Time for some new Dad questions:
1) Our daughter Sonia refuses to sleep in her crib. She cries relentlessly whenever we put her in. So, she sleeps between us at night. Any tips on getting her to accept the fact that the crib is her bed?
2) Sonia wakes up around 2 times at night for her feed. We’ve introduced solid foods (mashed potatoes, apple sauce, and even Cheerios) into her diet. But she still needs the formula bottle to get that ‘full’ feeling. Is that normal?
Thanks a bunch for your tips!
-Krishna
1) I was a single dad from the time my son was a year old. Best advice my Mom gave me when handling my son when he used to cry about everything. “Don’t give in to EVERYTHING.” She meant that when my son would be crying like crazy for my attention at night my son would know that I would come in and check up on him, and possibly have him sleep with me in my bed.
I had to stick to a the schedule and realize the difference between feeding crying and I want attention crying, .. which eventually it took a couple weeks to get my son adjusted to but it worked, and was necessary.
It just broke my heart everytime he would cry, .. I was the one that needed to adjust not him. My son got used to me not being at his beck and call and cried for a few minutes for me than realized that he should just go right back to sleep when I didnt appear at his whim.
2) which leads to the crying for food.. I learned that babies of course need food but at what schedule? Feeding my son every 2 hours wasnt exactly the best thing for him, so I gave him a pacifier eventually when it wasnt really time for him to eat. You have to figure out for yourself how often you want your daughter to eat and whats best for her,. My friends child was 2 years old and nearly 80 pounds at 2ish years because she just catered to every feeding all the time. .. most babies including my son were content with the pacifier until their body *really* wanted food and not just the sensation of eating.
I raised my son by myself, I had to learn the pitfalls of those various things. As a parent it always hurt me inside when my son would be crying, but I had to let some of it go when I figured out the types of crying. My son in just a couple weeks learned that I wasn’t on his beck and call and fell asleep nicely on his own in his room and when he woke up knew that it wasnt time to be awake so went back to sleep.
I’m not experienced with kids that age (we’ll talk when she’s a teenager…)
But I can hear my mother telling me (I know I’ve heard her give this advice to others) to put her to bed, and let her cry herself to sleep. Sounds cruel, but you are going to have to make her fall asleep in her own bed/crib. She’s getting what she wants, she cries, she gets to sleep with the parents. If all of a sudden she doesn’t get what she wants from crying, she’ll stop.
As far as feeding, I don’t think 9 months is too old to still be expecting a bottle. I was a breast-fed kid (I saw one bottle in my life, a water bottle my parents gave me as they stepped out for the evening, and I didn’t even suck on, probably because I didn’t know how to handle a bottle), and I weaned myself after six months, which was early.
1) Let her cry for a while. If she does not stop, go in check on her, tell her you love her then walk out. Keep doing that but wait longer each time before going in there. If that does not work, maybe there is another issue. My daughter slept in her car seat for several months (not sure why), my son has problems with acid reflex. The later is controlled with Prevacid. I guess they grow out of that.
2) Give her a good meal before going to bed. Then refuse to feed her until the morning. You should do early morning first, then just push it back more and more. Let her cry at in the middle of the night. She will fall back to sleep. If she is like my son, you put in the bottle and he started to doze off. We cut out that mid-night feeding and he sleeps all night now.
Hi Krishna
Asking for advice is a dangerous thing: everyone’s got an opinion when it comes to raising children, and some have extremely strong ones!
My view could be seen as controversial when compared to what is expected in Western societies, but you did ask :-)
My wife and I have three young children (8, 4 and 1.5) and we never owned a crib: they all slept with us for years until they were ready to separate and sleep on their own.
Think about it, a baby is a defenceless creature, unable to escape danger on their own. Would you leave your baby in the next cave thinking it was safe from predators?
Children will separate from their parents in their own time. Some take more time than others, but they all do.
When they share a bed, they tend to sleep better and it’s also quicker to comfort them without having to wake up too much (definitely a plus!). Although I do not know how that would work with bottle feeding.
And don’t worry about people spreading fear about you suffocating your child by rolling over them. Have you even rolled over your wife while you were sleeping? Our bodies unconsciously know and adjust themselves when sharing a bed so that sort of thing doesn’t happen.
Re the food. Yes it’s OK. As long as your child is healthy and happy, whatever works for them regarding food is fine at this stage. Some children are fed exclusively on breast milk for up to a year (some cultures go even longer).
Hope this helps :-)
Out little girl is almost 22 months old. Until she was 18 months old she would get up 2-5 times a night, and we would have to rock her back to sleep. People had told us to let her cry it out at around 10-12 months, but we felt that was too cruel.
But her waking got progressively worse, and my wife and are were getting more and more tired. At around 18 months, her waking was peaking at about every hour. We were at our wits end, and decided to let her cry it out.
The first night it took about 40 minutes of crying before she fell asleep. It was heart wrenching. But that night she only woke once, cried for about 20 minutes and slept the rest of the night. Each night she cried and cried less. I think it helped that we gave her a night time stuffed animal to hold (which we don’t let her play with the rest of the day).
After about a week, she would just turn to us, give us each a kiss, and go right to bed. She had slept great the last 4 months, and we are OVERJOYED about it.
But in the end, you have to do what’s comfortable for you, your wife, and your relationship. There’s no right answer. Some people advocate co-sleeping, but I could imagine that being very straining on your relationship.
