Project: Sleep Through the Night

When Jason was turning 8 months & still not sleeping through the night, our plan was to let him cry it out before he hit his 9 month birthday. I thought for sure that it was going to be a long & painful process that was going to require me taking some Valium to get through it. Then, just after Jason's 8 month birthday he slept through the night 3 nights in a row. We then hit Easter weekend & his sleeping stretch quit.

Since he had slept through the night, I started diluting his bottle so that it was mainly water in hopes that he would not bother waking for water. Well, he still woke up & was taking the bottle- until last Wednesday. When I got up with him, he drank maybe 2 ounces & then proceeded to play with my face. So I took him back to his crib, kissed him goodnight & left. He talked for a little bit & fussed somewhat, but then he went to sleep. I told Brad the next morning that I was no longer going to go to Jason because he was no longer seeking the feeding, but the company. Although I love spending time with the little guy, not so much at 4:30am.

I also thought that the timing of our little project was good since Sydney & I were going to be gone for a night that we could each get a good night's sleep without the very early morning protest from Jason. Brad is much better able to sleep through Jason's night wakings than I am.

I am happy to report that after a week, our little project appears to be successful & with very little growing pains. I say appears because I know Jason & if he starts on another tooth or gets sick, our nights will be filled with wakings again. I thought for sure that when we decided to bite the bullet & work on getting Jason to sleep through the night it would involve nights (or more appropriately early mornings) of screaming fits. Truthfully we have had a couple of nights where he has "protested", but never really screamed. The last few nights he has either slept right through to 6:15am or at 5am you can hear him chatting to himself before he falls back to sleep. I am sure that it has all worked out this way because he was ready to sleep through the night & demonstrated that to us early this month. If we had tried this a month ago, our results would have likely involved listening to his rage cry.

There has however been a down side to all of this. Two nights ago Sydney woke at 1am & was calling for me & I did not hear her. Brad went to her & settled her back down. I did not hear any of this. She also woke early in the morning & probably heard Brad go downstairs to exercise. She got out of bed & went to find him in the basement. This I also didn't hear. I am typically a very light sleeper, so I am hoping that the reason I did not hear any of this is due to the cold that has started to take over my body. Although I relish the thought of getting a solid night's sleep, I want to be sure that I also am hearing my children when they do need me.