CC/CIO Support and Information Thread

[lysh]

LO had no trace of cold left, so we started cc last night. I will not lie, it was hard. Granted, she did not cry as long as I though. We went in at 1 min, 3 min, 5 min intervals. We would have gone up to 10 if needed, but we never needed too. She usually fell back asleep during the 5 minute interval. That was the upside. The downside was that she woke up A LOT. Sometimes after 30 minutes, sometimes 45, sometimes an hour to an hour and a half. Finally, the last stretch of the night she slept for almost 2 hours. She started crying at 5am and I just got up with her.

I still nursed her about every 2 hours (sometimes a little less) because I am not looking to deal with that yet. If that does not get better with her self-settling more, then we will deal with it. Like I said in an earlier post, at this age, I just really want at least 3 hours stretches!

The hardest part was my own guilt and desire to pick her up out of the crib and bring her back into bed with me. I kept reminding myself why we are doing this and the cons to having her in bed with me.

So now that I started this at night, what did you ladies do for naps? Did you continue to keep structure for your LO? Part of me just wants to give in and take a nap with her in bed later, but I have a feeling that will be counterproductive. If I put her in her crib there is a good chance she might cry like during the night.

 

[CertainTurton]

Hi
So I thInk we are finally able to start CC tonight (cold pretty much gone and nothing really on in the eve for a few nights). Im nervous but feeling confident it's worth a try and all your stories hAve really helped!
I was wondering though, our routine is bath, bottle, bed and normally she falls asleep on the bottle a nd we put her in her cot, generally she stats asleep for about 30-45 mins before the wakings begin. Do we just start CC from then? We have tried giving her the bottle before the bath but she falls asleep for the 30 mins and wakes super grumpy etc what would you suggest? Also should we pick her up when we go in? We're planning 1,5,10,15 and 20 min intervals.

 

[CertainTurton]

Lysh- I havent started CC yet but I think you are supposed to just do nights to begin with and naps will follow. Your LO is so littl though, I'm not judging but maybe she is too small to start CC? She doesn't yet know you will come back etc. my DD was a right one for sleeping in her crib or cot, have you tried other things like white noise, making it warm etc? I apologise if you have but I do wonder if the frequent wakings are coz she isn't ready yet?

 

[lysh]

Lysh- I havent started CC yet but I think you are supposed to just do nights to begin with and naps will follow. Your LO is so littl though, I'm not judging but maybe she is too small to start CC? She doesn't yet know you will come back etc. my DD was a right one for sleeping in her crib or cot, have you tried other things like white noise, making it warm etc? I apologise if you have but I do wonder if the frequent wakings are coz she isn't ready yet?

Yes, I have tried everything you mentioned and more. She is 4 months on tues. which is, in Ferber's opinion, an okay time to start for bigger sleep issues. Technically he says 3 months (again, just for big sleep issues) but I do not think she was ready. LO wakes up every 1-2 hours and as much as I wish I could continue what I am doing, I go back to work full time in less than 3 weeks now. I am not expecting her to sttn, but I need her in her crib and waking up less frequently. If things do not improve then I will assume she is not ready, but otherwise we have to try. She does not easily take a bottle, so the evenings are pretty much on me.

 

[CertainTurton]

Lysh- I havent started CC yet but I think you are supposed to just do nights to begin with and naps will follow. Your LO is so littl though, I'm not judging but maybe she is too small to start CC? She doesn't yet know you will come back etc. my DD was a right one for sleeping in her crib or cot, have you tried other things like white noise, making it warm etc? I apologise if you have but I do wonder if the frequent wakings are coz she isn't ready yet?

Yes, I have tried everything you mentioned and more. She is 4 months on tues. which is, in Ferber's opinion, an okay time to start for bigger sleep issues. Technically he says 3 months (again, just for big sleep issues) but I do not think she was ready. LO wakes up every 1-2 hours and as much as I wish I could continue what I am doing, I go back to work full time in less than 3 weeks now. I am not expecting her to sttn, but I need her in her crib and waking up less frequently. If things do not improve then I will assume she is not ready, but otherwise we have to try. She does not easily take a bottle, so the evenings are pretty much on me.

Im sorry you are having such a hard time and I really hope it gets better over the next few nights Im sure she will get the idea soon. I feel your frustration with the bottle, it took my DD a long time to get used to it too. Do you think she is actually needing food every 2 hours or is comforting? how do you feel about a dummy? Fx you can catch up soon.

