[DharmaDisciple]

My ds is now 9 months old and his side car crib lies unused, he now crawls in it to play. I have always fed him to sleep and will unlatch him when he is asleep and lie him on his front. He usually sleeps about 2 hours before waking up slightly to feed back down again. I am considering using the no cry sleep solution to encourage him to sleep for longer periods and maybe with some predictability. There seems little rythm to his sleep patterns

What I want to know is are there any moms who sleep with their baby in the bed but not feed them during the night, and how long does you baby sleep before rousing to feed again.

I guess I am starting to feel angry at myself for allowing him to become dependent on me to get to sleep. It takes ages in the day to get him to sleep, and I homeschool, so my other 2 are downstairs when I can be lay in my bed with him for up to an hour in the day. I have also been invited for a girls night out and have had to decline because there is no way he would be settled at night without me there, he would just scream. (A bottle of EBM is not an option either). When will I be able to go out for an hour or two or more? Is the no- cry solution going to work?

 

[AugustineM]

Oh, mama, try not to be angry with yourself. Your baby is one of the many (most) babies that needs to be parented to sleep. Mine is the same age as yours, and is the same way. He has never once fallen asleep on his own, and in his first 6 months I tried to "lay him down when he's drowsy" a lot, to see if he'd go to sleep on his own. He never did, he would just start crying. So what other option do you have but help him to go to sleep? You're doing just what you have to do, so take comfort in that. That being said, I know it's very, very hard, and very tiring, and I can't imagine trying to do all that I do for my babe with two others. You are a great mama.

Here's what I've been doing (if this helps you at all, I don't know...

). My baby rocks to sleep very well. I didn't discover this until about 3 months ago. It can take a little while, but dad can do it. So I go to book group once a month at night, and DH is able to rock him to sleep and keep holding him. Lying him down will almost always wake him up.

Our sleep here is also totally unpredictable. From 6-8 months he woke every 2 hours at night, almost like clockwork, but lately he will have some nights where he wakes only once or twice, and doesn't nurse to go back to sleep. Although these nights are rare, it's starting to get better. I noticed that it improved A LOT when my baby really figured out crawling and finished with the 4 teeth he was getting. Teething really disrupts my baby's sleep... it could be bothering yours as well.

He takes 2-3 naps per day, the longest being from about 3-5pm. I usually wait until I can tell that he's really tired, and then usually he will go to sleep within 20 minutes, although it can take a combination of rocking and nursing.

I don't know if this helps, but I do know that your baby will probably very soon start sleeping better, and just think... soon he'll only be napping once a day and maybe you can work that into your older children's schedule more easily. I know it will get easier for us soon! Sorry for such a long post.