...somehow that seems to be happening anyway. We need help! For the last couple weeks our son (almost 8 months old) has been having a very hard time with going to sleep. We never ever lay him down and walk away, but he screams almost non-stop from roughly 5 pm until he finally falls asleep (as late as 8 or 9). We had been putting him to bed in his crib at 7:30 with fairly little fuss for months, but lately he screams the second we try to lay him down (in his crib or in our bed). We mostly co-sleep, but we were trying to establish a familiarity with his crib by having him always go to sleep there first. We have tried getting him to sleep even earlier, like at 5, which isn't quite the same ordeal but he just wakes up after an hour and screams until 8 or 9 pm anyway. It's like he screams until he's exhausted and finally falls asleep. I have to admit a little part of me is wondering if we just over-stimulate him with the soothing attempts and he would "CIO" faster if we just put him down and walked away..I mean if he's going to scream regardless. My husband is no where near wanting to try that tho, and I don't really want to either.
So far the only things that stop the screaming are taking a bath, but then he screams when he gets out; nursing, but only if he's hungry (he's never been a comfort nurser); and riding around in the car--once he's good and asleep we can carry him inside and put him in our bed pretty easily. One thing that changed recently is he used to take a binky to fall asleep but about a week ago he totally rejected binkies. Spits them right out.
He doesn't seem to be teething, or otherwise in pain, but we've tried giving him regular doses of tylenol just in case. It doesn't seem to make a difference.
We've read the No Cry Sleep Solution but feel like we can't even start to implement it because the Phase 1 in the book starts from the presumption that the baby will at least be calm and get drowsy while being held and rocked. We are not even there. We are at like Phase -10. He screams no matter how we hold him, rock him, sing to him, etc.
Any suggestions?
So far the only things that stop the screaming are taking a bath, but then he screams when he gets out; nursing, but only if he's hungry (he's never been a comfort nurser); and riding around in the car--once he's good and asleep we can carry him inside and put him in our bed pretty easily. One thing that changed recently is he used to take a binky to fall asleep but about a week ago he totally rejected binkies. Spits them right out.
He doesn't seem to be teething, or otherwise in pain, but we've tried giving him regular doses of tylenol just in case. It doesn't seem to make a difference.
We've read the No Cry Sleep Solution but feel like we can't even start to implement it because the Phase 1 in the book starts from the presumption that the baby will at least be calm and get drowsy while being held and rocked. We are not even there. We are at like Phase -10. He screams no matter how we hold him, rock him, sing to him, etc.
Any suggestions?