Learning to sleep

Rachel slept with a pacifier, but Lydia and Colin did not, so we followed the advice of our Pittsburgh pediatrician and did "sleep training" with them. Lydia cried for about forty-five minutes the first night, if I remember right, but in three nights' time she was falling asleep within minutes of being put to bed, and sleeping through the night, from about nine months old. Colin sucked his thumb, so self-soothing was simpler for him, and sleep training didn't work quite as well, but it still worked, and he started doing the same.

Eric is different. He has been easy to put to sleep for a long time, but for months he has been waking up several times through the night, crying. Nicole has been going to nurse him, repeatedly, and her sleep has suffered. Now, she is quite fed up.

When we got home from our camping trip, we decided to put a sleep training plan in effect. Not only would we put Eric to bed at the other kids' bedtime, regardless of whether he seemed tired, but if he woke up in the middle of the night, we'd let him cry for five minutes before going in to tell him that everything was OK, and leaving again.

I'm happy to report that this has been a resounding success. It was definitely a trial the first night or two, with several bouts of crying that kept us awake, too. Nicole can correct me, but I don't think they ever lasted past five minutes, so we never had to intervene. And it seems to me that those episodes have been growing both shorter and less frequent, and Eric has been quieting himself more and more quickly at both bedtime and nap time.