Oh me, oh my. This, well, this is one of those divisive subjects of parenting. Crying it out {CIO}. Ferberizing. Progressive waiting. Whatever you wanna call it, it’s the idea that rather than rock your babe peacefully to slumber as they snuggle up on your chest, and you take in their scent and you savor every single minute of having a wee one… instead of that… you plop them in the crib and peace out. Or at least, I think that’s a common perception. I feel like, in my experience, people prescribe to the notion that babies are either meant to cry it out or they aren’t. I don’t know that I know a whole lot of people in between. But as one of my friends says of me, I’m a pretty in the middle gal. I think for some babes, crying it out works beautifully, and for others, notsomuch. We’ve had one of each. And one that I will call, for lack of any better explanation, indifferent.
So anyhoozie, cry it out. We’ve done it. We would not have done it if we were actually, peacefully sitting, rocking a sweet babe who just nestled in and acted like a precious gemstone from Heaven. But that was not our situation. So we went there… To the very depths. It wasn’t easy. I didn’t enjoy it. But when sleep became a figment of our imagination, when we started losing track of wake-ups, and when my children began to question what was in the IV I was wheeling around with me all day {a constant stream of caffeine}… these were the signs, for us, that an intervention was necessary. If you hate CIO, can’t imagine why anyone would do it, or think people who do are damaging their babes, this is not for you. In fact, you may just wanna quit reading this post. Because I don’t want you to wanna call CPS on me. I just really don’t have the time for any extra paperwork right now.
So, crying it out. With B, I read up on it at 10 months of age. We were still rocking him to sleep at the time and he had begun more night waking than he’d previously done, so we positioned ourselves for the crazy haul of the Ferber Method. I was full of anxiety {I know… you’re shocked} over the situation but was also sick and tired of feeling tired all the time. We made the decision together that it was time to take a different approach so we hunkered down, prepping ourselves for a night {or a week} of feeling like the worst parents to have ever happened to life. And guess what happened… we didn’t need it. After a normal bedtime routine of changing, books, and songs, we put him down in his crib awake and we waited. And he miraculously went to sleep alone. With no crying. At all. And his night waking ceased. Little did we know, the kid was fully capable of going to sleep and staying asleep, on his own. I could still snuggle the little snoodle for a bit each night and we had no more problems with fussing once we started putting him directly in the crib awake. From what I gather, this is pretty much as common as finding a Kate Spade bag at TJ Maxx. So if you’re embarking on crying it out, I’d gander to say, those results are not typical.
Then with J. Oh man. We had a time with J. I was basically in a Medusa-like state by the time we decided to attempt CIO with him. The first night, we waited out an hour and twenty minutes of crying. With check-ins, of course. But still, an hour and twenty minutes of sadness. It was awful. Seriously awful. I can’t sugarcoat it. I can still remember it today. J cried. I cried. And while it worked for night time after a few weeks of diligently doing it, naps continued to be a constant struggle, even after we got nights straightened out. Now, we did it at 4 months {eeeek. I know} with Jonah as we were having many many many many many wake-ups a night. Having had that experience, I, personally, don’t recommend doing it so young. At all. The book that we were using as a reference said that the four month mark was the time to pull the trigger. And while the issue may have been that he was actually 3 months adjusted and I didn’t factor that in at the time, likely because I was in a Zombie-like coma, it felt like it took longer than it “should”. I don’t know a thing about babies beyond the three I’ve had, but I can say, for my middle child, 4 months was too early because I’m not sure he learned to self-soothe as much as just became exhausted. And yes, I will gladly dole out the moolah for any future therapy due to any damage that may have occurred due to that fact.
This time around, we waited until the 6 month adjusted {8 months real deal} mark. I was dragging my feet so hard, my shoes were full of dirt but it was time, truly. Here are the reasons we decided to have Harrison “cry it out”…
1. He was 8 months {6 months adjusted} and was still being swaddled. Because he could roll over, this was basically ridiculous.
2. He would not take a pacifier and would not suck his thumb so had no soothing mechanism.
3. We would swaddle him and then bounce, rock, pat, sing, shush, etc for 1-2 hours each night to get him to sleep. He would cry or scream the entire time until he finally fell asleep.
4. He began having more frequent wake-ups {4-5 a night} and needed rocking to fall asleep each time.
5. He was exhausted.
With just the nudge I needed from a dear mom friend, we decided that after we returned from a weekend at my parents, we would begin the cry it out process. While, yes, we have the rest of our lives to get full, restful nights of sleep, I’m not sure that anyone else in the house would have coexisted with me for much longer on such little sleep. My friend {who is also happens to moonlight as a pediatrician} suggested that we rip the band-aid off and ditch the swaddle and the 38 step process to lull him to slumber all at once. That was sage advice, for sure. Two birds, one stone.
Not having time to sit down and read sleep books this time around, I scoured the internet for resources and found a great cliffs notes version of Progressive Waiting aka The Ferber Method which we used as our timeline each night {originally featured on Noob Mommy}:
Number of Minutes to Wait Before Responding To Your Child
Day 7 – 20 min; 25 min; 30 min; 30 min (subsequent waits)
We started on a Monday. Change into jams. Eat. Book. Song. Prayer. Rock briefly and snuggle. Into the crib. At the beginning, we started the entire bedtime routine at 8 o’clock. Now, we put him down around 7:15 as that is when he seems ready for bed. And that night, he had 42 minutes of crying {I know. It was heinous}. With 8 check-ins and a beer each {no joke. And a little Pete The Cat action as well, it would appear}, we survived.
We actually had to wake him at 8 am.
So the next night, we were back at it again. Change. Eat. Book. Song. Rock briefly and snuggle. Into the crib. Said goodnight. And that night, he cried for 21 minutes. We checked in twice.
And then third night, he cried for 6 minutes. No check-ins.
The fourth, 8 minutes. On this night, he woke in the middle of the night, we set a timer for 12 minutes, and he cried for 8. No check-ins.
The fifth night, 2 minutes. No check-ins.
And every night since, a minute or two after he’s put in the crib and then he’s down for the count. He also ceased middle of the night waking after the fourth night. And bonus, it has worked for naps as well. And though we put him into the crib on his back, he’s taken to sleeping on his belly which sounds to be perfectly safe at this point as he gets there on his own.
So that’s how we roll on CIO. All in all, Harrison is much less tired for the majority of the day than he was before. And so are we. I would definitely call crying it out a success for him. And would probably do it again in a heartbeat if we ever had another. Though we’ve never encountered a kid who cries so hard he vomits. Or one who cries all night long. But like every part of parenting, we will never know if it was the right thing or the wrong thing, and it will take awhile to know if we caused permanent damage, but we will know that it works for us. And Harrison, well, he seems okay with that.
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