Hope that helps, and if you ever have more questions, feel free to e-mail me.
Hey Krishna, I agree with the first 4 commenters, with the exception of what Mike Wills said about checking on her. If you do go in to check on her you are not only giving in to her, but you run the risk of waking her up more and getting her started all over again. Some kids are more stubborn than others, it might take her a night to give in or a week, nine months is old enough to sleep through the night though, so don’t worry about starving her.
I know some people are fans of it but I personally disagree with the kids sleeping in with you. All other reasons aside, as a couple it is hard enough to stay married in this day and age, if your kids come before your relationship with your wife you’re just shooting yourself in the foot. In our house our bedroom is off limits to the kids, that is our space, sometimes it’s the only time I get away from them. Some friends of mine let their Five kids sleep with them all the time, it got so bad the had to hide in the closet if they wanted any ‘them’ time and even then they couldn’t get alone!
In trying to be a good parent, it is just as important to do everything you can to keep your marriage alive. If your marriage suffers so will your kids.Parenting is hard, you have to pick what works best for you and just be consistent. Babies are a lot smarter than you think! I’m sure you’ll do fine=)
Good luck, Charly
I’m not a big fan of infants sleeping in bed with their parents. There’s a high risk of suffocation if a sleeping parent rolls over on the child, and unlike what Steve says, children die of this every year–I have seen the sad results working in the ER.
Let Sonia cry herself back to sleep. You may have a restless night or two, but she will quickly get the idea. Try playing a white noise CD; it may help her fall asleep faster and stay asleep longer.
Don’t feel guilty about letting her cry. You aren’t being cruel and unusual Frumph hit the nail on the head with his suggestions.
Feeding her before bedtime is a good idea, but until she’s completely weaned off the bottle, she may still need a nighttime feeding. You guys are close though, she is getting to the point where she should be sleeping all night. Resist the temptation to leave a bottle in the crib (tho it doesn’t sound like you do that) as that creates an aspiration (choking) risk, and also the risk of “bottle caries (cavities)”.
@Steve Paris.. then one night without knowing it while you sleep you roll over and suffocate your child.
Let me clarify my checking on her. Check only when crying. If she has stopped or is slowing down, just leave her alone until you are sure she is asleep. Walking in during this mellowing time will only bring back the crying.
All of my kids slept in our bed until they were old enough to decide to sleep on their own bed. To help the transition, we put their bed right beside of ours. If they started crying at night, it was easy to put a hand on them until they fell asleep again.
Hungry means growing. That will eventually go away too, until she becomes a teenager.
When she is a teenager, you will wish for these days again. ;-)
Both ours slept with us from birth. As someone who used to sleep like the dead I can say that unless you are drink or drugged (probably the case in the ER situation) you will find it really difficult to smother a child by accident. They have a surprisingly strong kick :), ours always let me know when I came even close to them. I also found I slept much less deeply although not less well. Having said that I would say that a big (King/Super King) bed is a VERY good idea. Frankly, I can’t imagine leaving a baby to “cry it out”, talk about early alienation, sheesh. They leave on there own when they’re ready, usually by asking for a bed of their own.
As for feeding, ours were breast fed past 2 yrs so my better half barely woke during the night for feeding and every one stayed toasty and warm in bed. Solids probably started quite early with them pinching stuff off our plates at meal times but nothing formal until at least 18 months.
I have to agree with Daniel, wait till they’re teens. Bottomless pit doesn’t even come close!
Anyway, that’s what we did, YMMV.
See what I mean about strong opinions :-)
I always find it amusing how strong people’s feelings are against co-sleeping however look at what they say about letting their children sleep in their own bed:
Philip M. Hofer said: “It just broke my heart everytime he would cry”
Tpiro said: “we felt that was too cruel.”
The thing is, why go against your instinct? It’s there for a reason and it’s worked for us as a species for thousands of years. Why would we think that mother nature doesn’t know what she’s doing after all this time?
Bottom line is, if it feels wrong it probably is.
If you’ve got the time, have a read of this:
http://www.asklenore.info/parenting/sleep/cosleeping.html
All the best,
Steve
Greetings! Mom of 2 here. Ours slept with us for a while too, but it was HARD. I remember those nights very well. I was a working mom and couldn’t afford to do much experimenting and Dangit! I needed my sleep! I got this book called Solve Your Child’s Sleep Problems by Dr. Richard Ferber after I saw him speak on TV. The advice was similar to Mike Wills’s advice above along with some other information. One of the best things I learned was to do things in the SAME ORDER every night … for us it was Dinner, Bath, book/cuddle, bed. Consistency is the key… you will find that the baby soon learns to get sleepy right after her bath. But DON’T let her fall asleep in your arms.. you have to let her fall asleep in the crib so that the crib will become the trigger to sleep. Once she learns that crib = sleep, when she wakes during the night (as we all do!), she will be able to go back to sleep on her own much easier. (Obviously, if you let her go to sleep in your arms every night, she will continue to need to be in your arms to go to sleep.) This technique really works, but the cost is a week (or maybe 2 if your daughter is stubborn) of LONG nights. It’s worth it, though.
I have never had any arguments about bedtime and my mother-in-law used to be amazed at how easy they were at bedtime. Now they are 15 and 12. My 15 year old still gets sleepy after dinner and if I don’t say anything by about 9:00.. he goes to bed on his own! HAHAHAHAH! Good luck to you and your family!