 

[Boo44]

Hi girls! Am looking for your advice on whether my situation is suitable for CC now...

My LO slept through from 14 weeks which was when we finally stopped his dream feed. He's 20 weeks now. Before he slept 8pm til around 6.30, and wed give his dummy and he'd most usually go back until half 7.

We have always cuddled to sleep after his last bottle and put him down asleep. I have always known this is risky (!) but as he slept through I've left it as it is. He sucks his dummy to sleep but usually spits it out, and like I say, hadnt woken for it until we gave him it in the morning

Thing is he's really not so bad still but I do think I need to teach him to self settle on a night. He still goes down around 8pm and since the clock change tends to wake around 5.30am but now takes a few goes of settling before he'll go back to sleep

Do you think I should start putting him down awake on a night? Would that maybe help him at 5.30 to settle? I don't want to go through it if this isn't the type of situation it would help with!

Edit - he can self settle with his dummy lying on our bed, he does it every morning for his nap and hardly whimpers xxx

Just bumping this back up as it quickly got lost a couple of pages back - popular thread!! X

 

[Serenity_Now]

Hi girls! Am looking for your advice on whether my situation is suitable for CC now...

My LO slept through from 14 weeks which was when we finally stopped his dream feed. He's 20 weeks now. Before he slept 8pm til around 6.30, and wed give his dummy and he'd most usually go back until half 7.

We have always cuddled to sleep after his last bottle and put him down asleep. I have always known this is risky (!) but as he slept through I've left it as it is. He sucks his dummy to sleep but usually spits it out, and like I say, hadnt woken for it until we gave him it in the morning

Thing is he's really not so bad still but I do think I need to teach him to self settle on a night. He still goes down around 8pm and since the clock change tends to wake around 5.30am but now takes a few goes of settling before he'll go back to sleep

Do you think I should start putting him down awake on a night? Would that maybe help him at 5.30 to settle? I don't want to go through it if this isn't the type of situation it would help with!

Edit - he can self settle with his dummy lying on our bed, he does it every morning for his nap and hardly whimpers xxx

Just bumping this back up as it quickly got lost a couple of pages back - popular thread!! X

I would try putting him down awake for one night and seeing what happens. No matter what I do, my son seems to wake when he wants to wake, usually at 4 AM, but sometimes he surprises me with 5 or 6 AM! I put him down awake but drowsy -- following a bedtime routine.

 

[lysh]

Hi
So I thInk we are finally able to start CC tonight (cold pretty much gone and nothing really on in the eve for a few nights). Im nervous but feeling confident it's worth a try and all your stories hAve really helped!
I was wondering though, our routine is bath, bottle, bed and normally she falls asleep on the bottle a nd we put her in her cot, generally she stats asleep for about 30-45 mins before the wakings begin. Do we just start CC from then? We have tried giving her the bottle before the bath but she falls asleep for the 30 mins and wakes super grumpy etc what would you suggest? Also should we pick her up when we go in? We're planning 1,5,10,15 and 20 min intervals.

Since I am new with trying CC, again this information is from what I read in Ferber's book. If you and DH do not mind that wake-up after 30-45 minutes then go ahead and start there. However, the idea behind CC is to get rid of sleep associations. So if you wanted to separate bottle and sleep, then try to wake her up a little bit (by burping etc.) before putting her into her cot. When you go in at intervals, Ferber says not to pick your LO up. Again, do what feels best for you, but the idea is that she learn to fall asleep without needing you. You can go in, put a blanket back on, return a toy if thrown etc., reassure you dd...but leave it at that (again according to Ferber). We patted our LO a bit on the tummy, which is probably a no-no, but we did not pat her until she fells asleep so she hopefully wont make a new association. Good luck!

 

[lysh]

Lysh- I havent started CC yet but I think you are supposed to just do nights to begin with and naps will follow. Your LO is so littl though, I'm not judging but maybe she is too small to start CC? She doesn't yet know you will come back etc. my DD was a right one for sleeping in her crib or cot, have you tried other things like white noise, making it warm etc? I apologise if you have but I do wonder if the frequent wakings are coz she isn't ready yet?

