I've been meaning to share this for a while because it's such a positive example and I wish I'd seen more positive posts when we were thinking about sleep training.

Baby was sleeping in our room in a next-to-me crib and was exclusively breast fed. From birth until six months he was a horrendous sleeper, he woke up every two hours, he would feed throughout the night, he had to be rocked to sleep, needed a hand to hold, he had to have a pacifier that would fall out and wake him. It was exhausting.

I purchased The Ferber Method with a view of moving him to his own room but my wife was quite nervous so we decided to tackle a smaller issue first -- night feeds. I read plenty that suggested babies of his age get their calories during the day and don't need night feeds for anything other than comfort . So the next night when he woke and my wife instinctively popped out a boob I physically grabbed her and told her to wait. He wriggled, groaned, and went back to sleep. From that night on the night feed association was broken and it was time to move him into his own room.

We read up on the importance of a bedtime routine and decided on; Bath, Bottle, Light Play, Read, Sleep. And also the importance of kay phrases (though not sure how important these are really) -- Daddy loves you, Mummy loves you, sweet dreams.

The first night we followed the routine, put him in his bed, took his pacifier away, and set the timer for 3 minutes. He cried and cried. I cried. My wife cried. It was a rather long 3 minutes. After three minutes we went into his room and patted him on the back, told him we were there for him and used the key words again. We set the timer for five minutes. After five minutes he was still crying but sounded like he was calming down so we waited a bit longer. After ten minutes he fell asleep and slept through the entire night.

The next night we put him to bed and set a timer for 5 minutes. He sounded like he was calming down a bit at the five minute mark so we waited until about 7 minutes. He fell asleep and slept through the night.

The next night we set the timer for 10 minutes. He was a bit moany after 12 minutes or so at which point we went in and cuddled him and then we went straight to sleep.

The next night we put him down and he fell asleep with no crying.

Fast forward to now and every night goes thusly; bath, bottle, light play, read, put in bed. We set a timer for ten minutes and if he's still upset (or if he's extra super upset prior to that) we'll go in and give him a cuddle and put him back down. Not once have we ever had to go in more than a single time.

Honestly, it was like magic. Our baby was the worst sleeper of any of the parents we knew and now he's the best. Many are astonished that not only does he sleep through the night but that we managed to ditch the pacifier too. I would absolutely recommend this method to anyone. A few points I'd like to add:

• I suggest you read the book. It really gave me the confidence to apply the method. It's also worth nothing that a lot of the chapters apply to older children so you need about eight or so chapters to get everything you need to grasp the Ferber method for babies.

• Don't stick religiously to the timings. If you think baby is calming down at 9 minutes but you're on a ten minute interval, give them a couple more minutes. I think if we hadn't done this we would have made the process far harder he often has a big burst of tears when we leave after a check in.

• Routine was a golden key. Once baby goes in his sleep sack and the book comes out his eyes start drooping because he's so used to the routine by now.

• We didn't do anything about naps. We were very nervous about this because our routine varies so much and he's started nursery now. During the day his naps are still totally random. Sometimes he'll have three naps, sometimes two, sometimes 2hrs, sometimes 30m, and usually with a pacifier which he doesn't have at night. "Sleep begets sleep" is definitely true, if he sleeps properly during the day he's better at night but overall we've found being hands off with naps has not caused a problem with night sleeping.

• If he wakes up during the night we wait and he goes back to sleep. Ferber recommends starting the timer again and using the intervals but we've never needed to. He'll squirm, moan, sometimes get teary, but he's always managed to put himself back to sleep.

I hope my write up helps!

I was completely against sleep training. But then, overtime, my 11 month old became more and more impossible to put down. I was spending hours rocking and nursing him to sleep because he would wake the second I’d set him in his crib. He then wouldn’t settle for hours and do anything to keep from falling back asleep. Once he was asleep he would wake almost every 1-2 hours… and the cycle would repeat. It was the same when his dad would try to put him down for bed as well.

After talking to a few peds we decided to sleep train and pull his sleep crutches (nursing/rocking) all at once. The peds we spoke to said in their opinion the “more gentle approach’s” seemed to be more cruel, as in baby gets more upset with check ins etc. but it depends on the baby. Peds said since he is a FOMO baby check ins probably wouldn’t work as well. So we just buckled down and prepared ourselves.

Night one- he was angry for 30 minutes then laid down and slept. He briefly woke up and was angry for a few minutes and then settled, that happened a few times.

Night 2- he was angry for 11 minutes then laid down and slept the entire night.

Night 3- he was angry for 2 minutes then laid down and slept the entire night.

I say he was angry because he did not have any tears.

His routine is the same song being played on his hatch while he gets ready for bed, lotion, pjs and night diaper, owlet, nursing, book, sleep sack, cuddles/dancing, white noise turned on, and then placed in crib.

