Is it possible to avoid controlled crying?

[Ruddy]

The big question - do you think it is possible to put a baby (DS is 6 months) down to sleep, whether in the evening or for a daytime nap, awake, without much fuss, successfully? ie they just do it, rather than having to teach them by doing controlled crying.

I would love to just put DS in his cot, with suitable routine leading up to this, and to say goodnight, leave the room and for him to sleep. But has this ever been done without the dreaded controlled crying which at the moment, I don't think I could face? I'd love to hear your experiences and views.

I think that yes you could, and this is the best time before he gets too independent. My son slept alone in his cot, gurgling away in the dark up until 6 months, then we moved into temporary accommodation and he developed a problem with his cot (can't remember why, except that it has been exhausting ever since). He now won't go off on his own and I have to lie next to him (in our bed) until he goes off. THen, if I do move him, he will wake up in the middle of the night. Left with us, he will often sleep straight through (he is now 20 months). I don't have the guts to try controlled crying and I secretly love the closeness of him in bed. But it is very impractical and I would advise against it. Hope you succeed

I put my babies to bed with a musical clockwork toy, that even now when I hear the tune takes me back. You pulled a string at the bottom and it went on repetitively for a while.
I never did controlled crying with young babies because it was never necessary.
Now I did do controlled toddler strapped in buggy till falling asleep at bedtime (ds no. 3) - but that is another story

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Ruddy I dont know if this is helpful or not, but my ds was a bad daytime (but good night time) sleeper from birth. At about three and a half months I was determined to start him on a daytime nap as he was getting extremely tired by about 4pm, having only really snoozed in the day(unless in the car) up until that age.

I actually put him in bed in his sleeping bag in the cot BEFORE he even seemed tired - having observed what time he began to get crotchety the couple of days before. I ran and hid(yes, I'll admit it) for five mins, came back and he was sound asleep. He now has this nap every day, and this was so successful that about six weeks later I stated an afternoon one, about 1/2 hour after lunch.

At nursery he doesn't do this (too mcuh to look at I suppose!) but at home he does. I never really did any "controlled crying" as he never needed it. I've probably been lucky, but I thought that I would share this with you, HTH

Touch wood I haven't had to do controlled crying with DD. She too just has a cuddle before bed and then goes down. Sometimes if she fusses a lot I will go in and give her a quick cuddle and then put her down again then she goes straight to sleep. A cuddle and a bit of hair stroking always works for her.

Thanks to you all.

Mears, I have been wondering aboutsomething like a clockwork toy, or lights on the ceiling but was worried in case he came dependent on it. Am still bearing it in mind though.

clucks - DS sleeps in our bed at night and I know what you mean about the closeness but impracticalities. Also I think it is great in theory to lie down with them until they go to sleep but sometimes I just don't have the patience to be so laid back. Hence hoping he would do it himself which he does sometimes quite well but sometimes it takes quite a while and with crying.

Bloss re co-sleeping long term we are going to see how it goes. I think you are right though about each baby being different.

ZoeThanks for confessing about your hiding trick! I guess you were one of the lucky ones.

tillysmummy - You seem to have it sussed. I must say, DS can do this sometimes it's just a bit hit and miss and when it takes quite a while I get quite tense which no doubt exacerbates (sp) it all.

Anyway, I guess the upshot is, some babies do and some don't. Thanks for replying and telling me what you do, I hope that with time, practice and fine tuning, I'll get there in the end more often than not and be satisfied with that. He went down well both times today so I'm feeling optimistic again!

