first night of cc.dont shout at me but i want support

[kittypants]

ds is 16 months.up untill 8 months slept great,then stopped!then we coslept till just over 1 year which was great but didnt last as we all seemed to wake each other.we also tried pu pd which was great for a bit but also didnt last.then i just conditioned myself to hourly waking,only falling to sleep which bottle no matter the time.but now hes drinking 4 pints of milk a day not eating because hes full on milk but waking all night for more milk as its not enough.i think hes also comforted by the sucking.
so tonight we did usual bedtime routine.quiet time,bath,bottle(but this time on bed not in cot),story and bed-but i took bottle out with me.i went in after 2,4,6,8 minutes then every 8 minutes after that as i think thats my limit that i can cope with.it took 1 hour in all but hes sleeping cuddling his sleepy cow.i want to hear positive stories to keep me going in early hours of morning!!!please dont anyone tell me off etc,i need support.

lilysma - sorry it has taken me so long to respond! i have been busy with my Ma visiting. re: the early waking thing. once i was sure ds could sleep pretty much through i decided that all pre 6am wakings would be treated as night wakings. This didn't work as it was broad daylight in his room so i draped some blackout curtains over his existing curtains (looks a bit student flatish but at least it is dark!). This morning he woke at 6:20am but that is not an indicator of tomorrow necessarily. I shall let you know. I think when you hvae first done cc it is best to go with your gut feeling on some matters. as long as things sit easily with you then don't fret too much. i bring ds into bed for his first waking and have often thought that maybe i should do that feed downstairs to break the connection with waking and snuggly cuddles. But..... I enjoy them too! you will find your own way soon enough. it is very early days. enjoy your nights rest

oh, and just to let you know how well you are doing. my ds still cries every time he goes to bed for night or naps. I don't like it but i don;t worry as i think it is a)
his way of to all the fun ending, b)a habit and c)his way of winding down. i hate to think that i have created this crying at bedtiem thing but it is no worse than him crying every 2 hours for a bf back to sleep!

his way of 'objecting'

Shit, she's awake at 5 this morning . She is grizzling away now and I'm doing cc but finding it hard . Last night I struggled to put her down awake - she couldn't wake up after bf, partly because she was so tired after being awake at 5.20 yesterday . Then the same story at the 1.30 am waking. So it's not surprising that she's protesting now really. I've seen there are several other threads on this so perhaps I should join you there!

5.20am 4 me today too. i left him til 6 as he stops/starts grizzling so i think he dozes

for you too. She cried for 50 mins and I gave in and got her up at 5.50 as she clearly wasn't going to go back to sleep before 6. She wouldn't stop grizzling until I fed her, even though I had also fed her at 1.30. Has your lo ever gone back to sleep with cc after waking past 5? I can't stand the crying if there's no point to it. I hate to winge but although dd is sleeping for much longer stretches it doesn't translate into much of a better night for me if I have to wake up once to feed her and then again at 5 . Not sure if it's all been worth it if this is the outcome . Maybe I'll have to try dreamfeeding and see if this gets me a longer stretch.

if ds wakes before 6 (which he does )he generally dozes/grizzles etc. never full on crying. if he was crying i would feed/comfort/bring him to bed etc. the 5 will gradually become 6 then 7 as they get used to sleeping longer i think. more later. don't feel despondent. i will post morelater but ds on his onw in lounge at mo and his patience is running thin!

I really don't want to post on this thread - because I'm scared I won't be able to resist to get into a debate about contorlled crying per se and I don't want to do that - each to their own, I say. But I am following it with interest, trying to understand. I kow you are the best expert in your baby, but I just wanted to say that 6 months seems very young to go so long without food. Are you sure she isn't really hungry?

Really? I mean she was fed at 7.30, 1.30 and 6.15 - do you really think this isn't feeding her enough?? If she was hungry at 5 this is only slightly longer than a daytime feeding schedule. I realise she may need 1 night feed, but 2??

The trouble is that you really are down to one night feed - the 1.30 one! I realize that this is advising the bleedin' obvious, but if she's sleeping from 7.15 to 1.30 then 2.00ish to 6.15, have you thought about adjusting your sleep patterns a bit to fit hers? If you go to bed at 10.00, you'll get 8 hours in two chunks . Then, if you have a nap whenever she does during the day, you'll bank a bit of sleep and you'll probably feel much better. Sorry if this is just irritating rather than helpful - it isn't meant to be!

