Sleeping through the night

Hi!

Please share how you got your babies to sleep through the night??

And at what age did they sleep straight through the night??

Thanks
Denise

 

My DD started sleeping through the night (7 to 7) at a little over 5 months. She did this on her own. I just woke up one morning and she was still sleeping. I almost passed out! My DS, on the other hand, did not learn to sleep through without CIO. We did CIO when he was a little over 6 months. It took two days after we started CIO to begin to sleep through the night. :yahoo: Of course, now he is teething and all of that wonderful sleeping is out the window. We will try again when he is out of pain. Hopefully, both of yours will just begin to sleep through the night on there own! Good Luck to you!

 

Mine started sleeping from 11pm to 6:30 am at 7 weeks, from 9:30 pm-6:30 am at 2-2 1/2 mos, and by 3 mos they were sleeping from 7:30 pm - 6:30 am. Mine are really great sleepers...I am so lucky. I did BabyWise and stuck to it really strictly. Of course, I have no other children at home and don't work so I was able to be really strict about it. Having a schedule really made it easier on me. It helped me to not feel quite so overwhelmed. HTH!!

 

My girls are 6 months now and they have been sleeping through the night since they were 3 months old...and it's not that long ago but I have no idea what we did special ...they just happened to do it on thier own I believe... they cried for the first bit but I remember putting a CD player in thier room and playing a lullaby CD on reapeat and it plays through out the night till morning and same thing for thier naps..and it's been in thier room ever since and they still sleep to it...I think it drowns out all other noises to destract them from sleeping like hearing eachother and other noises we might make...

 

I started CIO at 4.5 months. I had no idea that everyone says to wait until 6 months of age. We had a pedi appt. and she mentioned the overnight feeding was probably for comfort so we cut out that feeding. Lauren slept straight through right away but we did CIO with Emma. I loosely read the book Healthy Sleep Habits, Happy Child. It took about 10 nights, with 5 and 6 being the worst.

Here are a couple of articles from the Twinstuff Wiki on sleep solutions.
Cry it Out Sleep Training
No Cry Gentle Sleep Training

 

My oldest was sleeping 10 hours straight at 8 weeks, 12 hours straight at 3 months and 13 hours straight at 4 months. My twins however were a little more difficult. My twin girl was sleeping 10 hours straight by 6-8 weeks as well, and at 3 months she was sleeping 11-12 hours or so. My twin boy did the same at 4 months, around 11-12 hours. However, since they were going to bed at 6 pm for a long time they still tend to wake up between 5 and 6 am. Now at 8 months they sleep until 6 am. So they're good sleepers (and nappers) but they just wake earlier than my oldest did (but they do go back to sleep, even if they wake at 6 am, but we start the day at 7 am) and had more trouble getting past the 6 am point.

We followed HSHHC since Weissbluth is my hero and pediatrician!

 

My guys started sleeping through the night around 4-5 months or so. We could put them down around 9 and they would sleep to 5 or 6. Now we can put them down around 6:30 and they get up at 6:30. I have read that they consider sleeping through the night if they sleep 4-5 hours at a time. But I hated that cause RIGHT when you are sleeping really good, they wake up!!! Just hang in there. It will get SOOO much better!

 

We followed Babywise with our older DD, and she slept 10pm to 6am, woke to nurse, then back down until 10am by 8 weeks or so. At 6 months, when we started solids, she started sleeping 10pm til 10am. This just happened -- we never had to do CIO.

These little ones will be harder, I think, partly because they came early -- but we're following Babywise this time, too. Right now, at almost 8 weeks, they're eating at 9:30pm and going down for the night, then waking at 12:30am and 3:30am, and then doing a 5-hour stretch until 8:30am.

I think they will gradually stretch their nighttime sleep blocks if we continue to do what we're doing....if things aren't better in another month or two, I will probably read HSHHC to get some more tips.

 

Mine are really good sleepers too. Swaddling them really helped in the beginning. I also slowly cut their night time bottle by an ounce or two at a time when they were only waking up once in the middle of the night. Soon, they were sleeping through until morning.

We also do the same bedtime routine every night- bath or sponge bath, pjs on, bottle and rocking, to bed in swaddle or sleep sacks.
If you are breastfeeding it will probably take them longer to sleep through the night. I was bottle feeding them formula by 9 weeks, and saw a noticeable change after that.

 

Mine started sleeping through at 4 months. The only changes that were made at that time was a their feedings. They went to every 4 hours with more ounces as well as we started fruits and veggies.

 

Mine are horrible sleepers for nights and naps!! But for the past weeks they have slept through from 6:30 till 7:00 :banana: :banana: :banana: They slept from 6:30 till about 3 till about 4 months, we would feed them then. We stopped that feeding around that time, and they had to rely on their soother. We ended up getting up 3 - 4 times per child per night to put a soother back in. At about 6 months we did CIO and they would sleep straight till 5:30 -6:00, and now on their own till 7:00. But hey they are 8.5 months its about time!!

 

DS started sleeping through (10 pm to 6 am) at about 6-8 weeks or so - after we put them in the swing to sleep (horrible colic)...DD was much smaller than he so she was still getting up once around 3 ish to eat - but then that stretched until 5 then till 6 till they'd both sleep till 6 am, have a bottle and go back down until 9 or 10 or so...now they sleep 8-6:30 most nights - I'd kill for a 12 hour night but 3 days a week they have to get up to go to grandmas house because I work so "sleeping in" is 7 am...they sleep 10 hours regardless so if I put them down earlier than 8 - well you do the math..mommy's not ready to get up at 5:30!

 

They both started sleeping through at 3 1/2 mos., and were sleeping 8-8 by 4 1/2 mos. and still do. We also followed Babywise, it really worked for us. The key is to stay consistent with your schedule and keep them on a 3hr. feeding schedule during the day until they are sleeping at least 9 hr. at night. Also, following the feed/wake/ sleep pattern. Good luck to you! It will happen!