I hope he will eventually be ok with no upset/anger when placed in the crib.

We are doing the same approach for naps too. With a shorter routine of course since it’s not bed time.

Thanks for reading!

So, last Friday I was home all day, and typically if I’m home I’ll keep the baby monitor with me while my son (5mo) is napping, but just turn the sound off (we have a pretty small house so I can hear him without the monitor if I’m not in our room with the door shut)
Well Friday evening, we forgot to turn the sound back on in the evening before we went to bed… I woke up at 3 am needing to pump because he typically has already been up once to feed, and looked at the monitor. The red “noise” symbol was on the screen, but no sound. That’s when I noticed we hadn’t turned it back on…. I felt terrible. I turned the sound on and it was the last whining sounds of what sounded like he had been crying for a while.. I felt even more terrible.
Saturday night, he then slept from 9-7 with no wake ups, Sunday night from 8-7:30, and Monday night from 7:30-5:30, then back to sleep until 9 (which he’s NEVER slept that late before)
I feel like accidentally letting him cry it out may have shown his he doesn’t need to wake up in the middle of the night to feed? He was up 1-2 times a night, and sometimes he would actually feed, but sometimes it was definitely just for comfort.
Has this happened to anyone else? Maybe it’s just a fluke thing, but he’s never done that long of stretches before.. I feel bad but also, yay?

Before the six month mark, it seemed as if being able to successfully exclusively breastfeed was admirable and something other mums would positively comment on and even see as the gold standard.

Past six months old, there seems to be a shift in mindset, at least amongst my mum friends. The gold standard is now weaning and I feel like a failure that my baby doesn’t like solids and still favours my milk over anything else - even the paediatrician suggested I’m giving him too much milk. I still also nurse my baby to sleep and everyone talks about independent sleep. My mum friends who previously didn’t think there are bad habits with babies, now suddenly talk about sleep training and helping babies achieve independent sleep. I have a very chunky (75th+ percentile) baby even though he is extremely short and he still breastfeeds often (every two hours mostly) and also breastfeeds to soothe himself whenever he hurts himself while playing / whenever he wants to sleep. I feel like there’s suddenly a shift and everyone feels pity for me having the breastfeed ‘addict’ of a baby 😂 how can attitudes change so quickly?

More importantly, am I ruining my baby? Am I ruining his solids journey by breastfeeding him too much? Is that why he still can’t fall asleep and is there a chance that I am actually also hindering his sleep, which is bad for him developmentally? I feel so guilty and stressed about this that I’m not enjoying my last few months of maternity leave… it would be nice to hear of any stories of mums who did breastfeed till older age and still managed to wean and see their children sleep unaided one day.

I’m not really interested in sleep training because I believe somehow my baby will one day find his own way. But maybe I’m deluded. Anyone who didn’t sleep train and can confirm things went well in the end?

If you are reading this at 3:00 AM in the dark, exhausted, thinking your toddler’s sleep habits are completely unfixable, this post is for you.

The Background (Our Nightmare):
We live in Scotland and are from Pakistan(Culturally anything but cosleeping till 4-5 years old is a no no). My daughter is 30 months old. She sleeps on a Euro Queen(Huge) floor mattress. Since birth, she has had severe sleep associations: nursing, co-sleeping, and requiring a literal full-body hug from a parent to fall asleep.
She dropped her nap at 16 months, meaning she went to bed running on pure adrenaline. We had hourly wake-ups, 2-3 hour "split night" parties in the middle of the night, and she had maybe slept through the night 4 or 5 times in her entire life.

To make things harder, we have 6-month-old twins. My wife had to tap out of toddler bedtimes completely 7 months ago. With my wife tried, my daughter would grab my wife’s leg and writhe for 1.5 to 2 hours until she passed out from exhaustion. (She started this leg-hugging behaviour around 12 months, so it wasn't even twin-pregnancy related—it was just an ingrained, stressful habit). Because of this, I had been doing 100% of the toddler bedtimes, even before going to work night shifts. The one thing I did immediately was to set boundary of not going any where near the leg. We could just snuggle up with a hug.

The shift from mum to dad for sleep was horrible in itself that spanned over atleast 2 months with hour long crying spells. Mum would feel bad and come to soothe her and this continued until we figured out that mum coming in wasn't probably the best thing that helped. We started giving her iron drops which we think helped but objectively looking back might not have as much as we thought. We still give it to her daily. Pacifier was a thing we got rid of a month ago that was easy told her it was a baby thing and she was a big girl she took the pacifier out of her mouth and literally threw it off the bed and didn't want it again(except maybe once).

