Tried CIO in the crib for the 1st time last night--UPDATE our second night!

Background:
DS is 4 months, does no more than a few catnaps during the day and sleeps from about 8pm-3am (waking several times during that period) in the swing and then has a bottle, falls back for another hour or two before he wants top play like 5:30am. After reading Healthy Sleep Habits, Happy Child, I wanted to start putting him to bed earlier because he takes this little nap at about 6-6:30 and the book says this should be his bed time, not a nap.

Last night:
I'm gicing him a bottle a 6:30 and he's falling asleep while drinking, so I put him in the swing for bed. He starts SCREAMING. Now, when DS starts to get tired or upset, his pulls his hair and scratches his head and face (he pulls hats and mittens off). So he's going crazy on his head, I pull out the best hat I've been able to find, and say, OK, if this is how the night is gonna be and I'll be up 6 million times anyway, we're gonna CIO for the crib finally. So I put him down and you'd think he was being tortured. Then, 13min later, he all of a sudden stops mid-scream and falls asleep. That was easier than I thought....no. He wakes up every half hour for so for the rest of the night until 5am when I finally put him in the swing for a bit. Some of those times he cried and fell back asleep on his own quickly. Other times, I had to go in and give him back his pacifier and he went back quickly.

Now, my question/problem is, DS used to get that middle of the night bottle....now that he's waking up so much, I had no idea when to give it to him, or if I should at all....He wound up getting 3oz at 2am and I don't know if he really wanted it and 3oz at 5am. And then I had trouble getting him back in the crib after each of these. What would/did you do in a situation like this? Also, did the frequent wakings happen when you first started CIO in the crib?

Just trying to figure out how to proceed tonight. Thanks!


UPDATE:
So this is how our second night went. Thanks for all the advice!!!
I put him down when he started get tired at 6:30. He cried for like 3 min, DH went in and popped the pacifier back in his mouth and he fell asleep immediately from 6:30pm to 2:30am with no wakings (If only I had gone to bed earlier!). Then I just popped the paci back in and he was out and this happened again at 3:30, 4:30 and at 5:15. At 5:15 he just wasn't going back so I figured this was the time to feed him. He took the whole bottle but wouldn't go back to sleep, so we played and then watched some noggin and when he was mesmerized by Maisy, I got up to get ready for work and left hopeing he'd fall back asleep watching cause he was being so quiet and DH could sleep a little longer. If we could have eliminated those couple little wakings just for the pacifier and he could have slept through them, it would have been great. I talked to the women at daycare yesterday and they're gonna try and get him to take naps in the crib there, so hopefully his naps will get better and his night wakings will go away. I hope we have similar success tonight!

Message edited 8/16/2007 8:22:00 AM.

Re: Tried CIO in the crib for the 1st time last night--insight/advice please--sorry, long.

I'm sorry! I wish I had advice for you, but it sounds like our sons have similiar sleep patterns! My son will be 4 months on Friday. He does sleep in his crib, but he sleeps from about 8 p.m. to anywhere from 12 a.m. to 4 a.m., but USUALLY wakes up several times in that time period and I give him his pacifier and he goes back to sleep. Occasionally, he sleeps straight through with out waking up for pacifier and occasionally, he doesn't go right back to sleep when I give it to him. He's pretty unpredictible. He's also a cat napper. Sometimes he gets one long nap in, but that's it. And it's funny because I just bought the book Health Sleep Habits, Happy Child, yesterday and started to read it last night!

So again, I apologize for not having any advice, but I am right there with you and sympathize. I'm here for support!

Good luck!

Re: Tried CIO in the crib for the 1st time last night--insight/advice please--sorry, long.

bumping for lunch time advice.

Re: Tried CIO in the crib for the 1st time last night--insight/advice please--sorry, long.

We didn't go CIO until Matty was 5-6 months I think.

I think its great that you are putting him in the crib! 4 months might be a little young to stop the night time feedings. Ask you ped if he thinks DS needs food at night.

