Sitting here doing timed controlled crying

[Madamecastafiore]

And every minute feels like an hour!

Please tell me it will work and get better.

We are at the end of our tether. Done the staying in the room thing and that doesn't work and 8 month old DD waking every 2 hours again.

JUDGEY! Blinking auto correct

Glad you like Jonkastique. Budget pants should probably be left in the drawer too though

I did cc with both my children. Tbh I have limited sympathy for those who don't and who complain that their children never sleep through the night. The cc only lasts a few nights then it's whole nights of sleep for everyone.

We did cc with DD at 8.5 months because I couldn't do a good job at work with the amount of sleep I was getting. I need to be able to make safe decisions and I couldn't.

It worked and our family was much happier as a result. She is a good sleeper now barring illness.

You have to do what works for your family as long as it's not known to be harmful.

Finally - totally agree with you .

I often wonder why, in homes where there are two parents, one of the parents (mum) doesn't try and go out for a short walk or something rather than sit agonisingly by the bedroom door. - Yes, I understand it might be difficult if you have other children or committments but when I did CC I just shut the door and got on with something else, it is almost as if you are expecting trouble if you sit by the door with a stop watch. .

No pants here. Good luck, OP. I am too soft to do the controlled crying route, but DS has been edging towards continuous sleep since he started walking. I live in hope and appreciate other families/kids do things differently. Hope it works for you.

I did controlled crying with DS1 when he was 11 months. I would have done it sooner bit DH was against it, not as a method, he just didn't want to listen to the crying! DH had to do a week of nights, DS1 was a big baby and I had recently had the cast off a broken arm so I couldn't carry him round to rock him to sleep, so I bit the bullet.

The first night was hard, by night 3 he was straight into bed, no crying and slept through. It was magical. DH didn't believe me at first, but when he experienced it for himself he was glad I had done it. We were all so much happier for uninterrupted sleep!

DS1 is 19 now, he has suffered no ill effects from it, but still loves his sleep!

I agree with you Ragwort I did the ironing the first night IIRC!

Good luck OP and everyone doing cc tonight. We are in the middle of it tonight but it worked for naps for us, about 3 months ago.

I was totally against CC before I had my own DD. My SIL did it with her 2, and by the time I got pregnant I was a total convert!

I did CC with DD at about 5 mo, and she's been sleeping through ever since (she's 2yo now). We're regularly stopped in the street for people to say how wonderfully happy she is - she never stops smiling! It obviously hasn't done her any lasting damage.

Agree with previous posters though - I always used to have a few jobs to do while I was doing it. I never sat outside the door, as I wouldn't have the willpower not to go in.

As for 'if it feels wrong to you, then you shouldn't do it', I think about how I would feel when she's older if she wanted to do something crazy like go travelling round the world. Would it kill me inside? Yes! Would I let her go? Of course - it's what's best for her!

You are being a selfless parent by doing what's best for your baby - teaching them to sleep properly, so they can learn and develop during the day.

Hope tonight is better for you xxx

diryan I agree. no real research has been done on the effects on a child's development of many broken nights' sleep, and a knackered parent. I suspect the negative effects of those factors far outweigh the negative effects of a few nights of CC.

I do have to say though - we have done CC at least twice with dd and she's still a shocking sleeper. Not because of habits like being fed/cuddled to sleep - the CC got rid of those long ago - but because she is a Princess and the Pea and wakes any time she is even slightly ill or teething. So, just to say, don't expect CC to necessarily produce perfect sleeping, forever. But it will get rid of the feed to sleep habit.

Thanks for all of your support and kind words. Am having a wobble though. We have been up nearly 2 hours now.

Last night she woke at 11.45 and went back to sleep about 1ish and then stirred at 2.30 but settled herself and we heard no more till 6.30 this morning.

DH and I have been sitting upside her door, putting washing out, having a cup of tea and getting increasingly worried that it shouldn't take her 2 hours to go off. We have been in to pat her after the allotted time and she just ramps up the noise.

Are we doing it right?

I take it she's not actually been crying for 2 hours?! I'm not doing CC ( just not getting any bloody sleep) but I'm pretty sure that would be too long! Hope you're doing ok - sleep deprivation is the worst. I feel your pain.

I'd suggest that some babies just aren't ready to sleep through yet and if it feels wrong, comfort your little baby.

Have you just stopped feeding at night all of a sudden?

There's no way she will understand this.

Sorry I'm half asleep and that sounded a bit short.

But 2 hours crying sounds a long time.

No I haven't all of a sudden stopped feeding her at night. We tackled that issue a couple of weeks ago so I know she isn't hungry.

She hasn't been crying for 2 hours solid. She stops for long periods of about 10-15 minutes then starts again. We go in every 10-15 minutes when she is crying to pat her and move her to the middle of the cot.

I think I need to do the cc in the daytime too as at present she falls asleep when ferrying other DCs around or in pushchair.

It's just so hard. If I don't do this I will go crazy. DH is really helpful but he is up at 4.45 each day and so getting a decent amount if sleep is important.

We found this very helpful, ours was a good sleeper until about 8 months - 10 months. Tool a few days and you need to be consistent in the day time aswell, but it worked

www.thesleepstore.com.au/sleep-information/infant-sleep/sleep-information/verbal-reassurance--vr--sleep-training

I don't think Justgotosleep was being judgey. Just disagreeing with the method. Isn't everyone allowed an opinion?

I have never done CC either. It wasn't right for us or our babies. Yes, for some of our children it did mean that we didn't get uninterrupted nights of sleep but that didn't really make things a lot harder for us. My DC all fell into a pattern soon enough on their own though.

Just because CC works for some babies it doesn't mean it works for all.

For nights like that, with Long intermittent crying I would check the usual - nappy, drink of water, temperature, teeth etc then I would simply shut the door and shut my door and ignore.

Possibly sounds harsh but I'm a single mom who works full time. Needs must.

I would only do it if I was absolutely sure there was nothing wrong and it was just tiredness/grouchiness.

DS is 2 now and sleeps (mostly) really well.

OP, this is probably not great timing on my part I'm afraid, but I wonder if now is a really difficult time for your DD to make big night-time adjustments - 8mths is prime time for separation anxiety as she begins to learn object permanence and social referencing. I know once you've begun it's probably kinder and certainly easier to push on, and maybe changing naps will make all the difference, but maybe she'll be much readier for this in another month or two, if you can hang on til then.

I do want to query the other posters on this thread who insist that CC is 'teaching' a child to sleep in a way that bf/rocking/cuddling to sleep isn't, though.

I think it's because you can't bf, cuddle or rock a child to sleep forever. They have to eventually self settle.

I do cc through the day as well so I was consistant. Hang in there - you are doing fine.

That's really helpful Paddington thank you.

I sit outside her room thinking at least she knows I am there but I think maybe this is making things a lot worse.

I agree on the timing, sleep went to pot here from 8 to 10 months, in that time she learnt to crawl and was walking at 10 months. Sleep improved again after that. We did the verbal reassurance technique because she had seemingly forgotten to self settle, and whilst it was a major development period, after 6 weeks we decided that she needed to try and learn again. She was waking every 30 mins at the worst stage which was a shock to her as well as us I think, she was sleeping through before and since then.