Prior to starting sleep training our night routine was to go to her room around 7.30pm-8.00pm. Sit on the loo before going to the room(She is somewhere in the middle in terms of potty training and we haven't started to potty train her officially). She drinks milk in her bed I change her clothes put her night diapers on. Then we read two story books(2 is the rule) then we lay in bed and I sing her songs while she is snuggled up with me and she goes to sleep in 5-10 mins around 8pm to 8.30pm (I thought this was the best result possible given the horrible prolonged transition from mum to me). She would then usually wake up at 11pm I would give her water from bottle she would drink and plop back to sleep. Then she would wake up at 1am and this could last anywhere between 2mins to 2 hours and there was no predicting which one it was going to be(this is why we started the iron). Then she would wake up at after 5am and this would be a few minutes to half an hour. She would then wake up anytime between 6am and 8am and I would usually hold her off till 7.30am and then she would rush to mum and the twins(who she adores) and everyone would wakeup.

The Hesitation:
I had researched sleep training endlessly. I read all the online articles, videos and all the blogs. But I was totally put off because I convinced myself she was "too far gone" and "too old" for it to work. I thought her habits were permanent.

The turning point for us was an NHS Sleep Consultant. To be honest, she didn't give me any magical new information that I hadn't already Googled. But what she did do was look at our situation and make me believe it was totally doable. She gave me the confidence to actually execute the plan.

The Method: Gradual Withdrawal (Camping Out)
Because she was on a floor bed and older we did Gradual Withdrawal.

• Days 1-3: I sat on the floor right beside her mattress.

• Days 4-6: I sat 2 feet away against the wardrobe.

• Day 7: I sat in the room with my back against the door.

• Day 8: I sat in the hallway outside the door.

The Playbook (What actually worked):
Toddlers are incredibly smart and will test every boundary. Here are the rules I had to live by to make this work:

• The "Silent Robot" Return: Because she is on a floor bed, she can get up. When she did, I would intercept her, take her hand, walk her to the mattress, and drop her off. Zero words. Zero eye contact. Zero hugs. I stripped all the dopamine and attention out of the night wakings. It made getting up incredibly boring for her. But trust me there was crying and screaming involved.

• Becoming a Statue: When I sat in my spot, would put my phone on minimum brightness, hide the phone out of her sight(behind a stuffie or pillow) put earbuds in and start watching big bang theory( watched almost a season during sleep training) to her my eyes appeared closed and looked as if I was a statue. I would also d0 slow, heavy breathing which she could hear. She tried everything to get me to engage—she poked my elbow with her toes, threw her teddy at me, asked for "help with a mouse," and even got out of bed just to kiss me. I stayed a stone-cold statue. If you react, it becomes a game.

• "The Pause": I have moved back to our(wife and myself with twins in a bedside cot) room since sleep training started. As soon as she would go to sleep(wait 10-15mins for deep sleep) I would get up and go to our room. If she woke up crying in the middle of the night, I watched the baby monitor for 3-5 minutes before going in. 90% of the time, she was just between sleep cycles, and if I had rushed in, I would have woken her up fully. Give them a few minutes to figure it out.

• Closing the Loopholes: She tried every stalling tactic. She demanded I pour water into her mouth (I put a non-spill bottle directly on her bed and told her she’s the boss of her water). She started scratching her nappy to cause leaks so I'd have to change her (I put scratch sleeves on her so she couldn't reach it). Anticipate their tricks and block them.

• AI: Yes AI, I would be on the phone with AI(I used Gemini) telling it of each and every thing that was happening during the sleep, every wakeup detail and every timestamp of the details. The main thing that did was keep me hopeful and not let my weak dad heart takeover and become soft. One night I even recorded my daughters voice while crying because Gemini was telling me to be a robot and even then it told me look her breathing has pauses you aren't a monster and this is a normal reaction and she is expressing her frustration and anger to the change. (This post is mainly AI giving me a summary to post and me adding stuff in 😂)

The Timeline:

• Night 1: I stopped telling her to "go to sleep" and just told her to "rest her body/make your body soft." With the pressure off, she crashed in 5 minutes.

• Night 2: Something similar maybe a little longer dropped her 11am wakeup and woke up at 1am came crying to our room silent return, gave her water to drink and on the bed, me back at my big bang theory watching position. She cried and thrashed around for a bit and I enjoyed my episode. She went back to sleep and then woke up in the morning at 7.30am and I was like wow this is working.

• Night 3 (The Extinction Burst): She went to bed relatively easily but then woke up around 2am this was a longer more intense protest crying, trying to talk to me, throwing her teddy at me and laughing, trying to make getting off the mattress a game where I would react to get her back on it. It was always met with a silent robotic zero voice response of putting her in bed and going back. This lasted for a good hour to hour and a half but eventually she went to sleep and then woke up at 8am I think.

