Moms whos DC's sttn and DIDNT do cio...

Have they always been good sleepers or did you try an alternative method? I'm still on the fence about trying CIO with DS so I just want a little more input to alternatives. No flaming or fighting please. This is purely for informational purposes, not opinions. Thanks!

Re: Moms whos DC's sttn and DIDNT do cio...

well my 12 week old sttn and he's just a good sleeper.

Re: Moms whos DC's sttn and DIDNT do cio...

Yes and no? DS has been STTN since he was 8 weeks old and not, we did not do CIO....the day I switched his formula he just went to sleep and didnt wak until the morning. This ended when he was 8 months old and yes, I have been doing CIO since then.

Re: Moms whos DC's sttn and DIDNT do cio...

Re: Moms whos DC's sttn and DIDNT do cio...

DS STTN starting at 7 weeks. I had to rock him though and transfer after he fell asleep. At 3 months I put him in the crib when he was tired but still awake. He fussed and whined but never really cried. Now he is 7.5 months old and when he cries now, unless he's sick or teething bad, then I let him CIO up until 15 mins bc I know he is able to put himself to sleep.

Re: Moms whos DC's sttn and DIDNT do cio...

I really didn't do CIO, naturally sometimes my DCs don't want to go to bed and cry, I let them for a few minutes, if they're completely hysterical then usually something is wrong. At least with my 2yr old. We follow a routine before bed: brush teeth/glass of water/book and bed. I've noticed if we have house guests or company though that routine goes out the window. But the normalcy of following a routine works for my DD 97% of the time.

My 7 month old sometimes needs more cuddle time/rocking or simply isn't tired yet. He's falling into his schedule though. Sometimes he'll lay in DD's crib for story time before bed. Hopefully, he'll go down with the same simple routine as DD soon enough.

Re: Moms whos DC's sttn and DIDNT do cio...

DS didn't consistently STTN til 7 months. He had some periods since then of up to a month of night wakes, all due to teething (he got all of his teeth before he turned a year), and now STTN. We never did CIO.

Re: Moms whos DC's sttn and DIDNT do cio...

My twins are just great sleepers. They are exhausted by 7pm and they just go to sleep. My oldest was a different story, he didn't sttn until he was at least 18 months.

Re: Moms whos DC's sttn and DIDNT do cio...

I tried CIO. I gave in to her 5 am bottle until around a year old. I let her cry at times, don't get me wrong, and I hated every second of it but I couldn't do CIO. If she was cranky and overtired and whiny, I'd let her cry (after 6 months) and she'd usually pass out within 5 mins. Other times, I'd go get her and play a little longer. As for the 5 am bottle, I don't remember how that ended...I'll go look up old posts and get back to you. I think she finally stopped waking herself.

Sydnie is an awesome sleeper! She goes right down for naps and bedtime, loves her crib, and puts herself to sleep. She just won't sleep anywhere but her crib

Re: Moms whos DC's sttn and DIDNT do cio...

DS slept through the night on his own at around 11 weeks. Never a peep.
Then he around 17 months he stopped and I was so unsure how to handle it.
I personally couldn't do CIO. And being he was old enough to really manipulate me he could cry for 2 hrs. I tried it 1x and I just couldn't do it again.
So I would sit in his room in the rocking chair, him in the crib and wait to he fell asleep. Every night it took less and less time. Then I would stand in his room and not sit and then I would stand in the doorway.
Then he just didn't care anymore and I put him down and he was fine.

I normally don't have any more issues, he is over 2. Once in a while but it is usuallly related to overtired (no nap) or he isn't feeling well.

good Luck

Re: Moms whos DC's sttn and DIDNT do cio...

My DS STTN (and fell asleep on his own)from 4 months until just recently and he's 10.5 months now. I'm struggling with what to do. I tried CIO for 2 nights and while the 1st night worked well, the 2nd was disastrous. I doubt I can do it again. I know some of this is separation anxiety and at 10 months they are aware of what's going so I'm reluctant to CIO bc I do believe that it can be emotionally harmful.

He's teething at this moment (tooth is visible and about to break through) which complicates things.

He can self soothe, he did so quite well this afternoon for his nap. Put him in awake and he fell asleep within 5 minutes. Bedtime though he cries as soon as he realizes he's in the crib. Tonight he went as far as to lift his arms for me to pick him up, proof he has me trained. So i did, rocked him another 7 minutes until he was asleep and transferred to the crib. Problem is he's waking at night now.

Here's my new plan. When he starts crying, I'm going to go in but I'm not going to pick him up. I'll talk to him, rub his head and chest and back and stay to soothe him until he calms down. Then I'll stay in the room a bit. It's all trial and error for me now.

GL!

Re: Moms whos DC's sttn and DIDNT do cio...

DD started sleeping through the night very early. Bedtime was so easy. She would sleep through the night, no problem-- we were very lucky, especially since she sleeps in our room. Bath, story, bottle bed (sometimes she would fall asleep eating, if she didn't though, it was never a problem--she'd put herself to sleep). Around 8 months she started standing in her crib, and this trend ended. Suddenly, we'd find her standing in her crib at odd hours (sometimes she cry and wake us up). Sometimes she wouldn't go down, even if she fell asleep during her last bottle. We tried CIO, but again it was really hard to do living in a one bedroom apt. The night she cried in her crib for almost 20 minutes did it. CIO was not for DH and me. DD must need to be comforted, plus she's teething and sometimes she just needs to be comforted. Our solution--we stick with the same routine every night (same as before) I even "read" Goodnight Moon to her as she drinks her last bottle EVERY SINGLE night. If Most nights she goes off and STTN, occasionally she'll wake up after sleeping for 20 min. and I just pick her up and rock her back to sleep. However, if she is up and just wants to play (she's usually start laughing when I enter the room if this is the case) I turn around a walk out--on these occasions we give her more time in her crib and she'll go off on her own.
Do what works for you!

