Sleep training (Ferber) questions

[felicity]

We're planning to try sleep training (Ferber) this weekend because DS has gone from great sleeper to an okay sleeper to an awful sleeper. He's unhappy, we're unhappy, and I think it's time. He's 5 months old. 

So, I'd love to know if anyone has input on any of these:

1. Should we be doing nap training at the same time? If you did nights only to start, did you find naps improved at all without needing to CIO? I just worry doing naps at the same time will just be a lot for DS to handle in a short period of time, but I think overall he'd be much more content if he went down easier for naps. Naps are a battle lately, and I think frustrating for both him and us. 

2. We're also planning to go from the RNP to the crib at the same time. He only sleeps in the crib for naps. Has anyone tried moving to the crib at the same time as sleep training? Did it work okay?

3. If he rolls on his belly while awake and crying, do we let him fall asleep this way? I figure the answer is yes, but I guess I just need reassurance he'll be okay all night that way . He pretty much always rolls on his belly when I lay him on his back.

And, I'd love to hear just general success stories, because I'm scared lol.  

[Deleted]

We did Ferber when DS was 18 months, so a lot older. So I'm no help with question 1 or 2. He was down to one nap a day by then, so we did Ferber for that. He had obviously outgrown the RnP. But yes I would do Ferber in the crib and ditch the RnP. Rip all the band-aids off at once KWIM. At 5 months old, he must be close to outgrowing the RnP by now. And yes I'd let him roll over if he wants to.

Short version of our Ferber story. DS STTN from 6w to 4 months, I thought we had a magic unicorn baby. Then the 4MW hit us like a ton of bricks. His sleep wavered between terrible and god awful for months. We finally Ferbered at 18m when I couldn't take it anymore. He wasn't teething, wasn't hungry, hot or cold. He just needed to SLEEP. We followed Ferber's check-in guidelines. Night 1 he cried for 55 minutes, which was ironic b/c we agreed to give up at an hour. Night 2 was 20 mins, night 3 was 7. He whined off and on for the next few weeks, but he STTN. Ferber was the best thing we ever did.

[nessness]

1. We sleep trained for nights last weekend but have not nap trained. DD's naps haven't changed much. Ferber says you can do them at the same time or start with nights, and starting with nights seemed easier - if they cry a lot at night at first you just want to snuggle all day.

3. Yes. DD was always a back sleeper but is now sleeping on her tummy.

[Velar Fricative]

Apr 27, 2015 9:38:55 GMT -5 felicity said:

We're planning to try sleep training (Ferber) this weekend because DS has gone from great sleeper to an okay sleeper to an awful sleeper. He's unhappy, we're unhappy, and I think it's time. He's 5 months old. 

So, I'd love to know if anyone has input on any of these:

1. Should we be doing nap training at the same time? If you did nights only to start, did you find naps improved at all without needing to CIO? I just worry doing naps at the same time will just be a lot for DS to handle in a short period of time, but I think overall he'd be much more content if he went down easier for naps. Naps are a battle lately, and I think frustrating for both him and us. 

2. We're also planning to go from the RNP to the crib at the same time. He only sleeps in the crib for naps. Has anyone tried moving to the crib at the same time as sleep training? Did it work okay?

3. If he rolls on his belly while awake and crying, do we let him fall asleep this way? I figure the answer is yes, but I guess I just need reassurance he'll be okay all night that way . He pretty much always rolls on his belly when I lay him on his back.

And, I'd love to hear just general success stories, because I'm scared lol.  

1. You could, but I preferred tackling nighttime sleep first because, well, she was with us every night but napping at daycare 5 days a week. Ferber did not work well for naps until she suddenly decided she was okay with napping anywhere except in our arms during our days off at 9 months old (we did Ferber for nighttime at 5.5 months). It seems pretty common around here that naps are a different beast and may take more time to resolve.

2. I did not do that. We moved her to the crib at 4.5 months hoping that would make her sleep better, but it actually made it worse. So I can't give advice on doing it at the same time.

3. I would, and did. Once Ferber worked its magic she immediately rolled over to fall asleep. She's still a belly sleeper for the most part at almost 19 months.

Ferber worked very well for us. DD had never put herself to sleep before and this helped beautifully after four nights. The key things to note are that you and your partner need to be on the same page about it, and you need to be consistent with it as much as it sucks to hear your baby cry. It's a lot worse to do it inconsistently and confuse your baby.

[ssmjlm]

We didn't ST until 5.5m and it was only for falling asleep, not MOTN.

1. Naps and nighttime are still different sleep. We didn't ST for naps until later at 7.5m.

2. No idea, she was in the crib at 2m.

3. We let her sleep however was comfortable for her.

[mannah]

1. We started with nights only and the naps did improve on their own. There was definitely times where we needed to ferber at naps too but there was improvement without doing anything at first. I would start with just nights because like you said it's going to be hard for you and doing one thing at a time should be less overwhelming. Also you may find you don't need to do anything and then you will have stressed out for nothing.