Lilysma .. please don't get cross, but I really believe that your night-feeding problems would decrease if you fed dc a little more during the day. At six months, it might be more helpful to you if you fed dc every four hours (give or take). You might find that there's no night-waking if you alter the day feeding schedule.

Hi, all and thanks for your thoughts.

Katelyle: not irritated and thanks for the suggestions. Actually she slept 8-1.30 and 2-5. I agree, in theory I should get a reasonable amount of sleep if I go to bed at 10. Actually i went to bed at 8.30 last night, but couldn't get to sleep until 10ish . I think after 6 months of really crap sleep i would really like to get one chunk of 4 hours plus if poss - I have a huge deficit! I'm planning to try the dreamfeeding approach tonight - i.e. feed her at 11ish, possibly in her sleep, and then hope she'll go through till 5ish and feed her again then. Will keep you posted! I can't sleep in the day as she will only sleep in her pram being wheeled around - I haven't tried any sleep training on that one as am trying to tackle the nights first.

Desiderata, I do feed her every four hours (or slightly more frequently) in the day. She feeds very well generally. The main problem at the moment is that she isn't interested in upping her solids from a relatively small amount of taster type portions. She seems to be a boob addict! But that's another story...!

ps Desiderata, I wouldn't get cross at people making suggestions as all are appreciated! Just don't want people shouting at me for doing cc as it was a difficult decision to come to (I really didn't want to do it and held out as long as I could). So far I think it was the right one, although I know it's early days.

Hi cruise, have only just noticed your msg, sorry! Thanks for the thoughts. I have also come to the conclusion that I can't let her really cry at that time as I'm not 100% sure that she really needs to go back to sleep. I am trying dreamfeeding and will set 5 as the new 'okay to comfort' time for a while and see what happens...

Good luck to you, Lily

It will pass .. it just seems like an eternity when you're going through it.

As we speak, I've got a 14yo dss who's been fast asleep on my settee all afternoon.

I wish he didn't sleep so much

lilysma - goo dluck for tonight - hope you feel more positive soon

grrr, it is getting worse again . typing with one hand while expressing hence no caps . night before last tried dream feed which went fine -she didn't wake up - but then she woke at 1.30, 3.30, 4.30 and 5.30 and took about 15 mins to settle each time, which is worse than previous nights. i fed her at 5.30 and took her into bed with me where she rolled over and slept and had to be woken at 7.30. then last night she woke up at 10.30 - just before the dream feed was due so i fed her but couldn't wake her to put her down. she woke again at 2, 4.30 and 5.30 and took half an hour to settle the first time and 20 mins the second time - at 5.30 i took her into bed and fed her and again had to wake her (closer to 8 today .

i seem to have right royally screwed this up and don't know what to do now. any ideas? i've an instinct that feeding her at any wake up confuses her but not sure that she can go through the whole night without a feed (she's 6 months and not taking a great deal of solids, plus her weight is only on 25th centile. having said that i don't think she's waking due to hunger as when she feeds at 5.30 it isn't voracious). help, please!!

lilysma - i stopped feeding lo at night completely as he was getting confused i felt. sometimes he got fed sometimes he didn't. mixed signals. maybe that is why it is recommended after 6mths so you can basically rule out hunger. my ds was 7.5mths and on three meals a day plus 4 milk feeds (varying amounts). if you are happy with food intake in teh day maybe you could cut out night feeds. tough one this isn't it???

Bloody hell, she's awake at 10.30 again, after going down at 8 . This is a major move backwards after she went for 5-6 hours at first for the second four nights of cc . Just don't know what to do. Decided not to feed now and not to feed until 5ish unless she starts waking even more frequently before then (my makeshift hunger test!). But she's going great guns with the crying tonight. I think her next teeth MAY be coming through. But it's hard to know, isn't it and even if they are, what do I do? Abandon cc and try to reinstate later? But the problem with teeth is you never really know what's going on - not like an illness...

aargh!

has anyone else had a similar situation?

lilysma, what is the crying intensity like - protest or distress?
Don't worry about screwing this up, setbacks happen and not just once
Given your success only last week your instincts (no food until 5ish) seem perfectly sound.

