Author Topic: Success stories?  (Read 88894 times)

0 Members and 1 Guest are viewing this topic.

Offline becky1969

  • Resident BW Chatterbox!
  • *****
  • Showing Appreciation 230
  • Gender: Female
  • Posts: 4038
  • my favorite thing
  • Location: IDAHO
Success stories?
« on: November 03, 2006, 01:18:35 am »
I was wondering if we could have a sticky thread with night waking success stories (not successful night wakings, but successful FIXING of night wakings!  ;D ). I know on the Props page, the successful swaddle weaning stories were SO helpful to me - and guided me in how I weaned Owen.

Any chance we could do that? Or ARE there any success stories? LOL! Perhaps even arranging them by broad age ranges (0-6 mo, 6-12, 12-18, etc.) might help too b/c night wakings with a 4 month old who isn't even rolling over is different than helping a 9 month old who pulls up to standing and has separation anxiety!
Owen, 12/28/05 7 lb 2 oz

Enjoying the toddler years!

Offline Kimberly®

  • Resident BW Chatterbox!
  • *****
  • Showing Appreciation 126
  • Gender: Female
  • Posts: 4288
  • Location: North Bay, Ontario Canada
Re: Success stories?
« Reply #1 on: November 03, 2006, 03:42:35 am »
I think thats a great Idea. I'll sticky this one and you can all add your success stories here.
Kimberly

shimzy

  • Guest
Re: Success stories?
« Reply #2 on: November 15, 2006, 15:24:31 pm »
Does anyone have a successful night waking fix story? I need some encouragement! lol

Offline mum2luca

  • New & Learning The Ropes
  • *
  • Showing Appreciation 0
  • Gender: Female
  • Posts: 23
  • Location:
Re: Success stories?
« Reply #3 on: November 20, 2006, 13:16:31 pm »
Hi,

My DS is 4.5 months old and had started waking up to 8 times a night.  I tried weaning him from sucking my finger to get to sleep, and every time he woke up did shh/pat or PUPD but although it became easier to get him to settle he still kept waking up.  Last week a friend suggested that because he was still in a bassinet by our bed we might be disturbing him.  On Friday I moved him to his big cot on the other side of the room and he slept right through the night from 7.30 til 6.45 (with DF at 10.30).  I think he was more comfortable in the bigger cot, further away from us, further away from the window and with more space.  Also, yesterday we stopped swaddling him and used a sleeping bag instead and to my amazement he again slept right through.  I heard him wake up at about 6.40am but he didn't cry or call out.  When I checked him he was playing quietly with a toy!  What an angel.

I just posted this because last week he was waking up every 20-60 minutes all night every night & I was so tired and I didn't know what to do.  And overnight everything changed. So if you're in the same situation, don't worry, it might suddenly be OK.

andibig

  • Guest
Re: Success stories?
« Reply #4 on: November 20, 2006, 13:18:18 pm »
i really, really, really need a success story right now. esp for 17 mth and older LOL

Offline bangkok mum

  • New, But Posting Steadily!
  • **
  • Showing Appreciation 2
  • Gender: Female
  • Posts: 88
  • Location: Bangkok
Re: Success stories?
« Reply #5 on: November 24, 2006, 04:43:22 am »
Hi Well I finally have a succes story!! 

Grace is now 7 months old and for the last week has started to sleep for much longer stretches at night eg 7-8 hour stretch and then 3-4 hour stretch with the last few nights waking only once for a feed, goes to bed at 7 and has a wake time of 7, and naps for 2 1/2 hours a day often with one of her naps for 1 1/2 hours completely unassisted at the 45 minute mark. 

For some this may not seem great but for me I am over the moon - i feel alive again and we have managed it without compromising myself or doing things I didn't feel comfortable doing. 

So how we managed it...

*Firstly Grace was being rocked to sleep, so I very slowly over the course of 10-12 days stopped rocking her to sleep and just holding her and when she was asleep putting her down in the cot.  Really couldn't face doing PU/PD and knew that I would not be consistent so did not do, also after looking at posts there seemed to be lots of mums whose babies were going to bed awake who were still waking and needing help to go back to sleep so I really didn't want to go through trauma and still end up doing assisted back to sleep!

*With help from very great ladies on this board esp colinmac's mum (thank you!!) got her reducing amount of time at feeding in the night, and eating more during the day - i think this has really really helped! 

*Instigated very good bedtime routine bath, feed, hold on bed and then in cot asleep same time everyday. 

*Started to feed her solids.. something that I think has actually made a pretty big difference and one that I was not expecting to make a difference. 