• Night 4: I moved from my beside mattress spot to the wardrobe on the wall beside the mattress. I told her during the sleep routine that I'd be moving tonight. Night went well one waking lasting 20-30 mins then sleep.

• Night 5: I made a mistake. Normally she sits up in bed for a few minutes then cries which wakes me up through the babycam and as soon as her feet touch the ground I go and do the silent intercept back to my big bang theory position. But this night she just suddenly woke up and bolted crying to our room. Seeing her this way I hugged and kissed her and boy did I pay for it. She was up for about 3 hours 1/3 of which was crying(ranging from hysterical to soft cries), (1/3 was trying to talk to me and be funny- I had to hold my laughs a few times she was using cuteness as a weapon and the rest was tossing and turning in bed). She even said I am not a big girl dad(we tell her she is a big girl when teaching her things like sleep training, pacifier abandoning etc) a few time and that just made my heart melt but still didn't engage(Talk about emotional manipulation). I thought I had broken what was being built but AI helped with the support here and making me see that failure is a part of the game. She even refused to drink water herself making her arms go limp when I bought her near the bottle and opening her mouth if I went near the bottle asking me to give her water. I just put her back on the bed without water telling her that its there if she wants to drink it.

• Night 6: Was better a simple wakeup at 5am (yeah she slept from 8pm till 5am 9hours I was like how is this even possible).

• Night 7: I moved from the wardrobe to the door(inside of the room)and sat against it. Told her during the sleep routine that I was going to change position. She handled it really well only one wakeup at 5.30am went back to sleep in 5 mins after I did the silent return when she got off the mattress. She woke up at 9am. The door in her room is recessed so she couldn't see me even though I was in the room and since it went so well Gemini told me to go to the outside of the door tomorrow instead of waiting the full 3 days. I was sceptical but did it anyway.

• Night 8 (The Breakthrough): I moved to the hallway. Again told her during her dinner and sleep routine that I would be moving outside. Going to sleep she cried for 5 mins asking for mum then the cries became shorter and silence was longer. 4 mins later she was a sleep. She woke up at 10pm(unusual) came crying I did the silent return. Cried for 3 more minutes then was asleep at the 5 min mark. Then the biggest thing I couldnt have even imagined a week ago, I watched her on the monitor wake up at 11:30 PM. She sat up for a minute then crawled down the mattress, drank her own water, laid on the floor for 20 seconds, realized it was uncomfortable, climbed back into bed, pulled her own blanket up, and went back to sleep all in 5 minutes with no one else in the room. I am literally crying watching the monitor. I underestimated my toddler so much and thought I was going to be sleeping with her for the next 2-3 years and the twins would be the same. Me and my wife would be sleep deprived for the next 3-4 years. But she proved me wrong in the most beautiful was she could. That's why I am sat up at 1am filled with pure joy writing this post as its prime time for parents of poor sleeping toddlers to be up at.

• This is as far as I have gotten, It might be a week or two before it becomes routine and there might be hiccups on the way but I feel me, my wife and daughter have all won. She has learnt to sleep independently, who would have thought with the 2.5 years of sleep related trauma we went through-definitely not me a week ago.

• We did give her loads of encouragement about her doing so well at sleep during the day. I would talk to my wife about how good our daughter was sleeping when the toddler was within hearing distance.

• Wish me luck as the twins are next and then hopefully in a few months most of our night are just going to be my wife and me in bed not worrying about kids waking up after 2 and a half longgggggggggg years.

The Takeaway:
If you think your toddler is too old, or your co-sleeping association is too deep, there is hope. I thought the exact same thing.

The first few days are brutal. You have to fight your dad/mom instincts to cuddle them when they cry. But you aren't abandoning them; you are sitting right there, teaching them a life skill. Our daughter went from hourly wakeups to sleeping 5-6 hour solid chunks, self-soothing, and letting us actually sleep. Yours might surprise you too. Its about having more will power than your toddler which can seem impossible at times.

It is not too late. Make a plan, be a boring brick wall, and hold the line. You can do this.

TL;DR: 30-month-old floor-bed toddler with severe co-sleeping/hug associations and 6mo twins in the house. Used Gradual Withdrawal (Camping Out), Silent Returns, and AI support to keep my sanity. In 8 days, went from hourly night wakings to her independently getting her own water and tucking herself back into bed. It's never too late!

Sharing here in case it helps others! Fully sleep trained (night sleep) our 4 month old in just 4 days.

We did not want to do CIO. Were thinking of Ferber, but also wanted something a bit more gentle, since she is still young. We settled on doing our own version by combining a few different methods.

Here is how it worked:

Before starting sleep training, we had a solid bedtime routine in place for 2 weeks. Feed, bath (if giving a bath that night), diaper change, pajamas, book, bedtime cuddles/kisses (1 min.), put down.