Its very hard, CIO. I was never really able to do it full blast at that age. I always went in as said shhh we love you, we are here, here is your binky but it is still night time. But, I never picked him up unless he soaked through his diaper. DS would fall back asleep quickly but we didn't eliminate the numerous awakenings until he was 7-8 months. Sometimes he still wakes up!

ETA: Matty did go on a regular nap schedule at 5 months and at 6 months was napping in his crib. We put my pillow in his crib and some stuffed animals because by then he could roll over easily. He started to cuddle with the pillow and the animals and that helped him like his crib for nighttime and naps. Now, he is more reliant on his teddys than his binky for sleeping.

Message edited 8/15/2007 1:00:02 PM.

Re: Tried CIO in the crib for the 1st time last night--insight/advice please--sorry, long.

I didn't do CIO until about 8 months, and I still didn't really do it. But, I'll try to help anyway.

Do you have a routine? I think 4 months is a little old for the swing, so I would try to get that out of the way first. You don't want to shock him by changing everything all at once.

Try starting a routine if you didn't already. Mine was always bath, bottle, book, rock while humming/listening to lullabyes. What always worked for me is putting baby down when they are drowsey, NOT when they are already asleep. IF he started to cry, I would rock a little more and try again.

If you don't want to do that, then do whatever works for you, but I would try getting him used to the crib first, THEN try CIO if you still feel you need it.

Re: Tried CIO in the crib for the 1st time last night--insight/advice please--sorry, long.

He does have a routine. We come home from daycare, and I make dinner and he has time with daddy. Then it's a bath and some lullabye's while getting ready for the night and for daycare te next day. Then we have a bottle and go to sleep. I always put him down while he's still awake and he usually falls asleep within 5min and has never cried before when I put him down. he's always been very good about going down. But it has to be in the swing. He'll nap other places, but he'll only fall asleep for the night in the swing.

It's weird, because he was sleeping in it when we came home from the hospital and then he just started refusing to sleep there until we moved to him to the swing.

We didn't do a complete cry it out. I went in a couple times and gave him the pacifier and rubbed his tummy. This seemed to be OK with him and he would fall asleep after this without me being a distraction, but then he's get up and do it again a half hour later.

Re: Tried CIO in the crib for the 1st time last night--UPDATE our second night!

Bumping for my update. Thanks again!

Re: Tried CIO in the crib for the 1st time last night--UPDATE our second night!

IMO I think 4 months is too young to let him go so long without another bottle. My DS is 4 1/2 months. Yes he does "catnap" around 6-7pm for a little while, but than he usually wakes up and I play with him him and give him another bottle anywhere between 9 & 10 and he sleeps through the night until 7 sometimes. He does wake up for another bottle around 4 if he has a growth spurt. I also let DS cry soemtimes if he is extremely fussy but my ped said not to let him cry for longer than 5 min., 10 min. max.

ETA: When we first starting putting DS in his crib he did wake up alot, almost every hour, b/c it was new surroundings. He was used to sleeping next to me in the bassinet. After a few days he got used to it and now he loves his crib.

I also have established a bedtime routine with DS. Like I said he usually catnaps between 6&7. I let him play for a little while. I give him a bath around 7:30-8 (I just started using the J&J lavender bedtime bath and lotion, seems to help), I dress DS , let him play for about 1/2 hour and than he usually starts to get sleepy. I give him a bottle, read to him or rock him and he falls asleep. DS has about 5 bottles a day plus I feed him cereal in the morning and at night. If he doesnt have that last bottle b/c he falls asleep and I dont wake him, it's a tough night.

Message edited 8/16/2007 10:19:06 AM.

Re: Tried CIO in the crib for the 1st time last night--UPDATE our second night!

I don't think he'll be missing the bottle, we're just changing the time he gets it. Before, when he's sleep in the swing, he'd wake up about 3-4am and I'd give him a bottle. He'd get up again 6-7 and be at daycare at 8-9 and he wasn't taking his next bottle till 9:30-10! So he was going a really long stretch not wanting a bottle since he got that middle of the night one. I think now, he'll get one when he wakes up in the morning, and still take the next one at about 10. That's my theory at least. He got one at about 6 today so we'll see when he got his first one at daycare.