Breaking the Bottle (Day 1)

Samuel has always been a difficult baby. Sunday night I hit my breaking point. Both boys woke up at 2am and stayed wide awake for two and a half hours. I of course am very sick with a cold so it made things worse. Over time with Sam being so difficult to get to sleep we have developed a bad habit. He has to sleep with the bottle. Progressively his habit is getting worse. We go through about 3 6oz bottles a night with him. He wakes up at least 3 times a night sometimes more. I would just put the bottle back in his mouth and he would go back to sleep. I know this is bad so I asked his doctor yesterday for help. She is a no-nonsence very blunt person. I was scared to tell her. But she was very supportive and nice about it. She gave us a lot of good advice and even commended us on working so hard with out much sleep. So here we go...

We started by moving the play pen out into the front room. Very hard for me it was the first time he hasn't slept in our room.

I read him two books and turned on some quiet music. I rocked him until he was yawning and layed him down. Night 1 consists of crying alone for 5 minutes, me comforting him for 5 minutes and then the bottle. I thought we would make it, but of course he didn't stop crying. I waited until he was in a deep sleep to take the bottle out of his mouth. So he is down at 11pm.

I of course can't sleep because he isn't right next to me. Finally I fall asleep at sometime.

2am I can hear him. We moved him in the other room so it would be easier to let him cry. I waited for 15 minutes, and tried to calm him down. The poor thing was soaking wet with tears. I finally gave in after 20 minutes and gave him the bottle. He fell back asleep for 10 minutes until I took the bottle out of his mouth. Then the really hard part...have to let him cry. It took 30 minutes before he fell asleep.

Again at 7am he woke up. I guess this would be when people wake up, but we don't. I actually didn't hear him cry I was that tired. Renato got up with him, wrapped him in a blanket and gave him a bottle. Oops. Oh well we got a decent night's sleep, and I'm over the first night of Sam in the other room. We will try again tonight.