Hi, My son is 7 months old and wakes up 3to4 times a night. When he wakes up he pulls up to a standing position. How do I get him to fall asleep on his own if he keeps pulling his self up not knowing how to get back down.

Hi there Evelyn,

My 19 week old son sounds exactly like yours. He has never slept......even as a newborn (typically only sleeps while being held or next to someone and even at that he only lasts about an 1-2 at the very most). Usually he sleeps about half and hour. He wakes up at least 8-10 times on average a night. I am now onto 10 days of trying NCSS. I noticed your last post on this was in November. I am wondering how he is doing; and if he is better what has been working for you.

Thanks,

Sheneal

Dear Sheneal,

I know this is a no crying method post area, but I was having trouble getting my son to sleep by his self also. I let my son cry his self to sleep one time and that actully was yesterday. After that he amasing did not need to be picked up last night and it was a much nicer night. I only got up twice instead of 3-4 times and spent half the time calming him down while he laid there by himself. I gave him a stuffed puppy that he cuddled with. I also tryed to make the puppy smell like me.

So one crying fit and now I don't have to rock him to sleep anymore.

Hi Sheneal,

My son is now 9 months and sleeping better, although not ideal of course. We tried several things, I'm not sure which one(s) worked, or if it was the combination of them all : firstly, we moved him into his crib into his own room (he was co-sleeping with us before), we play water music all night long in his room, we dim the lights in our dinning room and living room about an hour before bedtime, of course have a bedtime routing, and I think the most important one was that my husband went to him whenever he woke up instead of me, to calm him down and put him back to sleep. It took a while, but eventually he went from waking every hour to waking every two hours, then three. Now, he sleeps between 5-7 hours when we first put him down. After that though, he still wakes up every hour or two, so we're still working on that.

I believe in trying any idea you think will work and trying to be consistent at it. It was very hard to cope when he would wake up every hour, and we almost gave in to the CIO method, but resisted. I'm glad we did. Not all kids tolerate the CIO method, and for some, it may take upto two weeks before they don't cry themselves to sleep.....and I couldn't bear to do this to my son. Of course, if you do decide to do it, you have to stick with it for however long it takes. Another thing that helped us was that we would try to calm my son before picking him up, ie, we wouldn't pick him up if he were screaming in his crib, we would calmly tell him to stop crying and try to distract him with a toy. Only when he stopped would we pick him up, and I think this helped him become more calmer whenever he does wake up at night. He also pulls himself to a standing postion when he wakes up, but we're at the point now where my husband can lay him back down on his side and pat him and he quickly falls back asleep. He doesn't always need to be picked up and rocked as he needed to before.

It takes a long while to see the results of your efforts, but it's worth the wait. Things also do get better as the baby matures. Since your baby is only 19 weeks still, he may still need your help and closeness to fall asleep.

Good luck
evelyn

Hi Evelyn,
Elizabeth Pantley has responded with a chapter from her new book, NCSS for toddlers and preschoolers (which I just love, by the way... ) Here's her tips. When you get there, click on the excerpt titled "The Early Bird Waking up Too Early":

All attached material is copyrighted... Here is the link for information and more excerpts: http://www.pantley.com/elizabeth/con...stpsummary.htm

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