mins all in night one, and I think that might have been it! She is a good sleeper once asleep though. Still could have good and bad nights, but in the main it seemed to help.

ElBombero · 01/04/2014 22:10

Jaybird that sounds good. How many nights did that take? Did you just do that when you first out her down? Did you feed through the night? My problem isn't getting DS down it's the 5/6 times he wakes up for 1-2 min BF's

ElBombero · 01/04/2014 22:13

Nosleeptillbedtime that's so sad

Original poster

KikiShack · 01/04/2014 22:14

El Bombero is your DC in your room? if not really do try moving. DD was waking every couple of hours for a quick feed and instantly stopped once we moved her.

OP posts:

KatOD · 01/04/2014 22:17

We followed the advice in a book called "the sleepeasy solution". She was 9mo, it took 50 mins one evening and she's pretty much slept through since. Saved my sanity!

OhGood · 01/04/2014 22:24

Sorry, I agree you should not do CIO (ie like Isolde).

I read the Ferber book 'Solve Your Child's Sleep Problems' and used his method.

Is your DC in a cot? In own room?

ElBombero · 01/04/2014 23:15

Yeah he's on own room has been for months. Glad your DD has (hopefully) tuned a corner

NaturalBaby · 02/04/2014 07:59

It didn't work with DC in our room. They were right by our bed and could see us so just wanted feeding all night. It took a few weeks to fill them up on food enough to know that they weren't waking up hungry in the night.

jaybirdsinginginthedeadofnight · 02/04/2014 08:23

ElBombero we did it with every night waking too but she settled within a few mins in the wee small hours. It took about three nights, the first night it took total of about 45mins but only 20 the next night. Not going to lie to you it was horrendous, but I was literally falling apart physically and mentally and was due back to work so it was a last resort. DD was FF and had stopped feeding through the night at about 4months, I am 100% certain she was waking for comfort and cuddles, had she needed fed I'd of fed her.

jaybirdsinginginthedeadofnight · 02/04/2014 09:12

Was thinking about it and on night waking I would've went in and gave her a cuddle by lean

jaybirdsinginginthedeadofnight · 02/04/2014 09:14

Stupid phone!

By leaning over the cot (didn't pick her up) then the same say 'it's bedtime' 'shhhhhh shhhh' and leave then start the CC process she settled quickly for night wakings.

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