Sleep Training

Foster has always been a good sleeper. However, until recently he's also gotten used to being rocked to sleep for his naps and essentially nursed to sleep at night. Being sick for a month didn't help in our desire for him to be able to get himself to bed either. So, when he began to feel better we decided to try and get him back on track.

We started by laying him down and letting him cry or talk to himself until he fell asleep. Sometimes that would take up to 20-30 minutes but worked for the most part but was difficult to do for naps when he only sleeps for 30-45 minutes anyways. Then we moved to laying him down and standing near his crib to let him know we were there, but didn't require us to be holding 25lbs of baby while he drifted off. This seemed to work really well. He's almost more comfortable falling asleep on his own in the crib now than he is being rocked, but he still likes to have someone near by if he doesn't fall asleep right away.

It feels like pretty soon we'll be able to just lay him down and walk away without him getting upset with that either. I'm just grateful that he doesn't need to be held anymore because it was really taking its toll on my back. Fingers crossed!