finally we try CIO

until now our little ones haven't been awful sleepers (they weren't great either). if (usually when) one awoke at night, we'd go in shushing, patting and singing and usually they'd return to sleep fairly quickly. there's been the odd bump before after trips away etc. we do not pick them up or rock them.

now they've just recoved from 2 weeks of diarrhea and some other yuk viral illness and Tal's sleeping is HORRIBLE. she's decided it's much nicer to sleep on mummy than in her cot (something we've never let her do except when she was really ill with a fever last week) and she screams and screams at night. after 2 nights of 1 1/2 hours of screaming each - whilst we shush, pat, sing etc (anything except hold her) - we decided to try proper CIO. the first night waking she fell asleep after 40 mins of screaming. each of the naps has taken around 15 mins. we did ferber-style ie going in after 3, 5, 10 minutes to reassure and then leave.

she's anyway a clingy child, but today she's been like a limpet. and then as we were going upstairs for the bath she started to whimper :cray: as she thought we were taking her to bed. she also began crying before i even put her in the crib for naptimes.

have we traumatised her? will this settle? have i made a big mistake trying to do CIO with a child with separation anxiety?
help! this whimpering is heartbreaking.
lisa

 

That is so sad. I hope you will reconsider the CIO method. It is obviously traumatizing for your little one. Kids grow up so fast, so what if she needs her Mommy to lay down with her for a few more months? Try Elizabeth Pantley's "No Cry Sleep Solution" - it is much more loving & humane than CIO. Tal is telling you that she needs you & letting her cry her little heart out is wrong for her. I would definitely try something more kind.

 

CIO is not right for every child. I know you'll get a lot of good suggestions for different methods to try. Please don't feel bad, parenting is a huge experiment and you never know how things will work out until your try them. I'm sure you haven't traumatized her, children are pretty resilient.

 

I was feeling a bit demoralised by the responses and thought I should update and expand.

As an update, they slept through last night (the second night of CIO) so we didn't need to do anything. And cried for 7 minutes for this morning's nap. Tal still began to whimper when we got to the last book before the nap. She's less clingy today.

Has anyone else done CIO with an older baby (14 mopnths), did they also anticipate bedtime and not want to be put down alone?

As an expansion, we have tried "no cry solution" ideas for 10 months until two nights ago. The girls slept reasonably well and when they did awaken DH or I rushed in (far too fast) to shush, pat and sing. My only rule has been not to pick them up as, when both they cry simultaneously, I cannot pick both up to put them back to sleep, so it seemed unfair to teach them to need that in order to return to sleep. The problem this time (after the illness) is that the ONLY thing that was calming Tal was to pick her up and breastfeed her. For the two nights before we did CIO, she cried for 1 1/2 hours even though we were cuddling her in the cot, singing, stroking, shushing etc. Doing CIO the first night actually halved the duration of the crying. She seemed to be more upset by us being in the room without picking her up. This is the reason why we finally tried CIO, because it seemed kinder not to be in the room at all than to tantalise her by being in the room and not picking her up. And yes we tried singing from outside the door too!

Now I'm not sure whether to continue or to stop. She is going to sleep faster, but I don't want to traumatise her. What have other people's babies been like during the sleep training process?

lisa

 

I did CIO with Dave at 15 months and it took 3 weeks pretty much. Don't feel demoralized! If you feel like it's working and she's getting used to it and everybody seems to be getting sleep then it sounds like a good thing to me. Dave did start to anticipate bedtime and pout, but after he learned to sleep he never seemed to remember it and he wasn't traumatized.

 

we sort of do CIO in that I still rock the twins until their sleepy and then lay them in the crib - if they get up then I let them go for 10 minutes to cry and it usually only takes 5 minutes till they're asleep....if they wake in the night we give them about 5-10 minutes to flame out before we go in - usually if they cry more than 10 minutes then something isn't right and they need attention....

 

How rude of one person to say your traumatizing your child. Dang rude.

She'll be fine. Children are extremely smart even at this age. She knows she can yell and mommy will run. She knows if she kicks Mommy will run. CIO is not for all kids.But its doesn't sound like its not working. Some kids are tougher then the CIO and I swear will hold out till Mommy wants to cry.

Do whatever you can for her. I know we had sleep issues for ages. CIO and a combination of other things worked. Took me till they were older then 2. Drove us all crazy. Kids need love, not smothering. At her age she dones't need you to put her to sleep. She can learn. Keep uop the great work.


