Sleep training attached 4 month old. Help with WW, night feeds, daytime naps

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hopeful23

New member
I started Ferber last night on my 17 week old baby boy. He has never slept in a crib always cried despite all my attempts. Here is how last night went: His daytime WW are 1.5-1.75h (together with yawning/eye rubs) with 3-4 contact naps of 0.5-1.5h for a total of 3h. Bedtime was 2h after last WW [feed (took only 60 ml usually takes 90-110 ml), bath, book, into crib awake (he was fussing and I carried him to calm him but he cried even as I lowered him into the crib). He cried for 3h with 3-5-10-10… checks. Slept for 10 mins and woke up again crying. As this was 3.5h after bedtime feed which is usually when he wakes to eat I offered bottle after waiting for 10 mins, he drank 110 ml and then went to sleep. Kept waking every 2.5h and drank 90 ml at each waking. Woke at 7:15 am, tried to ferberize first nap 1.5h later but he screamed so much I gave up and took him for a stroller walk and contact naps since. I need advice on the following:

1) do I establish independent sleep first then focus on reducing night feedings?

2) I believe my baby has a feed to sleep association but he can never truly fall asleep unless rocked and/or given the pacifier just before bed. But he won’t go into the crib w/o crying. I try to feed at the start of the WW but sometimes he just won’t take a bottle, what do I do?

3) is 3h an average amount of time to cry for the first night? This is my first baby I have no idea if I’m on the right track!

4) is it necessary to do bedtime and naps together? PLS says ok to do bedtime first as sleep pressure is highest and that makes sense but people ive spoken to say bedtime and naps make it less confusing.

5) how do i get baby to eat more during the day!?

Any advice would be very much welcome! Thank you!
 
@hopeful23 From everyone I've talked to and what I've read, doing nights first is easiest in this case. Im in a very similar situation - I have a 4-month-old and we are on night 4 of sleep training. Previously only was co-sleeping and not staying in her own space. I am only doing nights and continue to do all naps as contact naps to ensure that I keep her on as good a routine as possible. I plan to do naps later on, once our nights are well-established.

I wonder if your baby was getting upset by all the check-ins? We decreased our check-ins as we felt they were not helping her and possibly making her worse.

Every baby is different, but you might not have long enough WW at end of day? We are doing 2.5hrs awake between last nap and bedtime.

good luck! FWIW, night 1 was brutal for us (not so much crying as you, but waking basically every 30-45minutes through most of the night), but then night 2 and 3 were magical (we're on night 4 tonight and so far so good, fingers crossed)...

my feeling is that you will know by night 3 if it is working or not! We said for ours that if by night 3 there was no progress, we'd pause the training and re-evaluate as maybe there is something else going on (such as not ready for independent sleep, something off with the schedule, or something else like reflux).
 
@hopeful23 You say 3 to 4 naps, with 1.5-1.75h WW. But that means either 4 OR 5 wake windows. Big big difference. You need to figure out total time awake (add up wake windows). If your baby had 3h of stamina to cry, I suspect he was undertired. I personally went the extinction route as I am firmly of the belief that check ins usually just extend crying.

Do nights first. Then once you have success there move to naps so baby is not overtired. Yes, first establish independent sleep, then try to night wean. Follow the 5-3-3 rule for feeds.

Slowly reduce the amount in each feed overnight. Offer feeds as often as you can during the day.
 
@paul500 I have a question: do I keep baby awake even if he is displaying sleepy cues (yawning, fussing eye rubbing) but isn’t at the end of his wake window? I do this regardless of his prior nap duration?
 
@paul500 Good point, I need to get better about logging exact sleep and awake time. He often wants to eat right before sleep or won’t go down easily so it extends his awake time for sure.

His stamina for crying might be unparalleled. He cried for 35 mins today after rubbing his eyes and yawning when his dad rocked him to sleep for a contact nap in exceedingly comfortable conditions. Then slept for 1.5h.

Thanks for your reply!
 
@hopeful23 Hugs to you! The first night is always hard!
Some answers/thoughts:
1. Yes - sleep training is not the same as night weaning. Focus on independent sleep for now
2. Perhaps try moving the feed to the middle of the wake window or near the end but not right before nap/sleep
3. 3 hr is on the high end. I'm wondering how you were doing checks - were you checking only during sustained crying? So for example the first interval - baby is crying for 3 solid min then check. If baby stops crying during that period you should reset the interval - because the break in crying is baby's attempt at self soothing so you don't want to interrupt that behavior
4. Not necessary to do both. With my firstborn I did nights first and after about 3 weeks worked on naps. We also did a slightly different approach... for night time we had gone straight to extinction. For nap time I started with just the first nap of the day and capped the crying at 15 min. If she didn't sleep by then I would rescue the nap. All other naps were contact naps UNTIL nap 1 was solid (which only took a few days!)
5. Offer more frequent feedings perhaps - if you're on a 4 hr bottle schedule try every 3 hrs. Maybe offer 2 feedings per wake window. I've noticed my second born will often feed twice a wake window. At first I was frustrated but not all babies like the same things! when you do eventually night wean you can slowly drop the amt you're offering so if it's typically 90 mL, start offering 80, then 70, and so on, starting with one feed at a time. Baby will naturally start taking in more during the day with that approach.
 
@texco Thanks so much for your detailed reply. Re. #3 on how I did the checks, yes we checked during sustained crying only and reset the timer if his crying stopped. Although sometimes it felt like he took a break (maybe 3-5 seconds) to catch his breath before crying again and in those instances we did not reset the timer. Do those short pauses count as self soothing? He seems to like to sleep on his side so part of his crying was also linked to him figuring out how to get on to his side and then he would flip onto his back and cry again. I will be more vigilant about the resetting the timer tonight just incase and let my partner know too. I forgot to add that I ended up needing to do a diaper/sleep sack change at 4 am as he had soiled his diaper and his sleep sack was wet. I fed him, did this change in the dark with a small light and put him back down. He cried again for an hour, again with checks and then slept for 2.75h.
 
@hopeful23 Hoping tonight is smoother!!! Sometimes folks find that checks make it harder on babe so they cut them after a few days. You may consider that as well. If there is still a lot of crying at bedtime after a couple more days - it should drastically drop after day 1 - might be a schedule issue (babe may need more awake time so you could start to slightly stretch each wake window by like 15 min each)
 
@texco He fell asleep after 20 mins of crying tonight! Same kind of crying when my partner rocks him to sleep not me. I can hardly believe it. He also drank 650 ml of milk during the day so hoping he wakes less but wouldn’t put it past him to wake for more anyway.
 
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