Hi all!

I'm a mom who loves to rock my baby to sleep...I've heard many times from a lot of people that i need to quit doing that because ds will want to be rocked to sleep for a looong time because that's what he expects.. :(
I know there are books out there to read...but i was just wondering when and how did you get your babies to sleep without rocking or did you continue to rock anyways?

What i've done so far is rock him to a point where he is just about asleep and then i put him in his crib sort of awake...most of the time he starts to cry and i go in and give him his soother and rub/pat his side until his eyes close..which is right away....I have a lot of friends who say to let them cry himself to sleep but my heart breaks when he does this! I tried last night to let him cio but i ended up going in there and rubbing him to sleep..is that still ok?

I was just wanting to hear what you ladies have done!
Thanks a lot!
S :)

It is absolutely okay! I am not a believer in CIO at all. People say that they will never be able to fall asleep any other way on their own, but noone in my family has never let a baby cry, and so far, we are all great sleepers. I haven't let ds CIO once, and I NEVER plan to.
You have to do what ever feels right to you, and your baby. Don't feel like your spoiling them, or doing the wrong thing. Other's may tell you differently, but that's my opinion, I never want my son to lose trust for me.

Thanks for your comment dizzygirl!
So do you rock your baby to sleep? And does he sleep ok? And how old is he?
I always thought we had to quit rocking so they could learn to sleep in their own...but your comment gave me hope that what i'm going is ok!
Thanks!
S :)

We went through that too.

I let her CIO. I started right at 4 months old...she is now 5 months old today. I feed (breastfeed) her right before she goes to bed, and then I burp her and make sure she's somewhat awake when I lay her in bed...pretty much like you describe.

She is able to go to sleep on her own now. If she does wake up (sometimes it's within a couple minutes...sometimes she'll wake up an hour later), I'll decide how hard her cry is & determine based on the sound/intensity on whether I need to go in there.

If it's softer cries...kind of whiny with breaks between her cries...I'll let her cry a bit & she'll go back to sleep without me even going in there. If the cry intensifies with no breaks, I go in and pat her, offer the paci...and I don't pick her up. When she calms down (I can tell by her breathing)...yet still awake, I quietly walk out. When I first started CIO...it could take up to 10 minutes of soothing her at her crib before I'd walk out. Now, I'm never standing over her crib for more than a couple minutes.

If she starts crying again, I let 5 minutes of crying pass before I go in and pat again.

If it starts again, I let 10 minutes of crying pass before I go in...then 15, then 20, etc.

When we first started this. I'd put her to bed at 8:30pm and it would be aorund 11:00-11:30pm before she was alseep for the night. I questioned whether it was worth it, but I stuck with it. Now, a month later, she is officially asleep for the night within 5 to 20 minutes of going in her crib...even if she does cry a little...it's not a big deal anymore.

I never looked at CIO as letting them cry and scream without supervision until they exhaust themselves to sleep. It was hard to hear her crying when I started, but after the 2nd or 3rd night it wasn't bad at all. I'm the one to put her to bed and let her CIO, and she loves me more than anyone in the world right now.

Another unexpected benefit to this is she has learned to put herself back to sleep if she wakes up in the middle of the night too. Sometimes I'll hear her let out some cries around 3am. Before she knew how to put herself to sleep, I'd get up and do the patting/CIO routine all over again at all hours. Now, I'll hear her wake up at 3am, and she can go to sleep on her own pretty quickly without soothing from me or DH. We never have to get out of bed anymore.

She currently has a bedtime of 8:00pm, and I get up when she wakes up to be fed...somewhere between 4:30 and 5:30...just whenever she wakes up.

That's what I'm doing.
Gayle

Hey- ds is 9 months old now. Does he sleep okay........not really, but he's been like that since the minute he was born, so I know he's just wired differently. I am still nursing, and he might fall asleep during that, or after, he might fuss, and I lay with him ( we co-sleep) until he falls asleep, then usually I do too, or go in a few hours later. We tried everything from soup to nuts with this kid, except CIO. I don't want to knock anyone who did it, it's just personally not for me. I could never get over that, and I'm not sure if they do either. Dr. Sears ( who I pretty much love) has a great site, and books on more info about getting tough sleepers down, it may be worth checking out. I honestly believe that one day, ds will get to sleep without it being work for me, but he's just a baby once, and I'll do whatever it takes to make sure it's as pleasurable as possible.

There are so many different ideas and it's really up to the parents I know :)
This afternoon I knew ds was tired after he nursed..so i tried and laid him in his crib to sleep...his eyes were closed but then he started to cry and fuss...i tried to soothe him in his crib and tried to let him cry for a few minutes..i ended up picking him up for 5 secs and then laid him down awake..he feel asleep right away.
Would that be considered ok? Also in the middle of the night he's been wide awake for an hour or 2 the last couple of nights...he usually sleeps right through..i've tried to see if he'll fall back to asleep but he won't so I end up nursing him and rocking him to sleep. I nurse him because he has a bit of a cold and it probably feels better for him to have some liquid.
I know people will let their dc cry it out in the middle of the night but it's soooo hard to do!
And, do they really rely on rocking as they get older? Has anyone held their baby to sleep and have had no problems when they get older?
Ds does sleep in his crib at night.

Thanks everyone!
S :)

I don't believe in CIO but I have done it. For awhile we went through a time frame where DS would wake up in the middle of the night and cry to be played with it. He would cry until we picked him up and brought him bed with us. So for that I let him CIO and it has not happened since. However, he does wake up at night still for a bottle and we give him an ounce or two and he goes right back down.
As to rocking to sleep, I didn't want to get in the habit of him falling asleep that way so we have cuddle time. DH and I lay in our bed and cuddle and talk to him and sing to him. After that we put him in his bed to go to sleep. This way we get quality time together and we are not putting him to sleep. He puts himself to sleep. If he does cry, we go in and give him his pacifier and rub his head a little.

I can tell you based on experience that no matter how you get your baby to sleep now, it will work out and be fine when he is older. As a matter of fact, rocking and cuddling is something he will not let you do forever and believe me, time passes more quickly than you can imagine. Our oldest is now 18 and our youngest is 6 and I wish I could go back sometimes and rock my sleepy pajama clad babies once again! Enjoy it while you can and don't worry about what anyone else may say.

Nancy

I have been rocking my DD to sleep for the past 4.5 months. She has her Rice bottle and then we go in her room and snuggle and rock with a paci in her mouth. She is out with in 10-15 minutes and in her crib she goes. During the night I do know that she wakes up - so I have put a couple of other paci's in her crib so if she does wake - she finds one and goes back to sleep. However, she was Colic in the first 3 months of her life and so we also use a CD that is a recording of a Hair Dryer - it runs over and over and over all night long, when it is shut off, she wakes up immediatly! It's amazing. The poor girl is going to be in College and will have this thing running to get to sleep. It's funny though, the second she hears it go on - she puts her head down on my chest and closes her eyes and starts to go to sleep. What ever works right? She sleeps 10-12 hours a night.

I would rock your ds. I rocked my dd to sleep at EVERY nap and EVERY night. All the sudden when she was about 6 or 7 months she stopped wanting to be rocked asleep and wanted to fall asleep on her own. She is almost 1 year old and now I miss it! I wish I could rock her to sleep now :( Rock him and enjoy every last minute of it and disregaurd what other people say. You are the mama! Do what you think is best! :)

awww you ladies are awesome!
Yes..I think i will just rock/hold him to sleep....You have all reassured me that he will probably not expect this when he is older..phew!
I'm going to put a few more "soothers" in his crib and see if he can find them and try and put them in...
Thanks again!
S :)