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Sunday, December 18, 2016

Sleep Training - Comic Relief and a Warm Heart

I just started sleep training my little girl who is five months old.  This is definitely not one of my favorite parenting activities, but I know once she is sleeping through the night for the full 11-12 hours without waking up to nurse, be re-wrapped or just need her pacifier replaced, both she and I will sleep so much better and be more well rested because of it.

Before this training she was sleeping in a wrap, arms tucked in tightly, on her back and would fall asleep either nursing or with a pacifier while being rocked.  In the last month or so I have definitely not gotten the best sleep (that's putting it lightly) because not only will she wake up to nurse or need to be re-wrapped - she is a Houdini and would break out of her wrap on average once every other night or so - but her brother would wake me up at times once or twice and say he needed to go pee in the middle of the night.

Something very unexpected happened tonight during the period of time she was left in her crib to fall asleep.  I was going through the let her cry a little and then visit her routine when her two year old brother said "let's go help her to sleep." He came upstairs with his Daddy, they asked to go in and my little boy proceeded to go to his sister's crib and pat her with his hand and say "it's OK S".  She calmed down, put her head down and then he left.

He was heading down the stairs when she started crying again and he said, "Uh-oh.  She's crying, she's crying again." Of course part of the reason she did is because he could not be quiet when he left...

He insisted on going back in.  Each time he left and she started crying again, he volunteered to go back and help.  He would either pat her or say, "Go to sleep, go to sleep S.  Shh, shh, shh."  He went in over ten times until she fell asleep.  This process took about 30 minutes.  He did show signs of being exasperated towards the end, but he wanted to keep going back in.  He loves his little sister.

I'm both proud of him and giggling over it all.  Here's a short video clip I took while watching on the baby monitor.  My husband was up with him during this process.


I hope this brings everyone a smile.

Singing off...so, fa, ti, do
Gina

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