Re: Moms whos DC's sttn and DIDNT do cio...

I followed the method in baby sleep solution. The book gives a no cry solution but also gives CIO as an alternative if no cry solution takes too long.

He was too young at the time to do CIO, and I could always figure out what he was crying about and at 11 weeks it was always food.

But after I got his feeding schedule worked out as, per the baby sleep solution, he fell into sleeping 10 hours a night automatically. Naps took a little more work, but we got there too, he sleeps on schedule, its amazing.

We did do a fuss it out, I'd listen to him whine and fuss a little, as soon as it escalated to a cry I'd go in comfort and get it back to a fussy whine. For bedtime I had to do it once. To get him back to sleep I had to do it for a couple of weeks, but not every night, he very sporadically would wake up and whine. We figured out it was teething and now remedy the situation with teething tablets.




ETA: you are the mommy, you know your baby best. IMO, I think depending on the baby, some can be ready for it and do very well on it very early (earlier than 6 months). The one thing I love about the CIO concept is that baby does it for 3 nights max, and thats the end of it (in the perfect case), you'll have a perfect sleeper then on, and you can avoid stressing your baby and stressing yourself out. Its so important to teach them to self soothe early on, and its so much easier the earlier you start. If you can figure out a way to do it, without CIO, more power to you, write a book, I'm sure we'd all love to know! For us, fuss it out, was the trick, but to be honest DS was and is not a crier, he only ever escalated to a cry if he was hungry. If he cries, something is seriously wrong.

I knew I had to take advantage of this chance before attachment phase, because then he would be screaming for us. I can't tell you how pleased I am that he's such a great sleeper, and it didn't seem to occur to him naturally. He had to learn it.

Message edited 8/22/2010 8:51:20 PM.

Re: Moms whos DC's sttn and DIDNT do cio...

My DD has always been a good sleeper. She slept through the night from pretty early on. We never had to do CIO with her.

DS on the other hand, was not a good sleeper, didn't STTN until he was over a year old. We had to do CIO with him several times.

Re: Moms whos DC's sttn and DIDNT do cio...

Never did CIO with any of mine. I swaddled them up tight in the "swaddle me", sat with them in their darkened bedroom with the white noise machine on, gave a bottle, and put them into the crib awake, but VERY sleepy. # 1 was STTN at around 9 weeks. # 2 at 12 weeks and # 3 at 6 weeks.

By STTN I mean 6-7 hour stretches. They graudally slept longer and longer.

Re: Moms whos DC's sttn and DIDNT do cio...

DS was terrible from birth to almost 4 months. Up 3-4 times a nite. Luckily he adjusted on his own as he got older. (he's 10mo). He would go down a little earlier and sleep a little longer.
Right now he's ready for bed bet 7-7:30 and is up by 6 am and hasnt woke up during the nite in weeks..unless his teeth were bothering him.

The only thing we've really done is enforce the bedtime routine...literally since day 1. When he was a newborn I kept it bright duing and somewhat noisy during the day, dark and quiet at nite so he could learn the difference. We get his jammies on, turn the tv off, lights down, lay him on the couch for the last bottle, and sometimes he's out on his own, and other times DH will walk with him then put him in the crib.

I've been lucky that I havent had to do the CIO method yet.

do you have a bedtime routine??

Re: Moms whos DC's sttn and DIDNT do cio...

Message edited 8/22/2010 9:55:24 PM.

Re: Moms whos DC's sttn and DIDNT do cio...

Re: Moms whos DC's sttn and DIDNT do cio...

My DS was sleeping through the night from 7 weeks old until 9 months and we did CIO at 12 months.

Minus those 3 months of his life, DS has always been a great sleeper.

From the first day home from the hospital he would sleep 5-6 hours at night. So going TTN wasnt too much of a stretch. Also DS was a big baby, and a big eater from day one. So for him I think he kinda stocked up food wise during the day and slept great at night because he was full.

At 9 months he just hit alot of milestones at once and got into a bad habit. Because he had always been a great sleeper I fed into his bad habit until I couldnt take it any longer.

GL!

ETA: I just read your last posts...DS was the same way at 9-12 months. He would wake, I woudl pick him up and bam he would be nice and cozy and fall asleep, but we went from waking 1x to 2x, to 3x to 4x and I was dying from exhaustion!
For us CIO was the only thing that worked becuase it was just habit and he had to learn that since he was okay and nothing was wrong mommy wasnt going to cuddle him at 2am.

Message edited 8/22/2010 10:19:49 PM.

Re: Moms whos DC's sttn and DIDNT do cio...

DD is 11 months.


I never did CIO. She started STTN around 4 months.

Overall, she is a good sleeper. There are the occasional middle of the night wakes, which I go and get her for.


But 99% of the time she is sleeping in her crib & thru the night.

Re: Moms whos DC's sttn and DIDNT do cio...

Both of mine are good sleepers since they were 6 weeks old they sttn.