3. Yes if he rolls over onto his belly let him stay there. The second night we Did it my baby flipped onto her stomach and slept better than she ever has. That was the first time she had ever flipped onto her belly and I do not think it was a coincidence.

You can definitely do this. It will be hard but it will be so worth it for everyone involved LOL. I was hesitant for a long time and I'm so glad I finally made up my mind to do it. That being said feel free to add your own modifications to his plan and do whatever feels right for you. You're not going to break them by making some changes that will work better for your family and only you know what those will end up being. You've got this! And post an update next week!

[ktw]

1. Naps and night sleep are different, so you can do whatever you think is best. Before we did Ferber, I was rocking DD to sleep for 3 (or maybe even 4) naps a day, and bedtime. It didn't make much sense to me to continue rocking her 3-4 times a day, and then dump her in her crib at bedtime and expect her to go to sleep on her own. So after night 1 of Ferber, I let her CIO to fall asleep for naps - she never cried for too long. She also was the queen of the 20-30 minute nap at that point. If she woke up, I would try patting her back, etc... to help her fall back to sleep, but it rarely worked. I would also sometimes let her cry for a few minutes if she still seemed to be exhausted, to see if she'd go back to sleep on her own.

2. Up until DD was 3.5 months old, she mostly slept in the RnP at night, and the swing for naps. Once the four month sleep regression hit, we would cycle through the crib, RnP, swing (which I really hated to do at night), whatever would get us any sleep (she was waking up every 45-90 minutes all night long). So once we decided to Ferber, we went cold turkey to the crib. I don't think it made things any worse than they would have been. I also ended up taking the pacifier at the same time. I was going to let her keep it, but every night I would give it to her, lay her down, and walk out. And within 30 seconds of me walking out the door, she would spit it out. Going in to give it back to her seemed counter productive, so after a few days, I just stopped giving it to her.

3. If he rolls there on his own, I would leave him there. DD never did, as she was swaddled and then went pretty much right into the Merlin Sleep suit. But, she sleeps most often on her belly now, and I wonder if I had been willing to put her on her stomach as an infant if we could have avoided many of our sleep problems. I still wouldn't do it, but I do wonder.

Ferber was a game changer for us. She went from waking every 45-90 minutes, to waking once per night to eat and going back to sleep immediately after on her own. She did this after one night, and did it consistently for weeks before she got sick and we had to do some re-training.  Falling asleep on her own took longer to happen without crying, and it still goes in phases at 21 months old. She almost always still cries when I leave her room, but now she knows how to put herself to sleep.

[lynn07]

1. We did both night and nap training at the same time for DS2 (he was 6m at the time). He was kind of a mess, sleep-wise, and it made him more mad when we tried to do two separate things.

2. I'd definitely move to the crib at the same time. And get rid of any other sleep props if you have them. We got rid of the swaddle at the same time as training.

3. Let him stay on his belly

[longtimenopost]

1. We did nighttime sleep first.

2. We transitioned from swaddled in RNP to magic sleepsuit in crib at the same time as sleep training.

3. If you don't swaddle or use a sleepsuit, I would leave him on his tummy. DD has been a tummy sleeper ever since we got rid of the magic sleepsuit when she rolled over in it.


Good luck! It's not fun, but if it works it's fantastic. Make sure you have a really good routine down so he knows what's coming and associates it with sleep, and avoid nursing/bottle to sleep. Our biggest hurdle was getting DD to learn to fall asleep on her own, but once she learned that we went from 3-4 wakeups a night to 1 until she finally dropped the last nighttime feed at 18 months.

[Myrrhine]

Apr 27, 2015 9:57:53 GMT -5 Velar Fricative said:

 1. You could, but I preferred tackling nighttime sleep first because, well, she was with us every night but napping at daycare 5 days a week. Ferber did not work well for naps until she suddenly decided she was okay with napping anywhere except in our arms during our days off at 9 months old (we did Ferber for nighttime at 5.5 months). It seems pretty common around here that naps are a different beast and may take more time to resolve.

I am quoting this part because I am so thankful to learn I am not the only one whose baby took at home naps in our arms until this age!

1 we did not do nap training at the same time. We went with the troublesome for idea of doing anything to get good naps so that he was in good shape for bedtime. His naps didn't automatically improve for us though.

2. We were going back and forth with the crib / rnp, but when we did Ferber we committed to the crib. It worked fine. He was sleeping terribly in the rnp anyway by that point!

3. I still don't put DS down on his stomach but I let him roll there himself!

Ferber worked for us! DS once cried for almost an hour and a half but usually it was much shorter. We did CIO at bedtime and if he woke up before 2 hours had passed. (You can tell how poor his sleep was since that was an improvement). When I did feed him in the night if he fell asleep nursing I just put him down asleep.

Within a week his nighttime sleep had dramatically improved. For a long time it took him 10-25 minutes to fall asleep at bedtime, crying part of the time, but that has finally improved. And again the nighttime sleep is SO MUCH BETTER.