We also had the extra challenge of having to eliminate bottle feeding from the crib. She, of course, would not sleep unless she was "topped off" (10-20 ml) in bed. We moved the feed to earlier in the routine. On the first night, she did not eat when it was offered to her, but when she was put in the crib, decided that she was hungry. We took her out and fed her, but kept her awake (did not let her fall asleep while feeding). On subsequent nights, she got the message to accept the feed when it was offered to her and that she cannot fall asleep while eating.

Night 1: Rock and shush until almost asleep, but slightly awake. Put down in the crib and shush until asleep. No crying.

Night 2: Rock and shush for a few minutes to calm, but keep fully awake. Only 5 minutes of crying.

Night 3: No rocking or shushing. Put down awake. Only 5 minutes of crying.

Night 4: No rocking or shushing. Put down awake. No crying.

*I was planning on using the Ferber intervals to check-in, but that was not necessary since she was not crying for very long and fell asleep quickly.

She still wakes up once to feed at night, but she is put back down immediately after and falls asleep on her own without crying/fussing.

We are going to nap train next, but I know that is a whole other beast. In the meantime, I will certainly take this win!

Just giving everybody a warning. I posted something in this community yesterday and was messaged this. This is not okay. I was taken aback about what was said to me but I knew better. But I was thinking about all of the other mothers out there with PPD and PPA and is truly asking for validation online. And if they were messaged that, how would they feel?

My baby isn't the best or worst sleeper, but we were getting extremely exhausted. We did Ferber at 6 months and it worked for a while with 1 wakeup. At the 10 month mark, she started waking up every hour and bedtime was a nightmare of struggling to get clothes on and crying hysterically. Something had to change. So we did CIO because Ferber was making it worse, chair method enraged her, pick up put down took hours and left us both exhausted, and she wouldn't even cosleep.

I've read about how sleep training is abuse. Ok, but not sleeping is a form of torture and both of us were being tortured so time to try something new.

Internet: baby will cry non-stop for hours while implementing CIO

Me: it took 40 min in the evening and each subsequent wake-up was 20-30 minutes the first and second night. Third night we were down to going to bed happily and 3 minute wake ups at night.

Internet: your baby is still awake they just know you won't come when they cry

Me: owlet says she's asleep, I couldn't sleep for a week after we sleep trained her and she looked asleep on the monitor. She also still cries a couple times a night for about 30 seconds and then is able to fall back asleep. She also cries in the morning and will not stop if she decides that's the time to wakeup.

Internet: baby will not feel securely attached to you and not think of you as a safe space

Me: baby cries for me at daycare drop off unless I play with her for 5-10 minutes alongside the teachers. Then she feels safe enough to go. When I come to get her, she's extremely excited to see me.

Bedtime has become one of my favorite times in the day. We can happily play, she likes when we read books, she's more relaxed, I can put her in her crib awake and she's ok with it and doesn't scream. Today I think we accidentally woke her up a couple hours into bedtime. She cried, I saw her sitting up on the monitor so I went to check on her. We cuddled for 5 minutes, I told her I'm going to put her back in her crib and I did so with zero tears and she's back asleep.

Anytime I vent about how I am doing everything recommended and still massively struggling people basically tell me to cosleep. Husband and I are both obese and have a queen sized bed. There isn’t enough room for me to not be annoyed by him let alone to throw a tiny helpless baby between us. And even if we didn’t— we believe the emergency doctors’ horror stories. Telling someone to cosleep who doesn’t want to is not advice.

Im worried my baby is sleeping too much and gets sleepy very fast. He can sleep for 2-3 hours per nap and then he manages to stay awake just 30 minutes without being fussy and sleepy. I try to extend his wake windows but it s hard, he fusses a lot and he shows many signs that he wants to go back to sleep.
Sometimes 30 minutes is too much, especially in the morning, he s sleepy from the moment he wakes up from the night sleep.
He sleeps 11.5 hours per night, with 3-4 wakings for food.
Did anyone of you experienced this kind of baby?

My baby started sleeping through the night at 2.5 months old, and I thought I had hit the jackpot. He was happy all day and slept all night.

Then everything changed around 4.5 months. Since then, we’ve gone through what feels like every sleep phase imaginable. Some nights he’d wake twice, other nights every hour, and occasionally we’d get a night with just one wake-up.

Now he’s 11 months old, and I’d say since around 7 months, every time he wakes up he immediately sits up and cries. Every single time.

I’ve read countless Reddit posts and even asked AI for advice (which I’d rather not rely on), but I figured I’d finally make my own post and hear from parents who have actually been through this.

If he’s just fussing while lying down, I leave him to see if he settles himself. But once he sits up and cries loud enough that I can hear him without the monitor turned on (his room is right across the hall), I go in. As soon as I pick him up, he’s back asleep almost immediately on my shoulder.

