Monday, January 28, 2008

One step forward, two steps back . . .

. . . gets us nowhere, right?

Saturday night was a dream come true. J* did not cry when I left his room after say8ing goodnight, and he fell asleep on his own. He even slept all night. Overjoyed, we kept telling him all day Sunday what a great job he did, blah, blah. Hubby went out and got him another Star Wars action figure we'd been promising. J* mentioned several times yesterday that "when I sleep by myself again, I want Yoda". I thought he was finally getting it.

So, you are probably surmising that last night was not bliss. He cried when I left him, and went on like that for 20 minutes. I came back, settled him down, and left again. This time, HE DIDN'T cry, and fell asleep on his own!

But . . . he woke in the night. So progress in one area and regression in another. Feels like we're standing still. But I will say, at least getting a few moments alone to myself in the evening is well worth it.

On to the baby brother . . . I spoke with AZJenn at length about sleep-training the baby. All of a sudden, we've realized he's developed a pattern over the past several weeks. He's tired in the evening, so I put him down around 7pm give or take, but he'll wake at 9pm for a feeding. Goes right back to sleep, then wakes at 2am to eat, and again at 5 or 5:30am. He'll be five months on Sunday. Time to sleep train. We're planning our strategy now, and hopefully start soon. I tried to let him CIO during the middle of the night feeding on Saturday (woke at 1am for some reason), but when he woke again at 3am, I was too tired to keep it up.

Any suggestions are welcome!

2 comments:

azjenn said...

Sounds like J is getting there and I bet Cooper will soon.

Kate said...

Matthew is sleeping thru HIS night (meaning down around 8pm and up at 6am - NOT my night) but a few weeks ago, before all this started, he would wake between 3-5am. I was on auto-pilot and assumed he was hungry so I'd feed him. One time, when DH was up and I was asleep, DH gave M his pacifier when he woke instead of me feeding him. Worked like a charm and has been that way 8 out of 10 times. Does Cooper have a pacifier or does he suck his thumb? Or maybe even one of those musical/visual crib attachments that soothe babies to sleep. Babies have such strange sleep cycles. Heck, I guess we all do. It would just help if it meshed well with mommy & daddy!