One of the Many Takes on Bedtime with Baby

By Gabby Anstey McDonald

I have to admit I was blessed with an incredible sleeper. Go ahead, flip me the bird, I deserve to take one for all the bloodshot-eyed, zombied moms out there. My daughter was sleeping through the night, in her own room, at 6 weeks …yes, it’s true.

I certainly didn’t force the issue or anything. For the first month I had my baby in a bassinet next to my side of the bed where I could get to her quickly and easily, not to mention check on her 50 times over to make sure she was still breathing (which I still do, not quite 50 times, but often). I’m a big fan of Dr. Karp’s The Happiest Baby on the Block, particularly when he says repeatedly that you can’t spoil a newborn, so I wasn’t concerned in the slightest about keeping her in our room for a while, but after about four weeks, it just sort of happened.

How it Started

I napped my daughter in her crib in her room during the day quite a bit in the beginning because I figured, why not get her used to it. Since she was very happy there, we thought why not give it a whirl at night. And so we moved her…down two flights of stairs to her own room in her own crib with just the Graco monitor connecting us. I thought we might all sleep better if she couldn’t smell me and my milk and we weren’t privy to every one of her movements and breaths. I was right, but others thought I was nuts. I got frequent funny looks when I’d talk about our sleeping scenario, “…she’s only a month old and you have her in her own room already?”

There are so many schools of thought behind the crucial sleep issue and while most seem to work in their respective cases (at least eventually), my husband and I were of the philosophy that our baby should be in her own crib, in her own room. We were proponents of getting her on her own schedule, teaching her how to self-soothe and put herself to sleep, and actually enjoy her own space. Granted, I had a baby who was a fan of this approach so that helped, but even if she hadn’t encouraged us, we would have encouraged her by 8-12 weeks by pushing some semblance of “sleep training.”

I read ample articles and books, but found most actually favored co-sleeping rather than my approach. It felt right to me though so I stuck to my guns. As William Sears, M.D., Martha Sears, R.N., Robert W. Sears, M.D., write in The Baby Sleep Book: The Complete Guide to a Good Night’s Rest for the Whole Family, “The only persons who can answer the question, ‘Where should baby sleep?’ are mom and dad. Listen to what your baby and your inner voice are trying to tell you!”

How it Progressed

I certainly recognize that don’t have anything to complain about, but just for the record, it wasn’t an entirely smooth ride from four weeks on. When she did get a little bigger, it took some work, several calls to the doctor for reassurance, and full on bouts of wingin’-it. And yes, I, like the rest of the team, did have several sleepless nights.

Since we knew our baby could sleep through the night and had made the decision to have her do so in her own room, we stayed committed. But she back-pedaled on many occasions: after traveling (when we were usually all in the same room sleeping together); teeth coming in; not feeling well; or simply baby being baby. This is what worked for us during each bump in the road, and what still does.

If she was sick or uncomfortable, hungry, or just really upset:

• –I’d nurse her until she fell asleep again and then put her back in her crib (since I’m not nursing anymore, that plan is now foiled)
• –Rub her back and stroke the side of her face while she was lying in her crib
• –Bring her into bed with us or curl up with her in the spare bed in her room (a lifesaver, by the way, if you want your kid to sleep in his/her own room), often for the remainder of the night

If the bump in the road lasted several days and she wasn’t sick or didn’t seem to be teething…in other words, she was working the system:

• –One of us (this is a good dad one) would pick her up, cuddle and kiss her for less than a minute, but not look her in the face; tell her she was OK; then put her back in her crib and leave the room (this technique came from our doctor)
• –Let her cry it out…yes, we let our baby scream her head off on several occasions and actually turned the monitor off to ease the torture (for us) and because we could still hear her, loud and clear, two floor up.

The latter is incredibly difficult any way you slice it. On every occasion, I’d want to go get her and swoop her up because I knew that would make it stop. It’s an unbelievable test of will power, and you have to be thick-skinned, while reciting the “I’m not a terrible mommy” mantra over and over. For us, however, it worked. If it happened for an hour one night, and she’s stubborn so there were a few nights she went that long (I remember calling my doctor to ask if letting her cry that long would bear any lasting negative effects), then it was 40 minutes the next, then 10, then done. Eventually, she’d get back on track and she’d always forgive me in the morning.

Let me reiterate that I wasn’t committed to having my daughter sleeping through the night on her own so quickly; she did it on her own. And I’m not a total Sleep Nazi either (OK, I’m a little anal about the nap schedule and bedtime), as we love bringing her into bed with us in the early mornings for that special cuddle/doze time, and I still sometimes sleep in the spare bed in her room if she’s having a tough night. I also fully understand and respect many of the philosophies behind co-sleeping, and see why people do it because there’s nothing better than snuggling with a baby in bed. But what I can say for my situation is that now, at 17 months old, we have a well-rested, full-of-energy toddler who loves her crib and loves going to sleep.*

*I do recognize these things are always subject to change so I say that with a big “for now.”