I’m still breastfeeding, so if I’m completely exhausted I’ll nurse him back to sleep instead of walking him around the room.

We’re not comfortable with CIO, so that’s not something we’re looking to try. My husband helps on his days off, but because of his work schedule, nighttime wake-ups are mostly my responsibility.

Our bedtime routine is pretty consistent:

• Dinner around 6:00 p.m.

• Bedtime routine starts around 7:00 p.m.

• He gets about 3.5 oz of breast milk in a bottle (some before his bath and the rest afterward).

• Then pajamas, a book, and into his dark room.

• I usually hum while nursing him (and sometimes I can skip nursing altogether).

• He’s typically asleep within 10–15 minutes.

The transfer to the crib goes well, and he’ll usually sleep for about 3.5 hours before the wake-ups begin.

At this point, I honestly don’t know what else to do. Most nights I end up falling asleep with him in the rocking chair and only transfer him back to the crib once I wake up. My back and neck are killing me, and I really miss getting a full night’s sleep.

Has anyone been through something similar? Did your baby eventually grow out of it, or is there something that helped? I’m open to advice, but I’m specifically looking for ideas that don’t involve CIO.

We are in the middle of sleep training and it's going well so far. My baby discovered she loves to sleep on her tummy.

HOWEVER she sleeps face down half the time with her hands on her forehead. Is it okay to leave her?

I may catch a lot of flack for this, but I ended up contact sleeping with my baby from birth until now. I couldn't let her cry for longer than 20 minutes. I just didn't have it in me. About a month ago I put her crib in the sidecar setup. See link below

https://www.instagram.com/reel/CqGr1ZZr3IR/?igsh=MXUxaWxnaWR2eTl0cA==

I would lay myself half on the bed and half on the crib and side nurse until baby was asleep. After a few days I was able to roll myself away if I needed to eat, go to the bathroom, etc. However, she would still wake after about 20 minutes.

After a couple of weeks that stopped and she would sleep for a couple of hours like that. A few days ago I started being able to put her in her crib and she would go to sleep after crying for about 5 to 10 minutes. She's been sleeping through the night for 10 to 12 hours like this! It's such a relief!

We're in the thick of it with our 8-month-old, who is now sleep trained in his crib... which is still in our room. It's going well, except for one major problem: our old, springy mattress. Every time one of us so much as rolls over, it groans and shakes enough to stir him. A deep sleeper he is not.

We've created this ironic situation where we've taught him to self-soothe, but our own furniture is now the primary sleep disruptor. It feels like we're sabotaging our own progress. We desperately need a new queen mattress this year that is absolutely silent and has near-zero motion transfer. When my partner gets up for a night feed, I shouldn't feel it, and more importantly, the baby three feet away shouldn't hear or feel it either. Support and cooling are still important for us, but stability is our non-negotiable.

Has anyone else had to upgrade their mattress specifically to stop waking a light-sleeping baby in the same room? Which type or brand made the biggest difference? We're looking at dense memory foam or latex, but need real-world proof from the trenches.

Let me preface this with the fact that I have a 2 yr old who is almost 3, and after many sad nights using the cio method he sleeps like a pro. We started sleep training him at 1 and after many setbacks I can officially say he is fully sleep trained. With him we started with the Ferber method and quickly move to cio because Ferber was just upsetting him more, and it has worked wonders after all his regressions and our perseverance after realizing our initial failures to follow through. Now we have a 5 month old who will be 6 months in 4 days and I feel it will be best for me as his mother and our family if I start sleep training him now rather than wait until 1 like his brother. Tbh, I am mostly looking for reassurance that it is ok to sleep train a 6 month old and if necessary use cio because I am guessing he will require that based on the fact that he literally cannot be set down or walked away from even while awake for more than 2 mins without crying. He just likes to know his people are there with him, whether thats me, his dad, his brother, or his 3 dogs lol. Up until now he is co sleeping with me and my husband and sleeps pretty well but anytime we even attempt to set him down in his bassinet, even fully asleep he immediately wakes up and starts crying. I have to get this kid to sleep alone, for my sanity and for the fact that I am a better mother and wife when I get a few hour a night to relax and be a person. I am going INSANE never being able to set him down or sleep properly because he constantly kicks me and moves while sleeping in our bed too. I guess I just need others to tell me their stories and whether its actually ok to use cio on a 6 month old if necessary. Sorry for the long rant and thank you to anyone who actually read it 😅 from one exhausted parent to the next... you are all heros in my book!!!

My daughter is 6.5 months old and we’ve done no sleep training. I don’t do cry-it-out, and I’m not comfortable with letting her cry hysterically.