*Instigated really good nap routine which still involved me rocking her abit but only for a few minutes and since it is such a short time I really love it, love holding my little baby and see her fall asleep (any longer than 5 minutes tho and she is no longer darling little baby but big heavy baby!!)

*Cut out cat nap and lengthened A time and did more activity. 

I think that is all, but oh it feels so good!!  And best of all
*we are still sleeping in the same room after long considering moving her out, but after reading posts thought this probably should not be our first course of action to help her sleep better at night and am really glad we did not do. 
*we are still co-sleeping on occasion although Grace really does grizzle alot more in bed with us and really does seem to sleep better in her cot so I guess this is going out window..
* she cries less now at bedtime than she did when i was rocking her.  I honestly believe the rocking was making her cry more and was not at all calming for her - no doubt caused by own mood I am sure! 

I was of course hoping that her sleep would right itself but after reading lots of posts of babes who were still waking every two hours at 14 months thought i really needed to take action and I am very happy with the action taken and the results. 

There are of course somethings I would like to change eg she is still waking 45 minutes after being put down for night, she is very easy to get back to sleep but would like to see this change eventually. 

So there is my success story.  I am sure I will be back on board with some other problem causing night waking eg teeth, SA etc..  but for now all is good!!

Hope this gives others some cheer!

 


Offline murkywaters

  • New, But Posting Steadily!
  • **
  • Showing Appreciation 3
  • Gender: Female
  • Posts: 52
  • Location: Windsor,Ontario, Canada
Re: Success stories?
« Reply #6 on: December 12, 2006, 18:35:48 pm »
DS, Textbook toddler, 16 month separation anxiety.

Started waking not only frequently but for hours was just awake!  When I finally figured out it was separation anxiety I formulated the plan.
Since waking hours effect sleep hours so much that's where I started.  I made sure that he didn't go anywhere without me (except grandmas since he's totaly fine there) for 2 weeks.  Even Grandma wasn't to bring him anywhere but her house.  I started a night time routine, never really had one and would often go from running around right into bed. 
We now go upstairs where the bedrooms are and no TVs or radios. I start by getting him wased up and changed into his PJs.  I sit in the chair and read a book in the babies room (gets her down early too  :) )He generally doesn't sit and listen because he just isn't a toddler that will sit for longer then 2 seconds. He plays quietly with the few toys or looks through my parenting magazines (he likes pictures of kids) He is listening to the book and if I don't read it he brings it to me and has started to "talk" whenever he opens up a book other times a day so I know he is paying attention. Then I pick him up we say goodnight to baby, walk down the hall to the stairway and wave down to the dog then go in shut off the light, close the curtain and put him in.  He still has a blanket and a suther (generally just sucks on it for a couple of minutes and then latly it has been going under his pillow) He now sleeps through the night again.
Mommy to Kyle July 2005
Mommy to Keira Aug 2006

Offline kirstenscolesmama14

  • BW Aficionado
  • ***
  • Showing Appreciation 10
  • Gender: Female
  • Posts: 226
  • Location:
Re: Success stories?
« Reply #7 on: January 09, 2007, 09:41:58 am »
Congrats murkywaters.... I needed that little bit of encouragement. We were doing okay until the dreaded chicken pox came in.... I will try to be patient until we can get back on track.

Thanks for posting
Suzie
<img src="http://by.lilypie.com/uSvtm5.png" alt="Lilypie 6th to 18th Ticker" border="0"  /><img src="http://b3.lilypie.com/D4cJm5.png" alt="Lilypie 3rd Birthday Ticker" border="0"  />

Offline Nathaniel'sMommy

  • New, But Posting Steadily!
  • **
  • Showing Appreciation 1
  • Gender: Female
  • Posts: 74
  • Location: Seattle
Re: Success stories?
« Reply #8 on: January 28, 2007, 12:15:20 pm »
I had some success recently to share but oddly enough my son decided to do it all by himself lol. He had been in a set schedule for awhile and recently hit a growth spurt, started crawling, getting more teeth, got his next round of shots..... Poor LO's schedule was all off. He started only sleeping for an hour during his morning and after noon naps. He got tired earlier in the evening because he hadnt slept as much as he had for the afternoon nap so he ended up going to bed at night earlier which made him waking up earlier for the day. Before all of this he had been waking up at 2 or 3 am again at 5 again at 6 and again between 7/8 for the day. I had added a snack before bed at 6pm because he was hungry at night and had thought I should increase his milk intake (later was told he was getting too much milk). Needless to say all of the subtle adjustments he has made rather then the ones I made have him waking only once at night hungry around 4/5ish. He is still fairly restless at night (I think due to the milestones) so I have to be careful not to go into his room or he sometimes wake up but otherwise I think it wont be long before he is back to sleeping through the night again!! We have been struggling with this since he started teething in September so this is a big breakthrough.  ;D
Mama to Nathan wife to Jason son to be mommy to Alia

