Not debating, and definitely not pushing sleep 'training,' but I had to share. We tried something new recently for Mycah. I love nursing and I love cosleeping (most of the time.) It's not a one sided thing either, Michael feels better with Mycah in our bed, happy and snuggling with us. It was important to me that he and I still had our space and he wasn't feeling negative about babies in the bed. But he has a very sweet bond with his son and loves waking up close to him. Cosleeping is just easy.
Once upon a time, two years ago I was nursing an almost two year old all night, every night. Which is how it had been since he was 5 months old. He never slept deeply, and I never slept at all. My quality of life sucked and I was depressed and sickly. Sleep deprivation gets real with me. I 'tried' to try out this article from Dr. Jay Gordon but had zero help or cooperation from my child's father, and the mess was keeping my 4 year old awake. And so I gave up until a little while later, when it ended up being a non gentle cold turkey thing. I promised myself I wouldn't let it get to that point with any future babies. Flash forward and here I am now with an almost 11 month old.. and adding pregnancy on top of that, I was feeling miserable again. Not to mention, pretty much dry nursing all night hurts like hell. So I tried this article again. I felt more prepared and confident with a small side of PTSD. It also helps that you have a great helpful and supportive partner. Which I have now. The first few nights were supposed to be the hardest. You pick a time block that you decide to not nurse. I decided to do things a little more gentle and still let him nurse, but only for a minute each time he wakes, and then roll him over and tell him 'all done, nigh night.' It was rough. Mycah threw a major tantrum when I unlatched him and told him 'no more.' He thrashed around and hit us and flailed and kicked and screamed, but I didn't give up. Michael sat on the other side of the bed the whole time and helped me calm and reassure him. After that hour tantrum, he fell asleep without milkies. That was over a week ago. We never had another bad night. Now, he sleeps solid chunks without waking to nurse. When he does, it's only for maybe a minute or less and then unlatches, rolls over and goes back to sleep. ON. HIS. OWN. Even nap time is better. He wakes up happy now instead of grumpy and crying. I'm sure since every baby is different for some people it could take maybe even weeks, but I really feel like we did the right thing with letting him figure out how to self soothe with our reassurance. My sanity and overall feeling towards nursing have gotten better. Here is the article. I hope someone else has success like we did and moves on from being a Mombie.
http://drjaygordon.com/attachment/sleeppattern.html