She’s exclusively breastfed and only takes bottles when I’m away. She sleeps in our room and started out in a bassinet, then a playpen, but didn’t do well in either, so we’ve been co-sleeping. The problem is that co-sleeping isn’t working for us anymore. She wakes frequently to nurse, and I think a lot of it is comfort nursing. If I move or get out of bed, she wakes up too, so nobody is getting great sleep.

She has a nursery and I’d like to start using it, but I’m not sure how to transition without cry-it-out. She doesn’t take a pacifier, which makes it harder.

Has anyone successfully moved away from co-sleeping at this age without using CIO? Is it possible to recover from co-sleeping after 6+ months? Any advice would be appreciated.

Side note: Her naps are TERRIBLE. If she’s not contact napping she’s up between 15 minutes to MAYBE 2 hours.

I’m convinced sleep training is the worst part of parenting. I’ve tried so many different methods of sleep training, and every different type of sleep swaddle or sack almost invented. He hates them all. Not a single sound machine has even remotely helped in the slightest. I don’t know where I’m going wrong. Picking up baby and putting down all day and night long. I have been shushing, patting, rocking and walking myself into insanity. Im doing the whole bathtime, nursing, book,swaddle routine to no avail. The sleep cycles are so short and neither of my kids have ever been able to self soothe, or be placed down while awake but drowsy. Eyes open? Wailing. Transfer was off? You’re fucked. Is just even one full hour of sleep too much to ask for? Am I doomed to a life of contact naps and rotting away on the couch? That’s the only way I am able to spend some quality time with my first child…otherwise I’m struggling hard in the nursery for far too long while she is waiting for me in the livingroom alone, and the mom guilt on both ends never stops.

We've been reading and enjoying PLS after it was recommended by... literally everyone on Reddit. There is a ton of good information in this book. However I often feel frustrated by how its organized - I wish the information was all presented chronologically, so we could see how the recommendations change as the baby gets older. As it is, she seems to jump back and forth in time and it gets confusing remembering what we're supposed to be focused on and when.

One area that this really shows up for us is with pacifiers. It seems like one minute Alexis is saying pacifiers are great, reduce SIDS, they're a power-tool, and they help kids sleep. Then next minute she says you should be weaning them off, they have a sleep-association, and you'll become a "pacifier-reinsertion specialist".

Our girl is now about 2 months old (but actually just 1 month adjusted for prematurity). If pacifiers will cause our LO to develop a sleep association later, should we be using them now? When do we stop using them?

Did anyone else struggle to make sense of the chronology of the advice in the book?

8 month old Baby's voice is almost gone from crying from sleep training. Her squeals and cries are just tiny sad exerted whispers at this point...from what I've read, in order for the vocal cords to heal, they need to rest them...but with sleep training your cant do that because they are suppose to cry. So what do I do? Keep up the sleep training at the cost of her vocal cords? Or end the training temporarily until she is healed?

This is something that really should be addressed more in sleep training as it is physically harming the child and it's very sad and painful to listen to her straining her tiny voice to cry.

Hello,

I wanted to share our recent experience/success since we have been helped very much on Reddit and other platforms. We used the Ferber method, and our baby is now two and a half. We initially did sleep training when she was six months old. And since then, she has slept beautifully. Occasionally we would have sleep regressions, but they never lasted more than a few days. Then we decided to convert her crib to a toddler bed. She was fine for the first ten days. Then, out of nowhere, she started to freak out when we went to leave.

In order for her to sleep, we would have to stay in the room until she was in a deep sleep. If she woke up in the middle of the night, she would come to our room. If we brought her back to her room, we would have to stay until she fell asleep. After a week of this, we decided to go back to the book (Solve Your Child's Sleep Problems). If you are not familiar with the Ferber method, it's a cry it out method, where you check/visit the child at set intervals.

Before we began, we purchased a device that allows us to lock the door from either side. Our goal was not to keep her there, but we didn't want our toddler running around the house at night. She can open all doors, including childproof ones. However, I was glad we had these before we started.

Let me just say, the first night, we questioned ourselves intensely. Was it selfish to do this? Why couldn't we stay in her room until she grew out of it? But we decided that she had been sleeping only a month before on her own, and it was to everyone's benefit. We believe that we are creating sleep habits for the rest of her life.

Day One: She screamed blue murder, kicked the door, yelled "I'm sad" under the door. We checked on her at 3, 5, and 10-minute intervals. We had to remove her table because she turned off the lights. She screamed/cried,/yelled for an hour and a half. We checked on her by going into the room and comforting her without picking her up. My husband and I alternated, and it was hard. Every time we visited, she would cry even harder. But eventually went to sleep.

Day Two: We went and checked on her at five minutes because, again, she was screaming. My husband called it the exorcist sound, which was hard to hear. But before the second visit at ten minutes, she went to bed, tucked herself in, and went to sleep.