Offline Lissybits

  • Resident BW Chatterbox!
  • *****
  • Showing Appreciation 60
  • Gender: Female
  • Posts: 2736
  • My world!
  • Location: Derby, sunny England!
Re: Success stories?
« Reply #9 on: February 23, 2007, 21:00:52 pm »
Hello! I've got a success story - well a 2 night one - which is nothing short of a miracle for my 13mo DS -  HUGE, HUGE thanks and hugs to all at Baby Whisperer ESPECIALLY Momofclaire, Layla and Aisling - This sounds really corny, but "I couldn't have done it without you!"  I really thought I was going to have a breakdown at some point. For details of problem look on Night wakings -" Frequent Wakings, Dummy Dependent"

We started with PD, sshh, pat and cold turkey dummy withdrawal just two weeks ago - and it took 12 long HARD nights to have a complete sleep through. It probably would have been sooner, but I have an uncooperative DH (refused to do PD) and sorry to admit it, but I brought DS into our bed on 3 occasions. 
Also I have to add that DS was diagnosed with eczema 3 days ago and the doctor agreed that the itching would have also have caused him to wake up frequently. The cream we apply now will have soothed the itching.
So we have a few contributary factors to the success, but I have to stress the intial problem was definitely dummy dependency as the night wakings (sometimes 4 per night) started long ago well before any signs of eczema.
I know it's early days yet, but the fact I know DS can sleep through the night (something you never believe will happen at some stage), has really encouraged me to stick with the routines, all suggested to me here - which blooming do work - I've got 2 night's proof!!
DS and I just simply could not believe it yesterday morning when we looked at the clock and it said 6.50am - we both hooted for joy!!
My advice to anyone with waking problems is:
 - Don't give up (even if you've given in a bit like I did by bringing DS in our bed)
 - Explore other possible reasons for the wakings  (like Ds's itchy rash)
 - Talk and cry to your friends - it helps!
 - And above all use the information and support here at Baby Whisperer - I certainly wouldn't have known where to start without them.

I'll keep you all posted to let you know how it goes - fingers crossed!



Offline Elphyrafire

  • BW Aficionado
  • ***
  • Showing Appreciation 11
  • Gender: Female
  • Posts: 156
  • Jack aged 2 years/ Rya aged 1 month
  • Location: Vancouver Canada
Re: Success stories?
« Reply #10 on: March 19, 2007, 19:50:59 pm »
Not sure if this is a success story or not (maybe he just grew out of it at the same time I did this) but who cares??? HE SLEEPS THRU NOW! I was scared to post this for so long for fear DS was going to revert but it's been 2 months now.
All I did was move bedtime back one hour (from 7 to 8) and cut day naps down. I think it was a mix of doing that and that he became ready to sleep thru.
I'm sending hope vibes out to any one reading this because night wakings are the worst form of torture- esp when it gets to be 4 or more a night and they are lasting for hours. Moms are so strong. Keep going ladies and it will come. Try not top take it out on your lo or your DP, DH's.
Mom to "Textbook" Jack born Dec 3, 2005
and (?) Rya- Feb 13, 2008

Vancouver, Canada

Offline becky1969

  • Resident BW Chatterbox!
  • *****
  • Showing Appreciation 230
  • Gender: Female
  • Posts: 4038
  • my favorite thing
  • Location: IDAHO
Re: Success stories?
« Reply #11 on: March 19, 2007, 23:32:29 pm »
Well, I think I finally get to answer my own question! It's still early days, but it seems that we've found the cause of our NW, and so are well on our way to eliminating them for good!

LO is almost 15 months at this point, and has had NW since 10 months old. I looked in his baby book, and from 10-14 months he got 8 teeth (4 of which were molars), so I know that definitely played a part. It seems that he was constantly OT by bed, which resulted in the NW. Complicating factors is he's at the 2-1 nap transition: not quite ready for 1, but 2 can be too much. In those 6 months of teething, we added some props: bottle when he woke, swaddling again (doh! Why did i do that??), and bouncing/jouncing to sleep. Once we got him well rested again, all those props became totally unnecessary and we dropped them pretty much cold turkey. Crazy, huh?

Our solutions:

1) We started weaning the bottle by decreasing milk/increasing water.

2) We got rid of the swaddle at naps first, but were clinging at bedtime. We finally just ditched it altogether, and things went much better.

