Hi all, I am Elisabeth, mom to a beautiful 6 month old baby boy named John. I started using the "no cry" methods when he was 2 months old and they helped significantly with his sleep - by 4 months he was down to only 2 wakings per night usually and generally he went into his crib sleepy but not 100% aslee. Suddenly he got a bad cold, started teething, and everything went topsy-turvy, I started letting him nurse to sleep because he was clearly uncomfortable and wasn't able to get to sleep otherwise. 2 months and 2 teeth and a couple of developmental milestones later (sitting up, starting solids) he is firmly entrenched in a practice of nursing to sleep, and often after the second or third night waking (right now he's waking up every 2 or 3 hours) he seems like he can't go back to sleep so I wind up being up with him from 3 am on, until finally at 6 or so I can get him back to sleep for awhile. Out of frustration (and some urging from dad) we tried a modified "cry it out" one night where we held him and comforted him but did not let him nurse. My husband felt like it was a good idea (still does) but I couldn't handle it and wound up crying almost as much as my son did. I hated knowing I had the means to comfort him but wasn't using it and the confusion and frustration on his face as he cried for over an hour each time after he woke up. There's GOT to be a better way. I have re-committed to myself that the no cry way is the only way to go, but I feel like I'm missing something. I try to do the gentle removal before he falls asleep but he just get ramped up and frustrated, and then there's the added challenge of getting him into his crib, which I can't seem to do without a lot of crying unless he's already asleep. My husband is concerned because right now I'm the only one he falls asleep for without a lot of crying. I'm lucky to have a wonderful friend who cares for him during the day and will often drive around with him to get him to sleep in the car but it's not a good long-term solution. My husband wants to go back to the sleep training so that he'll go to sleep without me having to be there to nurse him. I just don't have the stomach for him to cry for hours on end each night - and what if it doesn't wind up working? I also feel like he has too much else "going on" (teething etc) and it seems cruel to let him cry and cry when maybe he's really in pain or hungry or something. I'd really appreciate any input the veterans out there might have for me on that part in-particular. I can't always be there when he needs to go to sleep esp. since I work full time, is he doomed to just be miserable when I'm not around? One of the challenges I have is keeping the room the way it will be when he wakes up at night - I have to have a light on to nurse him or I can't seem to get him latched on right, which just results in more frustration on his part (he has a high palate which makes nursing difficult so I don't think nursing is as easy for me at night as it seems to be for most mothers). I also have trouble determening when he's waking up for sure at night so i don't know that I get to him quickly enough sometimes. I realize this is a bit of a ramble, I'm not entirely sure what my question is - I guess I'm just looking for some additional guidance and validation esp. from those who may have had success with a baby around the age of mine? Thanks.

and !!!

I soooo know what you are talking about with having a son that seemed to sleep well until the teething started! My first one was like that.... I thought I had it made because he seemed to be sleeping through the night at 3 months old... but then it all changed at 7 months! It took months to get past that teething time, using the no cry methods! Do you have the book "The No Cry Sleep Solution"? It really helps with slowly and gently working towards having a sleep routine that works for the whole family! In the book, there is a section that says there is no method (cry it out or not) that works when a baby is teething and needs comfort. She also mentions illness and separation anxiety making it not possible to get any sort of sleeping happening properly. That was a really hard message to read, but she is completely right because neither of my sons was able to sleep until bouts of teething ended. My younger boy really had the teething drag out so he has only just started sleeping through the night and he is 14 months old! Fortunately, my older boy was only a year old when it started to finally work for him! In any case, it is a very helpful book that has hundreds of pages of tips for getting baby to sleep in his own crib etc. I personally found that working on more than one thing at a time was very stressful for my little guy, so for example getting him to sleep in the crib WHILE trying to do the gentle removal was too much to learn at one time. I would just pick one and try to get that first.

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