04 April 2006

tough love boot camp

Inspired by recent posts on a variety of blogs (most notably Dooce) and some wise counsel from friends and readers, Oliver's parents have begun tough love boot camp. This mostly involves not entering his room after he is put down for the night. About an hour and a half after being put in his crib (asleep) he woke up screaming. We didn't go in. He screamed at the top of his very powerful lungs for over an hour. Then he went to sleep. CD bravely checked on him and covered him up with a blanket.

A couple of hours later he woke up screaming again, but this time it lasted 15 minutes before he went back to sleep. I think he may have woken up one more time but my memory of that is fuzzy. When he woke up at 5am I went in and nursed. He went back to sleep until 7:30am, waking up just as happy and cheerful as he does every morning.

I did rock him to sleep last night but tonight we will try putting him in his crib awake. I'm sure I will be wishing for earplugs or a distraction. Would it be horrible to leave the house entirely? No, probably not fair to make CD endure the noise on his own.

1 comment:

Pinterest Failures said...

It's hard, but keep at it. It DOES get better. I have also found that because Genna is now walking, she is exhausted and happily going to bed. I realize not every kid is the same, but I will hope that the more active Oliver gets, the better he will sleep!