Sleep Training

Chloe had been able to sleep in her own crib without our presence since June. But for some reason, around the holidays she suddenly started to reject her crib and cry every time we try to put her down. She ended up sleeping in our room in her play pen for about a week. Some nights she even cried in the middle of the night and ended up sleeping in our bed because we were too tired to deal with her antics. We brought this to her doctor’s attention and the doctor pretty much gave an executive order to start sleep training before this new habit gets too strong to break.

We started the sleep training with her late morning nap on Saturday. She had just finished her mid morning meal, so she was full. We changed her diaper, so she was clean. We kissed her, gave her the binky and told her it was time to take a nap. As expected, she started crying the second me put her into the crib. On the doctor’s order, we left her crying in the crib, left the room and shut the door.

She continued to cry, heart wrenchingly and nonstop for an hour. We watched via the video monitor as she roamed around the crib trying to get out. Through the crying her binky fell out of her mouth and onto the floor, where she had no way of retrieving. Without the binky, she cried even harder. Eventually she got tired, laid down and fell asleep.

45 minutes later, she woke up, realized she was alone in the crib and cried again. Although 45 minutes is considered a short nap, it was enough to rejuvenate her until the next nap. We also couldn’t bare another round of crying. Therefore we decided to free her from her confinement. It was a big relief to see her smile again when we picked her up. I was afraid she would remember what had transpired 45 minutes ago and give us a temper tantrum and/or guilt trip. Fortunately a 1-year-old is not capable of such attitude.

Later on that night, when it came time to sleep, we once again put her in the crib alone after making sure she was fed and cleaned. But this time we threw in three extra binkies in addition to the one already in her mouth. When I saw the binky fall out of her mouth during the previous crying session, I made a mental note to throw in a few extra ones in case she drops it again. This move proved highly affective. The extra binkies not only functioned as replacements, apparently they also functioned as a distraction to her emotions because after only 10 minutes of crying she started to play with the binkies. The crying ceased. She suddenly didn’t seem bothered by being alone anymore. Again we monitored her and this time it was actually amusing to watch her play with the binkies, rolling from one side of the crib to another. 40 minutes later she fell asleep.

From one hour of nonstop crying earlier in the day to just 10 minutes of light crying at night, this was a huge improvement. I started to feel better about letting her cry herself to sleep. As a mother, it’s always difficult to see your baby suffer through an uncomfortable situation.

Sunday night we continued with the sleep training. (We didn’t do it at nap times because we were on the road and she napped in the car.) Learning from the previous night’s experience, we once again gave her extra binkies before we left the room. As before, she cried the hardest at the moment we put her in the crib and left the room. But this time, she didn’t cry a long stretch before giving up. Instead she cried for a minute, stopped to play with the binkies and then maybe 5 minutes later let out another few cries/whimpers. These intermittent cries persisted for one hour and 15 minutes before she finally fell asleep. Is this improvement? I would say so because the crying wasn’t constant.

But as I thought her dependency on us started to improve, on Monday she exerted a lot of separation anxiety. When we arrived home after I picked her up from the babysitter’s, she wouldn’t let me out of her sight. In fact, she wouldn’t even let me put her down to play. She clung on to me like a monkey to a tree. Even her favorite toys couldn’t distract her from me. Then as I started our nightly routine in prepping her for bed, she started crying. From washing her face to changing her diaper, she whined because she knew what was coming next. Sure enough as I bent over the crib railing to put her down on her back, she screamed out in heart wrenching terror. I released my arms and stepped away from the crib. She immediately got onto her feet and walked to the edge of the crib reaching her arms out to me. My heart was torn to pieces watching and hearing her cry for me. I was ready to swoop her up and take her back with me as Daddy came in with an old iPod which he had just bought for her. She initially refused the iPod and continued to reach for me. After a couple minutes of coercion, she finally accepted the iPod (thought still whimpering) and turned her attention away from me. That was when I made my escape.

She played with the iPod for about 40 minutes before she fell asleep. She only let out a light cry on a couple of occasions. Again this seems to be improvement because the crying was limited to the initial couple of minutes when I put her in the crib. However, this time there was a different factor thrown into the mix – a toy. I don’t know if this toy, or any toy for that matter, would be another bad habit to break in the future.

As we continue Chloe’s sleep training, questions are floating in my head. Is sleep training really necessary? Is it really that bad to let your baby co-sleep with you? There are believers and there are non-believers. I unfortunately fall in the middle and can be teetered one way or the other depending on who I am talking to.

Arguments in favor of sleep training: You don’t want her to still be in your bed when she turns 16. Having your baby sleep in your bed is not good for your marriage. The crying is just her way of manipulating you to get her way.

Arguments against sleep training: It’s cruel to let her cry. How can you leave her in her cold room all alone? You are causing her a lot of anxiety and any form of anxiety is bad for her emotionally and psychologically.

Is that true? Are we really causing her anxiety? Are we messing with her emotional and psychological well being? If so, we need to stop this immediately. But if we stop, the last few nights of torturous crying would have been in vain.

Alas I think there is no turning back at this point. We have to finish what we started. We need to stand by our initial decision and give her time to learn. Otherwise it wouldn’t be fair to her. After all she does show signs of improvement – from one hour of nonstop crying to barely a couple of cries (albeit with the distraction of a toy). I just hope she learns quickly and we can all leave this behind us and move on.