Sleep Chronicles: and So It Begins

Little Miss is now 18 months old & we desperately NEED her to be able to put herself to sleep...yes, we still rock her to sleep for naps & night time. Ugh...so many hours of rocking her to sleep, I don't even want to think about it. Here's a little background as to how we got here...

Little Miss was colicky from week 2 to month 4, really bad colicky. And she had acid reflux, so to get the little one to stop screaming we let her fall asleep in her swing quite often.

At month 4 we moved, and with all the transition didn't think it was a good time to change her sleep routine either. Plus, we maybe didn't have a crib for a little while.

Finally around month 5 or so we moved her to the crib, but she would only go to sleep after being rocked (same motion as the swing) and sometimes only on her tummy. Then we would carefully put her in her crib & leave. She was still waking up every 2 hours (thanks to the jaundice she had from day 1-day 14 or her little life, we had to wake her every 2 hours to eat, so she got used to that).

For our sanity & to get some sleep ourselves, and not really knowing how to fix things - we'd take turns going in to rock her back to sleep. At month 9 enough was enough. With a little advice & motivating story of success from my friend Shauna, we got her to sleep through the night. Hallelujah!

We continued the rocking because it worked - she'd usually be asleep within 5 minutes & we didn't mind so much. If only I knew then what I know now...we trained her to need us to fall asleep, she cannot do it on her own.

For healthy development, she needs to know how. And for our sanity, we need her to know how. So...that brings us to where we are. The rocking isn't working anymore. Last night it took Ry 90 minutes to get the bug to bed, she just wouldn't relax, very wiggly.

Now it's time for the change, more sleep training, and I think we can do it.

We've read everything we possibly can & have come up with a solution that hopefully will work for us & our willful child - thanks Super Nanny (for writing about it in your book) and thanks dadjam.com for reading the book, implementing the technique, and then writing about the success.

So here we go, tonight's the night - wish us luck!

Have you had similar sleep issues with your toddler? Have any great tips to share?

Read what happens next...

Sleep Chronicles: Nap 1 & Night 1