We shall succeed!

Last night Justin and I had a small victory with Jack. I'm sure a victory with an 8 month old is laughable in the grand scheme of things, but hey we'll take what we can get. This victory being a change in our night time sleeping (or lack there of) routine. Little Man slept in a cradle in our room for 6 months, we both liked having him near and he slept great. Well at 6 months we decided we needed to reclaim our room and move him to his own room. I worked hard on that room, we had to get some use out of it!

(giraffes we made, the tree is a sticker)

(letters from Pottery Barn kids the alphabet cards I had from when I was teaching!)

A friend had advised me to try the tough love approach and let him have a few nights of crying to learn how put himself back to sleep if he woke up. The first night we tried this Justin and I made a pact to let him cry it out, and lovingly if not a little sadly put him down to sleep in his own room.

In our baby prep class they played the sound of a baby crying for a minute to give us a taste of what we had to look forward too. I think if they really wanted to prepare parents they should have played it for at least 15 minutes! :) When you listen to a baby cry it seems to last forever! It breaks your heart because you are the comforter, nurturer, the protector. I actually timed Jack one time to see how long he cried and was surprised that what had seemed like 10 minutes was in truth only 2.

But back to Jack's first night in his own room. Jack went to sleep great, no fuss, just a fistful of moms hair and he drifted off to dreamland! Justin and I were patting each other on the back thinking this was a breeze... then came the first wake-up of the night. We both woke up, and listened to his pitiful cries, this was a lot harder than we had anticipated. Then, finally, daddy broke, his son was scared, didn't know where he was and needed his daddy. This is why I love that man! So that first night didn't work so well, and well, we just couldn't do it again after that.

Fast forward 2 months and Jack has recently been waking and standing in his crib crying till we come and put him back down. At first we thought he couldn't get back down, then we realized he was playing us. Sneaky little guy! So last night we vowed to try the cry it out theory again. 1 a.m. rolled around and Jack woke up, stood up in his crib and cried as if his little heart was breaking. Then he paused and listened for mommy and daddy, then cried, then listened, etc... I sat up listening to this pattern for about an hour before Jack finally fell back asleep, on his own. What about that loving daddy you might ask, well I had to use all my persuasive powers to stop him for going in there but it was worth it.

They say letting your child learn to put themselves back to sleep is the greatest gift you can give them. And while I understand this sentiment, I think the gift of a late night snuggle just can't be beat.