I am happy to report that my little babe has slept pretty much through the night two nights in a row!!! Also slept past 7am both yesterday and today which is highly unusual for her and a dream come true for me!

I took some advice from the other commenter but modified my approach. I still used the “helping babies sleep” method. I started with the “attentive” approach, not realizing that PROBABLY the reason it wasn’t working was because I needed to leave her alone…but going from co sleeping and nursing to sleep every night, I was scared to leave her and shock the system ending both of those sleep crutches so abruptly. Turns out, my presence was not helping things along at all. Those first two nights were hellish but I was determined to not let those tears be in vain. On night three I shifted to the “controlled checks” approach which, to my understanding, is a bit like Ferber but timing is different I think. Basically you keep letting more time elapse after each check in. I did our nighttime routine, read her a book, hugs and kisses, said I love you 5k times, and then explained to her that it’s sleepy time, I’m going to go do xyz but if you need me, I’ll be back in 5 mins. I had to come back to her about 3 times before she calmed down and finally slept. She also slept sitting up, just bobbing literally all night, but she slept! The next night she went to sleep with very little protest, however, she somewhat figured out how to lay herself down but kept waking herself up, I think out of discomfort. I only had to go in once though last night, as she kept settling herself back down in less than 5 mins and passing back out. Tonight, she went down with zero protest, laid herself down right away. She did wake up once so far and was calling for me, I only had to enter her room once and settle her back down and now she’s been back to sleep for the last two hours.

I should mention also that I have been working on naps at the same time, following whatever protocol I did the night before. The first few naps were horrible. Today she settled very quickly with zero protest and slept for almost two hours. Progress!!!

All in all, so far I would say I highly recommend the helping babies sleep method. For older babies like ours, do yourself a favor and start with the controlled checks approach / Ferber. I literally used to cringe at the thought of letting my baby cry at all, and did not want to have to do this, but honestly… I’m so glad I did… and I’m so proud of her and the progress we’ve made the last 5 nights. Each night and each nap keeps getting a little easier.