My son is 18 mo and I would say he has been pretty good about going to sleep from about that age. I really dont do much. I just sit on the edge of my bed and rock him for about 3-5 minutes and then I lay him down with his mobile going. Hes asleep almost insantly. This is probally not that great of an idea if you have not gotten in a habit of doing this but since hes still in our room due to lack of space I have our floor fan going when we sleep at nights. Unfortanately he got used to this and uses it all the time. But it seems very relaxing to him. Im thinking that might have a little something to due with his sleeping so good. I know we sleep better with it then in silence.

ruddy - my ds is also 6 mnths now, & he always goes down with no fuss, as you described, and has since 2 / 3 weeks. However, I think this was achieved by following the contented little baby book, which no doubt you've heard about on this site before, and so it rather depends on whether you like the idea of routines or not. The whole point of gina fords routines (which some people don't seem to understand) is that she tries to AVOID the need for controlled crying by establishing a routine t an early age. Having said that, she does use cc with olderbabies who are having difficulties sleeping. I would say that it's not too late to get a routine, established, and having 6 months experience under your belt means that you can do your own if you do'nt fancy hers! A few tips if you want to do your own:

Baby should be sleepy 2 - 3hrs max after they woke at this age.
Always put down sleepy but AWAKE. (My first mistake a while ago!). Otherwise ds will not learn to get himself back to sleep when he comes into light sleep.
Don't wait until ds is overtired as it all goes pear shaped.
Babies come into light sleep mode 45mins - 1hr after going down. If it's quiet and dark and they know how to, they should go back to sleep no probs (esp. relevant for lunchtime sleep)
Always do the same things in the same order in the same room (where possible) while establishing the routine, as it will make ds feel secure.

I'm sure there's plenty of other stuff, but other people probably have more experience than me. I would say don't even consider controlled crying until you've given a routine (even just a bedtime one) a good couple of weeks. Most babies do seem to adapt, so you might be pleasantly surprised! good luck

I tried controlled crying with DD when she was about 3.5 months old. It was v hard but I really wanted to get her to be able to go to sleep by herself as I saw friends having to go to bed with their kids and drive babies around to get them to sleep and felt I would like to avoid this if I could. I used to leave her in her cot with a wind up bunny that played a little tune for about 10-15 mins. She cried at first, I left her for 5 mins at a time and went in and gave her a kiss but didn't pick her up. This went on for a couple of weeks and was really hard to keep it up. I feel the benifit now as she goes to bed with her bunny with no problems at all but I have to admit I did find it v hard going.

When both our two were little, we decided we would do controlled crying for 10 days on the grounds that if it was going to work, 10 days would probably do the trick. And if it wasn't, we would have a limit on the nights we had to endure it. For the first night or two, we sat up in bed just waiting for it to stop, but we encouraged each other, and within 4 days it was all over, the children went straight back to sleep when they woke up in the night, and I really started enjoying being a mother without the whole of my life being dominated by counting how many hours sleep I had had the night before.

We were forced into doing controlled crying when ds was 12 months out of sheer desperation. We endured a couple of weeks of hell, then all of a sudden he seemed to get the idea that we really meant it and we've never had any trouble with him since. Dd was put down in her cot to sleep and left to it from the very beginning (ds was 2 and putting dd to bed first was the only way I could get his story read, milk drunk etc), and she has always been fine - I think because she never got used to anything different.

Ruddy I was at my NCY group tea and cakes this afternoon and one of the girls who has had a nightmare with her son sleeping has done a kind of version of controlled crying based on the Richard Ferber book and it is all going beautifully now after four days. He really had had some difficulties and she is delighted. Just thought I'd share that as I know from your original post that you were not keen, but her attempt just used controlled crying as a basis

dd has always been a bad sleeper, i despaired for nearly a year before realising i had to do something. I couldn't do the controlled crying (toooo soft!) so I put dd down in her cot and just pottered around her room until she fell asleep - this took 5mins the first time! Some days it took 20 minutes, sometimes longer, but i can now put her down, give her a kiss and just walk out and she goes to sleep - heaven!

We still have a problem with her waking in the night, but i just take her into my bed and she sleeps - possibly not the best option, but it works for us, and right now i'm too tired to try and change things!

Thanks again to everyone for the latest batch of views and experiences. For both naps today it only took about four minutes of encouragement for him to sleep which is fine by me. I hope this phase continues. I'm glad the CC worked for some of you but I shall still hold off for a while.

