Night #1

Not only did we survive the first night of sleep coaching (see previous post), we did great! Everyone said that it won't be as bad as you expect it to be. And I was thinking "well, they don't know my kid and his willpower!". But, fortunately, they were right! It wasn't nearly as bad as I expected.

Here's the timeline of what went down:

The Sleep Lady recommends getting good naps in on the first day you're going to sleep coach. So, when Hudson was looking tired at 7:30a (after waking up at 6:15a), I gladly nursed him to sleep. He only takes one nap each day and it's usually from 12-2 or 1-3p, so this morning nap was very unusual. He slept for about 1.5 hours. He then took his afternoon nap from 12:15-2p. Now the problem with this is that the Sleep Lady recommends your child should be asleep 4 hours after he wakes from his afternoon nap (although she says you can stretch it until 5 hours, but doesn't prefer that). So this means that Hudson should be asleep between 6-7p.

Okay, now to the nitty gritty....

At dinner, Hudson wouldn't eat much (not unusual) and started rubbing his eyes. I quickly had Ryan take him up for his bath. In the bath, he started to get fussy (which is a sign he's tired because otherwise he loves his bath). So we quickly got him out, put some lotion on/gave a little massage, and got into pajamas. Instead of Ryan reading to him and then handing him to me to nurse, we decided that I would nurse while Ryan read to him. That way, we could keep him awake while nursing. After a few books, I handed him over to Ryan and went down stairs. That was at 6:50p.

Hudson cried and fussed, but wasn't hysterical. Ryan picked up once or twice when he was really crying and gasping for air, soothed him and asked him to calm down. Then he would lie him back down. Ryan knelt next to the crib and Hudson grabbed him and hugged him. Ryan laid him back down. Hudson cried. Then he came to hug Ryan again, Ryan laid him down, and he just looked up and closed his eyes. This was at 8:01p.

He woke up at 10:48p. I went in the room this time. I told him it was time to go "night-night" and I placed him on his back (he was standing when I walked in). He protested a bit, but wasn't too bad. I just sat in the rocker and pretended to sleep by closing my eyes. A couple of times he got worked up and I would just go over, kneel down, hug him and tell him "night night". He has this music box in his crib (it also has lights that project onto the ceiling):

So he started to push the buttons for the music and lights. Then he laid face down onto his crib with his arm over the music box. And then just fell asleep! I couldn't believe it since that was the first time that I ever got him to sleep without nursing! I waited a few minutes and moved the music box a bit (since it's pretty hard and probably not a good snuggle buddy!). When I got back to bed it was 11:26p.

At 3:41a he woke again. This time Ryan went in. Given the time, I didn't get all of the details on what happened, but I know that he eventually laid down ON TOP of his music box (it was under his belly) and fell asleep like that. Ryan obviously moved him off of it. When Ryan got back to bed it was 4:48a.

Hudson was crying again at 6:11a. I wasn't sure whether I should try to get him back to sleep or if he was up for the day. So I tried to sit in the chair and tell him it was okay, but then he started "talking" and playing, so I took it as a sign that he was up!

We had a great morning. We took him to a playgroup and he usually falls asleep afterwards. When we got home, we gave him a snack and decided that it was nap time. I took him up and nursed until he was drowsy (this was about 11:55a). But once I would put him down, he would get up and start playing. He was just playing and walking back and forth - no fussing or crying. So I just sat there. Then I tried to nurse again to get him drowsy. But once I put him down, he was ready to play again. Finally Ryan came up at 1:11p. Hudson started to cry and was getting tired. Ryan sat with him and he was finally asleep by 1:30p.

He woke up during the nap and was holding his blanket. So Ryan laid him down and covered him and he went back to sleep and is still sleeping now.

UPDATE: He woke up from his nap at 3:45p.

With only 2 awakenings last night (compared to our normal 5-7/night), I would have to say that Day 1 was a success!!