If it's any consolation we are expecting a broken night's sleep tonight due
to dd's cold. Our plan is to use boobiotics but try and put her down semi-awake..

Good luck!

lilysma - that is always gonna be a prob. ds woke last nite at 3ish and i didnt know wot to do. he cried on and off till gone 4 and i just cuddled and put back down. if it was teeth *which im sure it was , theres not much you can do anyway part fm calpol and cuddles. i remember ds taking a few backwad steps after abt a week. hth

lilysma - one thing i find really hard is knowing what to do if ds does wake in the night. once you have done cc how can you tell if it is genuine distress/discomfort and they need something or they are simply waking and not being able to get back to sleep? If it is teeth, like you suspect, what would your actions be if your dd had been a perfect sleeper from the outset? I think that is how you have to gauge it. with my dd, if she ever woke at night (she hardly ever did). I would lavish on the comfort, give calpol if necessary, pop her dummy in and leave. she was a text book sleeper from day one though. hth

Hi..not been on mn for a while but just came across this thread. We have had a bit of a rough time with our dd sleeping from around 5 months...we held off introducing solids till 5 1/2 months as advised, bf her everytime she woke up..wouldn't take a bottle from 12 wks old...then at around 6 months things got outta control we were going to her several times a night for upto 2hrs so we tried cc. It worked but was still bf her to sleep at night & cuddled to sleep for naps. This confused her & slowly things went downhill again. So around 7months we decided to do cc again this time for all naps & at bedtime..since then things have been great until just recently. She has started falling asleep when I bf her at bedtime..it's her only bf..so is going into cot asleep, she does stir a little. She has been waking anytime between 9-11pm when we give her some medised..she is cutting her 3rd tooth..a little cuddle then she sleeps until 5.30am. Since doing cc her awake time has always been 5.30-6.15am. Everytime she has cut a tooth or been a little ill we have had minor setbacks but she then goes back to normal..fingers crossed..as soon as she is better. I am thinking on what to do for her bedtime feed..maybe drop it & give her a drink from her cup or wake her after it so she goes to bed by herself. Anyway what I am saying is I have come to the conclusion there will always be minor setback but as long as you keep strong & don't resort back to the old ways of getting them to sleep things should keep "normal". I find by not bf or cuddling her to sleep at her naps this helps her to understand she can go to sleep alone.

amysmum- so hard isnt it? i hate to hear ds crying - just hate it so much but waht to do?!! he definitel sleeps so much better since cc. 10 - 11hrs straight and naps in his cot twice a day too (unless we are out). he always cries when i put him in there but never for longer than 5 mins and more of an objection than anything else. does yours do this? i wish he wouldn't - for his sake.

Thanks for the support you lovely people . What would I do without you? I feel like I'm all take, take, take from this forum at the mo, but I promise to be extremely generous with my support once I have some experience/success to offer!

Last night was an odd one - she cried for an hour from 10.30 and slept til 3.10. Then on and off for an hour and a half, but I'm pretty sure she slept in the middle of that, as i did and was not woken by crying for quite a while. When I realised at 4.30 that she'd not been able to settle well i assumed she was actually hungry and fed her, but put her down awake at 5.15 and she went back to sleep without a murmur until 7.10 ! So not sure what to make of that. I forgot to mention last night that it was her first night in her new room (long story but we had to move her there as her grandparents are staying). So that might have contributed.

DaddyJ, the first hour's crying was more vigourous than it has been for a few days. I'd say a little bit distressed but not out and out screaming, apart from when i left the room. I did pretty much what you suggest, Cruise and gave her calgel and a cuddle before putting her down again on one of my visits. Didn't give calpol as thought the whole process would wake her up more, but will try if i get a repeat tonight.

The wierd thing is that she will go down without tears but awake if she has been bf first. I guess maybe this is still the equivalent of bf to sleep? I don't know what to do except keep on with the current routine for a while longer, not bring her into my bed in the mornings (a common cause of setbacks according to Ferber) and see what happens.

Amysmum, dd only naps in her pram, so at least not bf to sleep, but a whole new set of sleep associations that needs breaking if we ever get through the night stuff. Maybe I should tackle both at once, but I can't bear to have crying at night and in the day - I think she needs a rest from it!

How were your nights?