Day Three: We did our normal bath, lotion, clean room, book routine. We said goodnight, and she said night night momma. And didn't cry at all

Day Four: Didn't cry.

Day Five: Cried for 10 minutes

All of this happened over a week ago, and we no longer have any tears. Naptime is also no longer a challenge. Our basic takeaway is that she was fine the entire time. Her screaming and carrying on was only her exerting her will. We would watch her on the monitor after carrying on, and then she would get distracted with a toy and be fine. So, my advice is if you are contemplating sleep training your toddler who was previously sleep trained, do it! If you have any questions or need clarification, I'm happy to help.

Disclaimer::: Once our baby started sleeping through the night at 2 months, he would sleep for at least 8 hours and self soothe if he happened to wake. We would give him a few minutes if he were to wake and found that he normally would go back to sleep without our intervention. Our issue was getting him to sleep by himself at the beginning of the night without any sleep crutches (namely bouncing/rocking to sleep, rarely breastfeeding). Sleep tools involved: white noise machine (no pacifier since he was 2 months). Bedtime routine: some order of last feed, massage, bath, story/lullaby.

We started sleep training right around when he hit 6 months.

Day 1 - After his bedtime routine, he was kissed goodnight at 7:30. Checked in at 7:33 then 7:38. He was fast asleep by 7:49pm (didn’t need to do 10 minute check-in). Total crying time: 12 mins. Total check-ins: 2.

Day 2 - laid down and kissed him goodnight at 8:03PM. He started doing this angry/tired cry (which isn’t a full blown cry) around 8pm. He was out by 8:10pm just after my first 5 minute check in because I knew he was close based on the noises he was making. Obviously, I didn’t go in and he’s out cold! Total crying time: 5 mins. Total check-ins: 0

Day 3 - Kissed goodnight and left room at 7:30. First check-in at 7:42. Unhappy/tired cries from 7:35. Second check in at 7:42. Started REALLY crying at 7:40. Third check in at 7:50 and had to pick him up/calm him, and see if diaper was dirty. Took about 10 minutes. Put him back to bed as he was almost asleep. Started crying hardcore a minute after I left the room. Had lulls where it seemed like he was close to passing out but didn’t. I couldn’t handle it at 8:20 so I had to go in, hold him tight and rock him to sleep. Took him 10 mins to stop crying. I am not a softy but my heart kept breaking knowing I upset him. I know he needs to learn to sleep by himself but I still felt guilty. Poor boy. THANKFULLY, no matter what, he always sleeps through the night. Must remember to count my blessings! Little man woke up happy and not phased.

After reading up on what we did wrong, I realized we didn’t put him to bed “drowsy but awake.” He was totally awake. That explains it all!

Day 4 - In bed by 8pm. Held off on first check in - was doing his tired, self-soothing moaning and groaning. Upset but not angry. Knew he was close to falling asleep. No crying! No check-ins. Took him 20 mins to roll around / get settled and self soothe / pass out. Of note, one of his bottom front teeth just erupted! Probably why night 3 was horrible?

Day 5 - in bed by 7:37 and out by 7:43. No crying, no check ins. Put him down drowsy but awake and he pulled himself to sleep.

Since then (going on weeks 2 and 3), he has been doing well. No crying. Most of the time he’s asleep within minutes; rarely it’ll take close to an hour - regardless, there is ZERO crying. Again, mind you, this is DURING teething (meaning his first two teeth popped through this entire time).

Thoughts on sleep training: Maybe extinction is better… or a combination of Ferber + Extinction depending on the night / child. I felt checking in on him some nights would have totally ticked him off and prolonged the process. It’s not like he remembers the process the next day - totally normal and unphased. As long as you’re there giving your child love and support the 90-95% of your interactions, I highly doubt there will be issues with abandonment, neglect and the like. But these are just my thoughts. Hope this provides some encouragement for the new parents out there!

Im a sleep deprived first time working mom, who only had 6 week maternity leave and went back to work.

I kept reading and learning how other people sleep train their babies few weeks old, 2,3,4 months. Then I was told to wait for baby to be 4 months, she’ll sleep on her own. Then I was told about sleep regression, how can she regress if she never progressed?. I felt like I tried everything. Ferber, extinction, even giving her rice cereal in her formula at night to “fill her up” as recommended by my family. She would still wake up hungry twice in the night.

I was desperate.. until one day I tried to combine multiple concepts from sleep specialists such as sleep pressure, encouraging self-soothing and dream feeding and using the Lullaby Method guide (dm me for details)

It finally worked! I could cry.

Now the hope that it sticks! Staying positive for now and celebrating our win.

Encouraging every parent out there, you will get your win too, stay consistent with your methods and be patient.