Sleep training - Is it too soon to declare that it isn't working?

[kittymamma]

So we are reluctantly (although I have definitely done my very best), sleep training our nearly 11 month old DS. My childminder is having difficulties getting my DS to sleep during the day.

The situation before was: For me, he is very snuggly and feeds to sleep, sometimes when he is asleep I will put him down to sleep in the cot but if my husband was working nights, I just put him in the bed with me. I did this because he still wakes twice a night to feed, once at midnight and once at 4am. So co-sleeping got me more sleep. My DH would rock our DS to sleep on the days he has him. This did not work at the childminders though as our DS wouldn't settle knowing there was so much else going on. He would just get over-tired and cry! So the childminder has requested that I sleep train so that he will self-sooth.

I'm not strong enough to do CIO or CC, so haven't tried, it. I tried a happy medium that I read about. I thought going from snuggles to a cot was a big enough transition as it was. So I am feeding him till he has had enough, then putting him in his cot. Then I sit by his cot and everytime he gets up, I lie him down again. I also tap him and shush him. We're on day 3, and this is how it has gone so far:

Night 1 - 40 minutes of crying before finally going to sleep, woke up in the middle of the night as usual and we had another 20 minutes.
Night 2 - 30 minutes of crying between 6:30pm and 7pm, then an hours sleep, followed by another 40 minutes crying. Still have the 15 minute resettle at midnight.
Night 3 - 30 minutes of crying, followed by a 15 minute nap, then another 30 minutes of crying then a 10 minute nap, then another 35 minutes crying with a nap of about 2 minutes before he started crying again. At which point I was brought to tears and gave up. I have now brought him downstairs, for a nice snuggle while watching TV. He is now asleep.

In addition to this, he has stopped eating during the day. My DH says that yesterday and today our DS has refused all food barring a Jaffa Cake that my DH gave him out of desperation this afternoon as he couldn't bare the idea of our DS going hungry. He then has a mega feed when I get home from work and then also ate his tea. He has also been more clingy, I asked my DH how he had slept today and he said it had been an odd one. He has only napped briefly and only while on my DH, he has been more cuddly and wanted to be held constantly.

So what should I do now? My childminder is going to be very disappointed that I gave in today. I just couldn't do it anymore. I have a pile of work to do and I just needed him to be asleep and not crying anymore. Should I try again tomorrow? Or should I accept that this way won't work for our DS and try something else? If so, what?

3 days is no time at all. It's going to take several months of consistancy so it would be worth resetting your expectations.

If you're doing this purely for the childminder then stop.

If you feel that you need to do it for you, Dh and your DS and it's right for you all then that's fine. It's just seems like you don't really want to do it and feel pressured.

It took about a week to see a difference with sleep training with dd1 for us and I'm currently on night no1 of attempt 50 with dd2 🙈

I have no advice as I've not done sleep training but I wouldn't do this for a child minder. Sorry. Can't she do something differently like rock or cuddle hin to sleep?

If you don't want to do it then it is not right for your family.

Based on the amount he is crying I would say you may as well do controlled crying. By being next to him and allowing him to cry he probably doesn't understand why you aren't just picking him up and is more distressing then if you positively and firmly set a bedtime routine and left him for shorter periods to settle himself. I know it's got a bad rep but if done correctly controlled crying is relatively painless and the long term benefits for you both are worth the tears. I have to say it only took my son 2 days and the longest he cried was 15 minutes, every baby different but personally I feel the length of time he is crying at the moment is extensive and just because you are in the room it doesn't make it any better than cc.

Thank you for all the messages. I must admit to still not knowing what I am going to do tonight. When I left him the first night (well sat at the other side of the room just out of sight), he cried so hard that he made himself sick. It is so heart-breaking. I remember being convinced that I had done CC with my DD but now I think about it, I recall giving up and just kept feeding her to sleep. The difference being, she was a very heavy sleeper and I could transfer her to her cot with little chance of her waking. My DS however, wakes at the slightest movement.

I am only doing it to help the childminder. However, I still don't understand how it is going to help. He still feeds before I put him down which settles him to begin with. Then he gets all upset when I put him in his cot. The routine is still going to be different.

Ho long has he been at the childminders? I only ask because when DS first started nursery he went on a 'sleep is for wimps' campaign during the day because of the change in routine. But after a month-ish he started sleeping there in ways that he never would at home, he sleeps there in the corner of a noisy room there for instance wheras at home he needs a dark, quiet room and his cot. It might be that yours will figure out a new routine eventually as well but if i was you I wouldn't change a system that works for you just to suit the childminer.

He has been with her for a while. Started there full time (mostly - term time only) in June.

I think you should persevere with sleep training (I would night wean and then do cc tbh). I know pp have just said 'never mind the childminder' but if you're otherwise happy with her, your ds is happy there then it would be crazy to pull him out? Can you afford to give up work to look after him? If not them he needs to be able to sleep in childcare. Most of the dc I know have adapted when at nursery or cms, just slept differently to how they do at home, it sounds like your cm has tried to get him to sleep but it's not working. I know quite a few cm and they generally try to be flexible (letting babies nap in buggies etc)but if they have more than one dc to take care of they can't realistically cuddle a child throughout a nap.

You sound like you're using the same method of me. We are seeing a sleep specialist because my dad is 13 months and was waking hourly and wanting to feed back to sleep every time. The specialist recommended we do it very gently. I feed her to sleep at bed time but take her off before she is fully gone and lay her in the cot and sit next to her. If she wants to stand up I let her but tap the mattress until she lays down and then I pat her back or her tummy. She likes to put her hand through the bars and touch my hair but other than that and the taping I ignore her. She rarely cries when I do it now. Initially she would cry for a while. After that if she woke I would feed her alternate wake ups but so the same putting her down before she properly fell asleep. We are now 3 weeks in and she feeds before bed and at 6 am and wakes once or twice in between but does not get fed. I just sit next to her and pat.

In the daytime, I'm still feeding her to sleep and holding her but at nursery where she goes twice a week they pat her tummy to get her to nap twice a day in a basket. All of the babies nap at pretty much the same time so nothing is going on to distract her from sleep.

Once she is sleeping through without waking, we're then going to tackle day time naps but we're going slowly and gently so not to distress her. Separation anxiety can play a massive part from around 11 months.

Well after speaking to a friend at work, I have decided to preserve. My childminder and I get along very well and he was sleeping then he stopped. He went from needing 3 naps a day to needing 2 and then he just starting trying to stay up when with her. That led to overtired grumpy baby!

I am not going to wean him so he can have a nap in the day. That seems to be some people's 'go to' answer. A month ago he napped just fine in the day, I BF then too. It may very well work without me needing to do that. Once done though, it cannot be undone. If it is nessessary then I will but I'm not convinced it is.

I have decided that as a PP suggested, this method may be confusing him. So I am trying the Jo Frost version of CC, I am sat in the bathroom listening to him, having popped in three time already. My only concern is that he is getting himself all hot over it. 7 days tops she says.... let's see, I hate listening to him babble 'mama mama mama...' while crying.