I am so amazed that I felt the need to write. Since most posts share only problems we are having here, I thought it would be nice to share my good experiences too. I have a 16 month old spirited baby who has been difficult from day one. At around 3 months, I started noticing that he was becoming a bit more calm during the awake hours, but his sleep habits were still irratic. We co-slept until 7 weeks, but he always napped in his crib so he would be used to it. When we put him into his crib at 7 weeks, he had colic and bad gas problems which made putting him to sleep and keeping him asleep a nightmare. Once the colic went away, around 12 weeks, he started sleeping well and only woke twice to feed, at night. The following week, all hell broke loose and he reverted to waking every 1-3 hours for his fallen pacifier. He needed this pacifier since he was 2 weeks old, he had a very strong suck reflex. So we decided it was time to get rid of the pacifier and get him on a consistent schedule. This is when someone recommended The Baby Whisperer. What a life saver!! We have been practicing the p/u-p/d and sh-sh-pat techniques since Thursday (4 days now) and we have already seen a good response. Now the sleep habits are actually getting better by the hour!! We dropped the middle of the night feeding and replaced it with a DF. We are giving him all of his calories during the day, finishing him up with what he might have missed, using the DF. So when he wakes out of habit, we would use the above techniques to get him through it. Now granted, we did have a night when I thought I was going to throw in the towel. The crying got so bad that I actually had to get into the crib with him!! He was hysterical for 1 1/2 hours straight and finally conked out. Thankfully, we haven't had another experience like that since the second day on the "plan". Since then, he's progressed wonderfully. For two nights in a row now, he's woken only a few times, was easy to resettle (in minutes), and for the very early am waking has been able to play and coo in his crib until he falls back asleep. The first time he did this, we were shocked and reacted to a yell by going in and repositioning him, which helped him. This morning, we let him go and he put himself back to sleep. He's also been waking to start the day a little later each day which is heaven, because he was on a 5am kick for a while there too!! His naps have gotten better too. It seems that the magic number of p/u-calm-p/d sessions is four. However, his last nap didn't require it at all! He was put in the crib, I patted his hiney for 2 minutes and he was out! I can't believe it!! The key to this is to stick with it, even when it gets rough, because it does get rough, before it gets better. But with consistency, it can work wonders. I think the p/u-p/d has allowed him to become more confident in his crib. He doesn't cry as quickly when he wakes up and sometimes he will yell out, but not cry and we can leave him alone to settle himself. This child has NEVER settled himself until now. Anyway, that's my story. I hope it is working for many more sleep deprived moms out there.
Jessica with Grayson - 16 weeks old
