Sleeping Soundly
I think the bulk of my posts on motherhood have had something to do with sleep. Mostly, the lack of it, and my acceptance of my sleep deprivation.
Our son is nearly 19 months and finally, having been driven to desperation, I turned toward that one source I thought I would never choose: Dr. Ferber’s “cry it out” approach in his book “Solving Your Child’s Sleep Problems,” which I had never read.
As it turns out, it’s not what I thought it was. Not an endless tunnel of all-night crying while you bite your fingernails in terror in the other room, your spouse restraining you from rushing in.
Dr. Ferber, it turns out, is rather a sensible man, with a sensible approach. As an “attachment parenting” still-nursing type who has co-slept with our son since he was three months old, and hasn’t had a good night’s sleep in that much time, I’m shocked at how easy this has been.
For two nights I have not nursed my son to sleep. He has slept in his own bed, by himself. The first night he woke four times, but fell back to sleep after kisses from me in less than 5 minutes each time. Last night, following Ferber’s plan to extend the amount of time you wait before going in, he woke three times, but I never made it in any time–he fell back to sleep in less than five minutes each time, so that I never had the opportunity to go into his room. He slept from 8pm to 7am.
And, with only temporary waking, so did I.
I don’t regret waiting. I don’t regret the time we spent co-sleeping and bonding and nursing at night. But we are all ready for this, and it is good.
J.C. Towler said,
January 6, 2010 at 12:31 am
Ferber is the bomb. We waited a lot longer than you to break off the co-sleeping thing, and it was quite a bit harder, but in the end worth it. The most difficult thing for us was our daughter would want us to stay in bed with her until she fell asleep. That was sometimes a lengthy process. Getting her to finally go to sleep by herself felt like getting an hour of my life back.
Oh, and don’t be afraid to occasionally slip in there and steal the little one in the middle of the night. We’ve done it a few times without and repercussions. We also make exceptions for when there’s a thunderstorm of if the little one is legitimately sick.
Best,
–John
jordanrosenfeld said,
January 7, 2010 at 5:43 pm
Hi John. Yeah, I’m glad we did it. I still have a hard time during the one time a night he wakes up, usually around 11pm (which is right when I’m just asleep), not just going in there and cuddling/nursing him back to sleep. But I’ve noticed that he’s a much happier boy since he started sleeping on his own…I think I was keeping him awake at night! And he eats more now that he’s not night-nursing.
Still, it’s hard. I’m learning that there is no one way to do this parenting thing.
L.C. McCabe said,
January 7, 2010 at 7:00 pm
Jordan,
I’m glad to hear that you’re now on the road to getting a good night’s sleep regularly.
I need sleep, and cannot function without adequate amounts of sleep. If I don’t get enough during the night, then the next day I take naps. Hard naps.
I probably need sleep more than the average person. So I wind up getting less accomplished in my day than I would like, but it is better than allowing my defenses to be lowered and succumb to Strep throat infections. (I’ve actually had normal flora bacteria on my throat become pathogenic when I overextend myself. That means I literally gave myself Strep throat. The good thing is that it’s a strain that’s not considered contagious, the bad thing is that it hurts like hell.)
To me, whatever works to get your little one to sleep is worth trying. We didn’t have to do the Furber method, but I have heard others rave about it.
We moved our son out of our room after the first week because he was such a loud sleeper. He chuffed, grunted and groaned. It was like sleeping with an old man in the room. The baby monitor was enough to let us know when he woke up and needed feeding.
I wish you, your son and your husband new found energy with getting more restful nights!
jordanrosenfeld said,
January 7, 2010 at 7:06 pm
Thanks Linda! He only wakes once now, early in the night and then sleeps for a 7+hour stretch. We have to wake HIM in the morning at 7 to get ready for daycare…and I put him to bed at 7:30pm. It’s heaven.
We also had to move Ben out of our room at several weeks old due to noisiness. He slept alone for 3 months, but I had a terrible bout of hormone induced insomnia when he was 2 months old, for an entire month. After, I was so traumatized (I couldn’t fall back asleep and would literally not sleep the entire night after first waking)–that when he went on a little sleep strike at 3 mos I pulled him into bed with me.
It worked for a long time, and then he moved to his own bed, where he’d start out the night but inevitably cry for me after 3-4 hours. I was going in and sleeping with him and night nursing.
Ferber’s point is that you’ve taught your child how to sleep one way (by nursing back to sleep) and now you need to teach them a new way. He was ready!
J
Maddy said,
April 14, 2010 at 4:51 am
Well that was a major achievement – I see a whole new side to you now.
Just wanted to pop by and say a big thank you to you for your talk tonight at the CWC – I couldn’t stay at the end as I had to rush back to pay my babysitter, but I thoroughly enjoyed it [ordered the book on Amazon before I came here] – so – word to the wise you need [you might like to consider] claiming your authorspot on Amazon. Every bit helps right?
jordanrosenfeld said,
April 14, 2010 at 3:58 pm
Thanks, Maddy! I will check out my authorspot. I thought I filled out something there, but frankly I haven’t been paying attention
It was quite a night and I appreciated everyone’s attention at that late hour.
Susan Salluce said,
November 1, 2010 at 6:46 pm
Jordan, I used the Ferber method some 14 years ago and I was a new woman. I swear we are such better mothers when we are rested! Now I move into the new era: awake and obsessing over the teen years! It’s always something