Sleep Training

Chase is almost a year old and I am kind of late, but I just started trying to sleep train him. First of all, who the heck invented sleep training? I think babies should come already wanting and knowing how to sleep a full night. Now I know some babies do, but Chase must have missed that day! I have tried multiple times many different things to get him to sleep through the night. Ever since he was sick at Christmas time he has been waking up at least 5 times every night and he wants a bottle every single time! So I started another bad habit when I started giving him bottles whenever he wanted them throughout the night. Now I am trying to break him of that habit. So in 360 days Chase has slept through the night 9 times. Say it again, 9 times! He was an extremely fussy newborn and has always hated sleeping. He also refuses to take his binky. I know I will appreciate that in a few months when I don't have to break him of that bad habit, but at the same time it would be so nice if he would have liked his binky and used that instead of a bottle at night!

Last night was my first night (again) of trying to get him to sleep through the night. The only thing I have left to try is crying it out. So last night he woke up at midnight. After an hour of crying, I went in to comfort him and help him settle back down. I was in there for about 20 minutes and I left him calm and content. Then about 10 minutes later he started crying, AGAIN! We have a camera in his room so I just sat and watched him cry. He was fake crying (I am not a heartless mom, just a sleep deprived one!) I put a sea horse in his crib that plays music, so on the camera every few minutes I saw him stop crying and start dancing to his sea horses music! He's so silly. So I laid in bed until 4 AM listening to him cry until he finally fell asleep. Now how many more nights do I have of this? I feel so bad just watching and waiting for him to stop crying and fall asleep, but I have got to get some sleep!  I was so proud of him when he fell asleep on his own, but I had nightmares the rest of the night that he was still crying and on and on.

It was a long night, but we are making progress!!!


(ok, my rant is over)