Sleep Training

DS just turned 5 months on Nov. 4th. He is BF and can fall asleep in my arms without sucking. The last week has had started an oral fixation and will simply not sleep unless he is using me as a pacifier. He can find his thumb, but gets too mad and can't do it.

When he falls asleep on DH, it takes a long time for the transfer--it used to be real easy but we can see it getting worse. Taking a long time to get him to sleep.

Have tried a twinge of CIO and he essentially lies on his face while standing on his feet (sort of smooshing his face) and just screams and cries. I've let him do this while checking in on him every 5 minutes for 20 minutes total and break down.

He wants to use me as a human pacifier.

The question--is 5 months too young to CIO?? I can deal with the crying if I think that he is going to learn to fall asleep...but am just not sure if he's too young. Anyone have words of wisdom. I've read Weissbluth and Ferber...but want some real people advice.

I did CIO with older DS at 10 months, and am not sure I can take 5 more months of this....

it depends largely on how you feel about CIO and whether you feel your baby is ready. IMHO, i think it's really up to you whether you feel comfortable to ST your baby at 5mos. the general age that most books (at least the ones i've read) say to begin ST is 4mos so i guess in their eyes, then your baby is just about the right age.

the thing about CIO is that you have to be consistent - i can't stress that enough. letting your baby cry for 20mins and then going to him is only teaching him that if he cries up to a certain point, you'll go to him. so regardless of the method you choose, you have to be consistent in how you respond to his cries. i suggest you take a peek at the sleep training faq section in the sleep resources folder and pick a ST method you're comfortable with and can commit to 100% for at least 2-3 weeks. i also recommend reading the success stories - those are true testaments from parents who have successfully ST their babies.

i will give you a good example that is recent: my friend across the street has 14mos twins. they have never slept in their crib all night and used to have multiple night wakings, were cranky and fussy most of the time, didn't nap well, never had any sort of routine or schedule and didn't know how to put themselves to sleep. so basically, my friend and her DH has been sleep deprived for 14mos. she had attempted CIO several times but caved every time and their sleep got worse and worse. their bedtime since i discovered she lived across the street had been between 9-11pm! but now she has to go back to work in january so she asked for some help and we put a plan together. tonight is night 5 of ST and for the past 2 nights, her babies have STTN: 12hrs straight. of course, the first 2 nights were hell for her because she hates hearing them cry (i was standing on her porch waiting for her to open the door bc i was going to sit with her until her husband came home and i could hear them screaming from the porch!) and during my time with her, she wanted to go in or check on them or pick them up or whatever but i remained firm, told her to stick to the plan and in 20mins they stopped crying and fell asleep. 2.5hrs later when i left they were still sleeping. and when she told me that they STTN on night 3, that surprised me because to be honest, that's the first time i've heard of babies responding so quickly to ST. so the point to my story is that although we hate to hear our babies cry because it's a natural instinct to go to them, we also have to give them a chance to learn how to self-soothe. it's our intervention and fear of them being sleepless all night that prevents them from learning this very valuable skill.

so you have to be ready to ST your baby; if you feel he's too young then wait but if you are ready, then go for it.

please post any more questions you have about ST. GL!