3) We made sure he gets 2 naps, waking him by 4:30 (although, it now seems 4 is a better wake-up time - we're still experimenting with this).

4) Give him PLENTY of wind down and time to fall asleep on his own. Now that he's unswaddled, he really needs the extra time to relax (the swaddling gave him an artificial sense of relaxation, and I think it caused him to sometimes fall asleep before he was tired ENOUGH!  ::) ).

5) Removed all toys (FP aquarium) for him to play with in the crib. Leave stuffed animals and loveys for relaxation.

That's pretty much it! The PM nap is vital. He has to wake up no earlier than 2:30 or we have problems. I just can't get him to bed early enough then. He's doing so well with self soothing. We sometimes give him a Pat/Shush, but mostly we leave him to mantra cry or fuss himself to sleep. He really seems to need that to relax himself.
Owen, 12/28/05 7 lb 2 oz

Enjoying the toddler years!

zed

  • Guest
Re: Success stories?
« Reply #12 on: June 06, 2007, 04:18:16 am »
I also have a success story,

My child woke up every 2 hours since birth, at 11 months old I managed to get him to sleep from 7:oo to 5:30.  Then 2 weeks later he could get to 6:15.  Now for the last 2 days he has made it all the way to 7:00 am. 

I couldn't get any success until I read BW solves all your probs.  I started with making our day time routine completely ridgid (Eating at exactly the same times and naps at exactly the same times).  We always had a pretty good routine but sometimes quick trips to the store would get in the way. 

The next thing I did was put the baby to bed in a sleaveless bunting bag.  This was b/c he seemed to move so much in his sleep and get uncovered and bang his head on the enc of the crib. 

The last thing I did was use shh pat if he did wake and slowly reduce this to just putting my hand on his back to get him back to sleep.  In the last week all he needs is to be recovered and  a quick touch on his head for 2 seconds and I leave. 

I also found it helpful to wake just before him in the morning and place a bottle of water in the crib for him to find.  That way he learns it is ok to wake with out me coming right away. 

One last thing.  I have also made him play a while before breakfast so he doesn't wake early from hunger.... Training him that breakfast is at 8 has really helped.

Offline SarahCH

  • New & Learning The Ropes!
  • *
  • Showing Appreciation 1
  • Gender: Female
  • Posts: 5
  • Location:
Re: Success stories?
« Reply #13 on: August 12, 2007, 21:13:18 pm »
Dear BabyWhisperers,

Here I am, finally logged in as a guest, so that I can thank you for the great gift of "Babywhispering." Wish i could thank Tracy, but you all work with her commitment, so thank you! You can imagine that I am full of gratitude as I have had two nights now when my 11 month old (today!) baby boy has slept through the night--from 7 to 6:30 ish, after two weeks of steady improvements. What did it? I read the fine print in 'The Babywhisperer Solves All Your Problems,"  scanned these boards, and used pu/pd consistently, and it worked!

I chose this thread to report our success because my lo was waking around 4am, consistently, and I was breastfeeding him, consistently. I had tried around around 7 months to do pu/pd, but after two weeks of being up from 4 on, I decided to just feed him quickly, and he'd go back to sleep (and I would) until 6:30/7. He had stopped feeding at other times in the night before that, and I had enforced that with pu/pd if he did wake up at 12 or 1 or 2, but the early morning wake/feed was not "going away," as my friends and mother said it would.

The key this time was Tracy's direction to stay with your baby until he falls into a deep sleep. Before, I would leave once he was asleep, but he would call me back in every 15, 10, 5 minutes--so I never slept. I decided that standing there was worth it. A couple nights I had a rush of feeling ill (I probably woke in the middle of a deep sleep rhythm), and my back needed TLC in the morning, but it did work. (A little aside: I learned quickly that I had to pee and drink water BEFORE going in to him, and make him wait, or I wouldn't make it)

The first night was maybe 20, 30 pu/pds over 1 and 1/2 hours. Then he had "heart sloughs", then finally slept, but I stayed another 20 minutes. He didn't wake until 6:30.

The second night, he wasn't crying so intensely, so after putting my hand on him and him pushing it away, I just sung to him--for an hour. "Jesus Loves Me" is our bedtime song and I just sung it over and over. Then he cried intensely for 1/2 hour and I did pu/pd, , and then he slept until 6:30.

The third night I was still there for 1 and 1/2 hours, singing and 2 pu/pd, then many more for 45 minutes. It wasn't easy, I say honestly. But I felt I'd seen improvement and i was hopeful that this would work.

