CIO Help!

I am attempting CIO with the boys. They are almost 7 months old. I wrote about my issues earlier and after last night I have to do something. I even took one of the boys to the doctor today to rule out an ear infection. He is fine and the ped and I talked about the sleep issues. He says do CIO.
Ok, this is so hard and new to me. Tonight, our bad sleeper took 30 minutes to fall asleep and we went in about every 5 minutes to pat on the back. The good sleeper took and hour to fall asleep and I caved and rocked him! Our main issues have been with frequent wakings at night. Last night, one twin woke every 2-3 hours. Usually, we don't have a lot of problems with them going to sleep, but tonight was not that way. I still have questions.

Do I still feed them at night? Ped says no, but I read HSHHC and it says nightime feeds are ok till 9 months. They are over 18 lbs at their 6 month visit.
I don't know what to do about this. They have been getting one bottle at night.

Am I doing this wrong by going in and giving the paci and patting their back? Do I just not go in at all "cold turkey?" This is especially hard for me in the middle of the night. Do I just not respond? Or do I set intervals, 5 min. 10 min., etc....

I am an exhausted and drained mommy and just need sleep. I really want this to work!

 

Well, really it's all up to you & what you want to do. Some people do cold turkey & don't go in at all. I found with some of my babies that worked the best. But with a couple of them, if I didn't go in at all they would get so worked up they would never go to sleep. So, it depends on you & your little ones. As for the feeding, I would probably still feed them in the night, but that's just me. ardon: Again, it's up to you. Whatever you decide to do, the key to CIO is consistency. You have to decide what you want to do & do it every single time. After a few nights, it should get easier. :hug:

 

When we did CIO about a month ago, i had similiar feelings. I wasn't sure if they still needed that bottle at night or not, and what was going to happen. When we did it, we decided that we would really try not to feed them at night and see what happens. Our one twin, Ryan, responded very well to CIO and after the first night or two, he was able to sleep through the night and if he woke up, he would resettle himself pretty easily. My other twin, Dylan, has been a bit tougher. The first night we did CIO, Ryan fell asleep after 1.5 hours, but Dylan kept crying, so I went in gave him a sip of water, and his paci and he went back to sleep. For about a week, when Dylan would cry for a while, I would go in give water and paci. It then got to the point that DH and i felt that he started to depend upon that, so one night we decided not to go in at all for him, and eventually he did fall asleep. Now he also sleeps through the night. I feel like the whole process of CIO was trying to figure out what is best for that child. Ryan responded well to CIO right away, where Dylan took a bit longer. They are going to be turning 7 months next week, and they are both sttn. They too are over 18 lbs, and they no longer get that bottle in the middle of the night. I now know that they were waking out of habit not out of hunger.
Just want to say that first night was not fun letting them just cry for so long. I would have DH go in and just make sure that everything was okay with them. I was afraid if I went in there, that I would really want to pick one up. It was not easy, but now looking back it was well worth it. Goodluck with whatever you decide to do!

 

We started doing CIO about 2 weeks ago and I was so anxious and nervous leading up to it. I knew I wanted to do it, but wasn't sure I could hack it. But after the first night (which sucked!), it got soooo much easier - on them and us! Now if they cry I don't freak out or stress too much at all. We did graduated extinction where we would go in and pat their backs/rub heads after 10 minutes, then 15 min, then 25 min, etc. Though if we were due to go in and sooth/console but they were starting to wind down (we were watching them on a video monitor) then we did NOT go in to console then because I knew it would just give them a second wind to cry more when they were almost ready to sleep. After a week or so the boys would generally go down fairly easily and if they cried at all it was either for only a few minutes or just a brief whimper. If one woke in the middle of the night I started out going to them initially just to pat their back for one minute and let them know we hadn't abandoned them, then left them to CIO it. But after a few nights of that I started waiting 5 min or so and they almost always settled themselves back to sleep. So we've been very pleased with the CIO progress we had made....and then my DH had to leave for a couple of nights for a business trip and my in-laws came down over the weekend too. The combination of those two things threw a wrench in our bedtime routine, and even though DH got home this evening to help me tuck them in they were very fussy and waking and crying a lot tonight. Since there was a change to their routine with their dad gone and visitors here I've decided to hold off until this weekend before doing CIO again, so that they get back into their normal routine first. Anyway, GL to you whenever you do start CIO! It is hard but I think it is worth it.