People need to think before typing if there going to hurt or insult another person. I found one thing terrible. It was the person personal opinion but OMG it was nasty offensive to me.

 

Do what you think is best for your children and your family. Trust your instincts.
We successfully did CIO when they were about 10 months old, but only to go to bed. Naps and night waking weren't a problem.
We had to do it again at 20 months because they had been sleeping with us in hotel rooms/Grandma's house and didn't want to go back to their cribs. That session took exactly one day.

I'm really for whatever method works best for the WHOLE family. I cannot and will not sacrifice my sleep for a child that isn't sick or having nightmares. That probably sounds harsh, but we are a family and all of us deserve to sleep. Maybe you'll need to experiment a bit, but you'll find what works best. I suspect it is neither full on Ferber nor nursing to sleep. The trick is to find the balance in between the 2 extremes that everyone in the family can live with.

 

We've used CIO successfully at about 7 months. What is important is that you know your own child. With my DD, CIO does not work. WIth DS it has worked. Toddlers can be very manipulative in that they know that if they 'push' the right buttons, they'll get what they want. The trick is not get around that and if CIO works, (sounds like it has) do it. Everyone is different. Somethings work for some toddlers, some don't, but it is your job as a parent to figure that out. CIO is a lot of the time worse on the mom than the child. :hug99: I hope it gets better. I have heard so many people say that it is your job to teach your child to sleep well. I think there is some truth to that!

 

QUOTE(CapeBretoner_123 @ Jul 21 2007, 07:10 AM) [snapback]339787[/snapback]
How rude of one person to say your traumatizing your child. Dang rude.

She'll be fine. Children are extremely smart even at this age. She knows she can yell and mommy will run. She knows if she kicks Mommy will run. CIO is not for all kids.But its doesn't sound like its not working. Some kids are tougher then the CIO and I swear will hold out till Mommy wants to cry.

Do whatever you can for her. I know we had sleep issues for ages. CIO and a combination of other things worked. Took me till they were older then 2. Drove us all crazy. Kids need love, not smothering. At her age she dones't need you to put her to sleep. She can learn. Keep uop the great work.
People need to think before typing if there going to hurt or insult another person. I found one thing terrible. It was the person personal opinion but OMG it was nasty offensive to me.

I agree - people do need to think before they type. The point of this board is not to agree with everything everyone says or does. The OP asked for opinions & I gave her my thoughts in a measured, pleasant way. She asked if anyone thought her child was traumatized & I answered her honestly. I wouldn't have used that terminology if the OP had not specifically posed the question. Please dial back the drama - it was neither "rude", an "insult" or "nasty offensive" - probably another of my opinions you will not agree with but I don't censor my posts so that every single person will agree. I do read all my posts twice & make a judgment of whether it is hurtful & I don't agree with you that my response in this case was.

I am glad Tal had a better night & I hope she settles down in peaceful sleep from here on out.

 

Firstly thank you ALL for your replies. They have been very very helpful. It's a scary thing doing CIO and your experience and support has been appreciated. We've decided to continue for now as the girls 'only' cried for 3 minutes for their second nap of the day. As this is less than they usually cry when I'm there as I try to put them to sleep, it seems to be working.

I was going to PM BellaRissa privately, but then I thought it might be better if I say publically: I feel that what she wrote was honestly and politely put. I also agree that everyone is entitled to their opinion and that I did specifically ask for people's opinions. I realise that my last entry in this thread sounded as if I was getting at BellaRissa which I didn't intend. I am sorry if it came across that way.

CIO is so very hard to decide to do (we've dithered since the girls were 6 months old) and then to carry it out, I was oversensitive to echoes of what was already going through my own mind. The problem was really that, with only a couple of responses, if one comes from someone who is not a CIO fan then it stands out more than if it was one of many.

Anyway, I do apologise for inadvertently stirring things up and hope that there are no bad feelings.
Lisa

 

Lisa -
I can tell by your posts that you are a very loving mother. I'm glad Tal is doing better. At around 8 months I did CIO with my daughter and it was a disaster.. she really was traumatized for a month after that. My son on the other hand, does the crying thing and in a day or 2 he's sleeping better. Fast forward to now, she's still in my bed and my son only comes in during the morning hours. I'm tempted to try again with her also. We'll see what time brings.. But worst case scenario, if a baby does get upset about CIO, I do believe they forget about it. Real traumatization lasts way longer, and results from abuse, not a mommy trying to get her toddlers to sleep.

SIncerely,
Stacy