Hi, I'm new here - and I'm hoping that you lot might be able to help.

DS2 is 6m and has from birth nearly always been cuddled to sleep despite all my best intentions. Having been through it all with DS1 I knew I should let him fall asleep on his own, but whenever I tried he cried and I wasn't prepared to let a newborn cry himself to sleep. Anyway, it was always fairly easy to get him to go off if he was tired - just stick a dummy in and give him a cuddle for no more than 5 mins. Then I could usually put him down in cot or pram and creep away and he'd sleep for anything up to 1 1/2 hours (per nap) in the day and (thankfully) longer at night.

Recently, however, he's been taking longer and longer to settle during the day, and then only sleeping for 30-40 mins. He's better at night - either me or DH cuddles him for the early evening, then he's put into his cot and only wakes once or twice, usually resettling after a short feed.

This situation wouldn't be so bad if it wasn't for DS1 (aged 3 1/2). But I really feel I'm neglecting him at the moment, as his baby brother is taking so long to settle for naps, and I'm snapping 'Be quiet!' at him all the time. Anyway, he's now getting into trouble at playgroup, hitting other children and I'm sure it's because he's so unhappy and frustrated - because I'm constantly dealing with a tired and grumpy baby.

I've been considering trying controlled crying. My gut feeling is at 6m he's too young, but I'm fairly desperate because of the lack of time I have for DS1, and the affect it's having on him. I did it with DS1 at about 15m when he was refusing to fall asleep at night - it was a nightmare but it did work. It's going to be hard work with DS2 too, as recently whenever I've put him down just to see if he'd settle himself he went ballistic. Far from 'crying down' he's worked himself up into a right state. And it's not that I'm expecting him to have too much daytime sleep. He only has about 1-1 1/2 hours total - most of which is in his pram on the trips to and from playgroup.

Sorry, I've gone on a bit here. I just wondered if anyone had any thoughts or comments. Thanks in advance.

Have you read Gina Ford's book ? Would you consider a routine ?

Just a quick word about musical light shows. I tried with dd at 8 weeks but it just sent her hyper, she got so excited kicking her feet at the celing that she got over-tired and suddenly went from smiley baby to hysterical baby!

I've read Gina Ford's book and yes I do think that routine is a good thing for babies in general. I didn't actually follow the routines as I was very keen to b/f and I was worried I wouldn't build up a good supply if I didn't demand feed. I have taken on board quite a few of her ideas though, especially the spacing of naps (looking for him to get tired after 2 hours or so.)

Now he's older I have (sort of) tried to follow the routines, but it's difficult to do when I've got to fit them around DS1's social life. DS2 nearly always falls asleep going to and from playgroup, and there are toddler groups some afternoons which I need to go to to preserve my sanity!

I seem to remember DS1 had developed his own routine by now of two naps of at least an hour morning and afternoon. However, I could probably spend much longer settling him down, as I didn't have to contend with a (not so) little voice bellowing "But I need you mummy" from the next room.

Yes - the musical light thingy! He used to enjoy it till I started trying to leave him to cry. Now the moment I go to switch it on, his little face crumples as he knows I'm thinking of leaving the room.

I have never had to resort to CC and I do find 6 months early to start it but I do know several people who have and who said it was very efficient and "only" hard for 1 or 2 nights... I think you need to be VERY detremined to do it -there is no point in starting it and giving up half-way....
If you do it, make sure you have read how to do it (Christopher Green explains it in Babies... it's half a page in his book which you can read in a book shop without buying the whole book).

Let us know how you get on.