Yes, I have tried everything you mentioned and more. She is 4 months on tues. which is, in Ferber's opinion, an okay time to start for bigger sleep issues. Technically he says 3 months (again, just for big sleep issues) but I do not think she was ready. LO wakes up every 1-2 hours and as much as I wish I could continue what I am doing, I go back to work full time in less than 3 weeks now. I am not expecting her to sttn, but I need her in her crib and waking up less frequently. If things do not improve then I will assume she is not ready, but otherwise we have to try. She does not easily take a bottle, so the evenings are pretty much on me.

Im sorry you are having such a hard time and I really hope it gets better over the next few nights Im sure she will get the idea soon. I feel your frustration with the bottle, it took my DD a long time to get used to it too. Do you think she is actually needing food every 2 hours or is comforting? how do you feel about a dummy? Fx you can catch up soon.

I did question if she needed the food every two hours as well. My Pedi and I felt she might have, due to the fact that I had supply issues at the beginning and I could just be low capacity as she feeds often throughout the day. My pedi wanted me to introduce solids a little earlier with her so that will help unsure she is getting what she needs. Even though when I am awake enough to pay attention, I find that there are times she just 'sips' and does not take a full feeding. I bet she could go 3 hours and be okay, just based on how she feeds. After all, there are times during the day she will go 3 hours if distracted. She is a HUGE comfort feeder. If she took full feedings I would be comfortable with spacing 3 hours. Would I be tired getting up every 3 hours? Sure- but still better than every 1-2!!!!

We tried the dummy- we tried about 6 different kinds. lol She spits them all out.

 

[megangrohl]

megangrohl - our girls are only 4 days apart

LO wouldn't ever take a soother, but I've heard it suggested that you can pop the soother in for a min or two and let her suck, then take it away. Put it back in and repeat if she starts to get upset...and repeat as necessary. It will take some time but the idea is to let her soothe with the pacifier but not fall asleep with it so she learns to settle without and you don't have to replace it a million times a night
Or if she can find it herself, I've heard some moms say they just leave a bunch of soothers in the crib so LO can easily find one

and your lo is so gorgeous, love your avatar what i started doing was giving it to her to fall asleep - she NEEDS it. I tried without yesterday and she screamed for 20 minutes so I don't think she is quite ready to give it up yet. However, she always spits it out, then if she cries out every 45 minutes to 1 hour at night for it, so I let her self settle and fall back asleep. so instead of going in 8-10 times lastnight was only about 6 times.

 

[Noelle610]

Hi girls! Am looking for your advice on whether my situation is suitable for CC now...

My LO slept through from 14 weeks which was when we finally stopped his dream feed. He's 20 weeks now. Before he slept 8pm til around 6.30, and wed give his dummy and he'd most usually go back until half 7.

We have always cuddled to sleep after his last bottle and put him down asleep. I have always known this is risky (!) but as he slept through I've left it as it is. He sucks his dummy to sleep but usually spits it out, and like I say, hadnt woken for it until we gave him it in the morning

Thing is he's really not so bad still but I do think I need to teach him to self settle on a night. He still goes down around 8pm and since the clock change tends to wake around 5.30am but now takes a few goes of settling before he'll go back to sleep

Do you think I should start putting him down awake on a night? Would that maybe help him at 5.30 to settle? I don't want to go through it if this isn't the type of situation it would help with!

Edit - he can self settle with his dummy lying on our bed, he does it every morning for his nap and hardly whimpers xxx

Just bumping this back up as it quickly got lost a couple of pages back - popular thread!! X

Hi Boo! I definitely think it would be worth trying to put your LO to sleep drowsy but awake. I don't think CC is necessary, but perhaps you could cuddle him until he is almost asleep and then place him in the crib. It may help you later down the line, as sleep associations tend to become more pronounced with age.

I would also suggest trying to move his bedtime a bit earlier - maybe even just 30 minutes! We had a problem with LO being unsettled early in the morning (it was more like 4am for us!) and when I moved her bedtime from 7pm to closer to 6pm that went away. Charlotte still wakes (she's a "special case" LOL), but she typically sleeps until 6:30pm or 7pm.