 

My girls started sleeping through from 10pm to 5am from 7 weeks and now from 8Pm to 7am at three months. I started with a sleeping routine from the word go and stuck to it no matter what.

 

we might be getting close!...the day after they turned 8 weeks they slept 6 hours straight! (from 10-4, nursed and then back down until 8) we start our eat/ play time then and they are down for a nap within an hour of waking/ eating. amazing how 6 straight hours can change your life! i am hoping the trend continues and they start sleeping more and more.

we too follow the baby wise routine... sleep/ eat/ wake every 2.5-3 hours during the day. i also love HSHHC and have been practicing putting them down in the 1-2 hour window. we will start a wake up window next week since i am getting ready to go back to teaching.

anyone with HSHHC experience... when you wake them at a specified time...do you feed them again, even if they ate recently? just trying to figure out how to keep the sleep/ eat/ play schedule once i introduce the wake up window. also, i know Dr. W says to do an earlier bed time...do you let yours sleep without waking them at 3 hours once it is 6 or 7 pm? we have been waking them at 9 - 9:30 for one last feed.

thanks!

 

Well, isn't everyone else lucky,

Mine still don't sleep through the night yet. They each have on occassion, but they still wake once to nurse. They go down for bed about 630 pm, they sleep until anywhere from midnite to 3am, wake up to feed, then down until about 630 AM. I've just always followed their lead and let them gradually go from waking 3x a nite, to 2, to now 1 and sometimes none. I'm debating CIO, but I think I'll wait another month or so, until each cuts their first tooth (which Chase is right now) and just see how it goes. I don't mind waking once or twice a night.
Also, if they wake any time before midnight or after 4am, I leave them in their cribs to put themselves back to sleep (which 90 percent of the time they do). If in 5 minutes they are wailing, then I pick them up. So I do a somewhat CIO with them.

 

QUOTE(TAD665 @ Aug 6 2007, 01:20 AM) [snapback]358855[/snapback]
They both started sleeping through at 3 1/2 mos., and were sleeping 8-8 by 4 1/2 mos. and still do. We also followed Babywise, it really worked for us. The key is to stay consistent with your schedule and keep them on a 3hr. feeding schedule during the day until they are sleeping at least 9 hr. at night. Also, following the feed/wake/ sleep pattern. Good luck to you! It will happen!



What is the feed/wake/sleep pattern?

Thanks,
Amy

 

The way we did the 3 hr. feed/wake/sleep pattern was for example, bottle at 9:00am, then wake time (or playtime) until naptime at maybe 10-10:30 (depending on the age of your babies will determine how long they will have wake time), then bottle at 12, wake time, naptime, then bottle at 3, etc. The idea behind this pattern is so that the babies don't fall asleep with out finishing their bottles, therefore they don't get full and end up waking to feed more frequently disrupting their sleeping patterns.

Hope the helped!

 

One word: "Babywise" excellent book by Ezzo and Buckman. I used a combination of the flexible schedule and routine. I started pushing a schedule from week 1. They slept through the night at 8 weeks, but they were full term and had no health problems... so I would't think that it would work with all babies. It seemed like, with mine, if I fed them enough during the day, they were less likely to want to wake up to eat at night. But even now, (my 8 month old GG twins)will wake in the night occasionally, depending on what's going on with them... i.e. getting teeth, sick, gas or whatever. It might be good to ask your pediatrician if you can't get anything to work...

 

Babies learn to fall back to sleep on their own when they are ready. You don't need to "do" anything to them. Every child will learn to "sleep through the night" at some point without intervention. Then they will backslide while sick, or teething, or getting ready to master a new skill like crawling, walking, etc.

But to answer the OP- my first started sleeping all night without help at about 6 years, my second at about 3 years. Both still regularly need an adult at night. My twins are 6 weeks old. One sleeps 5-8 hours at night while the other sleeps 2-3 hours at a stretch. They all learn it when they are ready. IMO, to leave an infant (or toddler, child or other human being) alone, unhappy, hungry and/or scared to "teach" them a new skill is wrong.

 

My girls sleep 6ish-6ish and did when they were 11 1/2 weeks. They are now 13 1/2 weeks. One night Lauren got up at 3:45 (Their bedtime was 6ish) so I just gave her a paci. She went right back to sleep. Ashley then woke up at 6am. It was no turning back from there. They sleep 6ish-6ish. It is the best feeling. I just looked for their cues (yawning, glazed over eyes, falling asleep) and put them to bed. They nap 3 times a day 45 minutes-3 hours.

 

My oldest (2yo) was sleeping 12 hours a night by 3 months.

The twins started sleeping in 6 hr stretches at 8 wks, 8 hour stretches at 10 weeks and 12 hour stretches at 4 months. They are now almost 5 months and sleep 7 pm - 7 am straight through.

I don't think we did anything super special, but tried to be consistent with their daytime naps (limiting wakefulness to no more than 1.5-2 hrs) tried to keep them from getting overstimulated/overtired and gradually, kept them to an earlier and earlier bedtime. It's now 7 p.m. but used to be 8 and eventually, will be 6 p.m.

I am also a big believer in Healthy Sleep Habits, Happy Child - highly recommend it.

 

Chloe was sleeping through the night from 5 months, at 6 months Ashley was terrible sleeper, waking up a lot and crying, so we did CIO with her and it took 1 night!! What I consider sleeping through the night is going to bed at 7pm and waking up at 630pm!

 

Mine just naturally started doing it around 4 months of age. All we did was go to an on demand feeding schedule during the day, which meant lots of feedings, but then there were no night feedings, so it was okay.