My son is 8months and is a terrible sleeper (though we can just put him in his cot at bedtime and walk away - the result of a strictly regular bedtime, I think - he still wakes up at night). We tried CC at around 6months and he cried without stopping or diminishing for over three hours, so we abandoned it. He also had a string of killer colds that put us off doing it as he couldn't breathe etc. But recently we have both reached the end of our tether with his night waking (down to one and a 5am wakeup) and feel sick with exhaustion so have decided to be a bit stricter - finally. Last night he woke at 1am and my husband popped in to give him a dummy & left immediately and ds fell back to sleep. He woke a bit later and we let him cry for half an hour and then he went quiet until 5am. Fed him, put him back in his cot (instead of in with us, as usual) and he slept until 7am. Very early days yet, but v encouraged by just 30mins low-level, tired-sounding crying. I always felt unable to do this before but have been feeling so ill with tiredness feel I have to do something. I am also getting dh to deal with him so he doesn't get excited at the thought of milk! I think it helps that he's older, for some reason. He didn't seem ready before. Also, on the naps question, I put him down two hours after he wakes up in his pushchair (or earlier if he seems very tired) and he usually goes to sleep. If he doesn't I push him back and forward a bit. He hardly ever naps in his cot in the day.

Aloha.... I am hesitating to write this because you may not like it.... hope you take it as a useful comment but dummies and rocking a baby to sleep in a pushchair are sleep associations... it doesn't "teach" your baby to fall asleep happily on his own.
At 8 months old he still needs daytime sleep (even 2 naps a day) to happily sleep through the night. If he is too tired when he falls asleep he is likely to have a disrupted night sleep (however exhausted he is).

But then my dd had a dummy until 9 months, was regularly fed to sleep, and we didn't have to do controlled crying. She slept well as a baby with the props and sleeps well as a toddler without them. It seems unfair to me to refuse a dummy or whatever to a child if you dont mind going and sticking it back in - it's hard on kids - every time they find a source of comfort they like someone tries to take it off them!! lol!! Can't take dd's thumb away mind you, but I dont think it wwas related to the dummy as she stopped using the dummy at 9 months and only started sucking her thumb just before her 2nd b'day.

Dear Ruddy,..my DS is six months and always was a bad sleeper.She slept in our bed for 3 to 4 months(not by Choice!!) and never had naps during the day until I started weaning her at 4 months,and I slowly got her to sleep in her cot,by holding her hand and singing to her( this never worked when she was younger) .
We have no problems putting her down to sleep in her own room ,but She still wakes up several times during the night.I got her used to fall asleep with her dummy,which I have a feeling is the reason why she still wakes up.

I never could do control crying,and I'll only use it as a last resort.
I'm glad to say she's now got regular morning and afternoon naps,due to my observation.I realised she was very grumpy everyday at the same time,and started to put her down at the first sins of tiredness.
I believe,to a certain extent, you should let babies develop in their own time and not force them into too strict a routine.She doesn't go to bed strictly at the same time everyday.When I feel she's ready and rubing eyes,I calm her down,by singing or reading,..or giving a bit more milk,if it's getting later than her normal bedtime.

Don't do Control crying unless you really feel it's the right thing for your child.At 6 months ,it's not too late to get him into a routine.

Dear Ruddy,..my DS is six months and always was a bad sleeper.She slept in our bed for 3 to 4 months(not by Choice!!) and never had naps during the day until I started weaning her at 4 months,and I slowly got her to sleep in her cot,by holding her hand and singing to her( this never worked when she was younger) .
We have no problems putting her down to sleep in her own room ,but She still wakes up several times during the night.I got her used to fall asleep with her dummy,which I have a feeling is the reason why she still wakes up.

I never could do control crying,and I'll only use it as a last resort.
I'm glad to say she's now got regular morning and afternoon naps,due to my observation.I realised she was very grumpy everyday at the same time,and started to put her down at the first sins of tiredness.
I believe,to a certain extent, you should let babies develop in their own time and not force them into too strict a routine.She doesn't go to bed strictly at the same time everyday.When I feel she's ready and rubing eyes,I calm her down,by singing or reading,..or giving a bit more milk,if it's getting later than her normal bedtime.

Don't do Control crying unless you really feel it's the right thing for your child.At 6 months ,it's not too late to get him into a routine.