 

[caitlyn2009]

Hello Ladies I really need your help. Last night was the worse night we have ever had and she is 14 1/2 months old. We dont have a problem at all with naps. I lay her down and she sleeps for a couple hours. We also dont have a problem at bedtime. She has a bottle and then goes to sleep. Sometimes she fusses a little or cries for a couple mins but nothing to dramatic. The touble starts after she has been asleep for a couple hours. She wakes up screaming and nothing helps. I was just giving her a bottle in her crib and she would go right back to sleep but things are getting progessively worse. Last night we didnt sleep at all. She went to bed at 8:30 and was up at 10. She cried and cried and I went in to comfort her which makes it worse. After an hour and a half. I brought her to our bed which is something I have never done and dont really want to do. She wanted to play and talk and would lay still so i put her in the pack and play and she slept a couple hours but then woke up crying and nothing would settle her. I tried everything I could posible think of. I am at a loss of what to do and feel like giving up. Please someone help.

 

[CertainTurton]

Please help, im finding this soooo hard, were in the middle of the 10min wait....she is screaming I feel so sick!

 

[lysh]

Please help, im finding this soooo hard, were in the middle of the 10min wait....she is screaming I feel so sick!

I cried like a baby before we even started. For the first night, do not feel like you have to go past 10 minute chunks. Do what you can manage. I do not have the Ferber book in front of me, but for day 1 I think 10 min waiting periods is the max.

 

[CertainTurton]

Please help, im finding this soooo hard, were in the middle of the 10min wait....she is screaming I feel so sick!

I cried like a baby before we even started. For the first night, do not feel like you have to go past 10 minute chunks. Do what you can manage. I do not have the Ferber book in front of me, but for day 1 I think 10 min waiting periods is the max.

Thank you, my hubby has gone in now to calm her. I think he may be staying too long though!? I have never heard her so upset! really hope she goes to sleep soon....

 

[CertainTurton]

OK, I think shes asleep....when she wakes again do we start at 1 min again? thanks

 

[lysh]

I am sorry, I went for a walk with dd. Yes, start back at 1 min. How long did she cry for? I know it is heartbreaking.

 

[libbylou]

Please help, im finding this soooo hard, were in the middle of the 10min wait....she is screaming I feel so sick!

You don't have to use 100% of the method if you are not comfortable with it, find a compromise that works for you. I'm not saying it will be easy, it's always hard to hear our babies cry, but you can gentle the method

I was not comfortable leaving LO to cry alone, so I "camped out" in a chair next to her crib. If she whinged, I left her alone. If she cried, I would pat and shush for a min or so to calm her (but not long enough for her to fall asleep). If she got really upset, I would pick her up and rock or nurse her until she was calm and then put her back down
After 3 days of sitting right next to the crib, I moved the chair to the otherside of the room and sat there for a few days, then started to leave the room unless she got really upset in which case I would go back in and calm her

Also, I would start the CC from the first time you put LO in the crib. Try to keep LO from falling asleep on the bottle (HARD!!!) or wake LO by burping or something before you put LO down.

Boo44 - Wouldn't hurt to try putting your LO down awake after a bedtime routine and seeing if he will fall asleep on his own instead of cuddling to sleep. The idea is that he learns that he can put himself to sleep without you being there to rock/cuddle/nurse/whatever until he is asleep

 

[DaisyBee]

Boo - I too think you should start bedtime earlier. The early wake up is really just an early wake up for the day and cc really won't help that. I would see if you can move bedtime a bit earlier and if lo is overtired at all and that's the cause of waking early it should help that. Most babies aren't late sleepers. What I've read most babies wake for the day between 5-7 am.

Certain - I did shorter intervals with Jordan and it helped both her and I.

And libbylou - totally agree with what you said. Everyone has to do what works for them and what they feel comfortable with. I think people sometimes forget that.

Lysh - I think that is totally fine if you rub her belly or whatever you said you were doing. As long as they aren't falling asleep to that. You can comfort them, just have her still be awake when you stop rubbing her belly. Hopefully tonight goes better for you

Megan - if she still needs it then I would get multiple pacifiers and put them in her crib so she has better odds of finding one herself if she needs it. Megan "needed" her pacifier and I really believe that.

Caitlyn - is she is falling asleep on her own - as you say she sometimes fusses so thinking that is the case? Then I'm not sure that cc is your solution? She isn't wanting you or to be fed? How long has this been happening?

 

[Boo44]

Thanks all, last night I had him down by 7.40pm and he managed to self settle. He sttn until 7am, I even checked on him at 6.20 as I'd not heard anything :facepalm:

I Definitely appreciate the advice about an earlier bedtime and will work on it. But his bottles are about 4hrs apart or else he just isn't hungry for them, so it works out last bottle 7pm hence why it's usually at least half past before he's in bed. Ill have to work something out....