Day five he started to put himself back to sleep, and/or need only a couple minutes of singing. Into week two, i was ready for him not to wake up at all, impatient for real results I was! But I knew that it was huge for a baby whose eaten ever 4am of his 10+ month life to go back to sleep quickly without eating. For a week, he'd wake about twice, say at 4:20 and then 5:15. Most times I just sang, maybe put my hand on him, occasionally pu/pd if he got crying, and then I'd stay in the room, but only 10-15 min max. For example, he'd wake at 4:20, I'd stay until 4:30, and he'd wake again at 5:15. I decided that I'd rather lie down and maybe sleep again than wait for him to wake again, as they were longer intervals. Sometimes he's wake close to 6, and then we were up for the day--pu/pd didn't work for us then.

Two weeks later, he slept from 7:15 to 6:30, and I couldn't believe it! The next night was two wake up agains, and then last night, again 11 hours! I am so thankful!

My husband, not one to go in for all this BW stuff, told me early on that the definition of insanity is doing the same thing over and over and expecting different results. Well! I said, call me insane then! Repetition and perseverance have been the saving graces of my early parenting, so call it what you will! But seriously, a note about husbands: I had thought that I needed him to get on board before doing night pu/pd weaning. then I read a story where Tracy said no, the husband was too soft, let the mom do it. Well my husband isn't too soft but we are not on the same page and I didn't know how to get us on the same page. He went downstairs to the guest room actually, and I felt better that I/crying wasn't waking him. Not ideal but acceptable to us.

This is long enough, but I wanted to get in some of the smaller points that I know we all question. The big find for me in the Babywhisperer and in all of you is our agreement that letting babies cry for long periods of time, alone, as a way to teach them to sleep through the night is not best. You have been a haven for me as not one friend follows the BW but insteads tends towards CIO or attachment parenting. My heart couldn't do the first, and my energy level couldn't do the later. But what would we do without a workable way? Thanks for this way, and it truly works.

If anybody is desperate to sleep as I was, I'm with you!  :D


Offline simonealisa

  • New & Learning The Ropes
  • *
  • Showing Appreciation 0
  • Gender: Female
  • Posts: 22
  • Jake's mommy
  • Location:
Re: Success stories?
« Reply #14 on: December 16, 2007, 18:28:05 pm »
We had really drastic night waking problems for a long time. My son didn't sleep through the night more then once or twice by the time he was 10.5 months old (and by sleeping through the night, I mean longer then a 5 hour stretch at night).

I did BW from the beginning, but he did have sleep associations for his night sleep. His naps weren't too bad, we fixed his nap problems by 6 months by doing shush/pat when he was about 4-5 months old, and that worked wonders.

I should have done pu/pd when he was 6 months, but I waited because I thought he was teething. After months of constant NW's I realized teeth were not the real issue. I finally did pu/pd when he was 10 months old, and he started sleeping through the night consistenly soon after that. When he was 11 months old he was sleeping from 6:30 am - 7:00pm! Sometimes he would wake up once or twice at night and cry for a minute or two, but then would put himself right back to sleep. It's been consistent like that for 2 months now. Jake is getting his molars now, so we've had some disrupted naps cause of teething - but his night sleep is still really good and it's all thanks to the BW methods! Hope that encourages all you who are dealing with problems, one day "this too shall pass!". :) I didn't sleep through the night for over a year!!! But when it finally happened, it felt like everything was back to normal and my mind blocked out all those bad memories from this past year and the extreme sleep exhaustion...next time around with the next baby, I will definitely be trying the pu/pd method earlier!!! I saw results after only 4 days! It was much easier then I thought it would be, you only have to make sure you are doing it correctly. The first night I had to put him down over one hundred times! By the fourth night it only took two times! I've hardly every had to use it since, it really works like a charm!!!


It really pays to follow all the BW methods EXACTLY. We have such a tight schedule. I try to ALWAYS put him down at the same times every day, that really helps. His body clock has adjusted to the schedule and he just always knows when it's time to go down for a nap and he still naps really well.

This is what our schedule looks like at 13 months:

wake up 6:30-7:00am, BF
E 8:00 am - breakfast
A
S 9:00 am - 10:30 am (1.5 hr nap), BF when up from nap
Y

E 12:00 - lunch
A
S 1:00pm - 2:30pm (1.5 hr nap), BF when he wakes up from nap
Y

E 5:00 pm - dinner
A 6:00 pm - bath time, BF
S 6:30 pm - sleeps through the whole night, 12+ hours till around 7:00 am the next morning.
« Last Edit: December 16, 2007, 18:33:08 pm by simonealisa »