Ferber isn’t working!

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Drop the nighttime feeds. Don’t do checks. Just close the door and don’t come back until 10 hours later. Repeat the next day.

+1. Yep - unless your pediatrician said to keep night feeding there's no reason a 6.5 month old needs to eat in the middle of the night.

You all are flarpin nuts. STTN is 5-7 not 10.

[Anonymous]

I would try to feed the baby extra during the day to stop night feeds, or wait a few months. You cannot do both.

[Anonymous]

If Ferber (or whatever sleep training method you’re trying) hasn’t worked after 10 days, I’d call a professional sleep consultant.

[Anonymous]

OP again. Thank you for the responses. Again, the problem is the baby going to sleep anytime - day or night. And I’m not going to stop feeding her at night until our pediatrician says it’s okay. So bye-bye Ferber!

[Anonymous]

Ferber didn’t work for my baby either. Glad you’re giving it up. My baby responded to being picked up, cuddled and hummed to and then put back down almost asleep. More humming and stroking her brow in the crib until she was out.

Healthy, happy preschooler now who has been sleeping 12 hours since about 14 months.

[Anonymous]

Rip a page out of Satan's parenting handbook and try a bottle with a little baby cereal? Preferably daddy gives it to start breaking the boobie boobie boobie yum yum cycle.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Thanks everyone. (OP) co-sleeping is not an option and neither is dropping the night feeds. I do think she’s overtired from not napping. We have to keep working at it.

Ferber doesn't work unless you drop the night feeds. Dropping the night feeds is step one in ferber if you read the actual book. You have to gradually reduce them one at a time first. Signed, someone who ferber'd a tough 7.5 month-old

Have you every actually read Ferber's book - he clearly says night weaning and sleep training are different and they should be separated.

[Anonymous]

I sleep trained and then gradually night weaned later (dropped 1 feed at a time). It 100% can be done and I think it would help this OP. After sleep training he went to sleep after his night nurses instead of wanting to be held to sleep.

[Anonymous]

I don't mean to say that the PPs are wrong because our baby was easy, but we had independent bedtime and naps before baby dropped the last night feed, and we still do a dream feed at 7 months. But we did E-A-S from day 1 and only held for occasional naps.

[Anonymous]

Oh man OP, I'm laughing because you've had every possible response from every end of the spectrum. Sleep training is clearly not a science. Godspeed, however you can get some sleep I hope you do!

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Thanks everyone. (OP) co-sleeping is not an option and neither is dropping the night feeds. I do think she’s overtired from not napping. We have to keep working at it.

Ferber doesn't work unless you drop the night feeds. Dropping the night feeds is step one in ferber if you read the actual book. You have to gradually reduce them one at a time first. Signed, someone who ferber'd a tough 7.5 month-old

Have you every actually read Ferber's book - he clearly says night weaning and sleep training are different and they should be separated.

Right. and He says you can't sleep train until you have night weaned.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Thanks everyone. (OP) co-sleeping is not an option and neither is dropping the night feeds. I do think she’s overtired from not napping. We have to keep working at it.

Ferber doesn't work unless you drop the night feeds. Dropping the night feeds is step one in ferber if you read the actual book. You have to gradually reduce them one at a time first. Signed, someone who ferber'd a tough 7.5 month-old

Have you every actually read Ferber's book - he clearly says night weaning and sleep training are different and they should be separated.

Right. and He says you can't sleep train until you have night weaned.

OP doesn't want to do it.
But I second night weaning. There is zero reason to feed in the middle of the night. The fact that the Dr is not against it is just that - nobody is against night feeds, but night feeds are not compatible with sleep training. At 6 months baby can't tell if he'll be given a boob in the middle of night or ignored, hence the distress. Ferber works in less than 10 days when done properly.

[Anonymous]

I am against sleep training if it involves crying alone, but if I were you OP, I would try a dream feed at 11 (before you go to bed) and hold off feeding until 5-6 am.

I have 3 kids and never let them cry alone. My first STTN on her own at 9 months. My second did not sleep through the night until after 2 and my third somewhere in between.

We took turns sleeping with the baby and we were never too exhausted

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Thanks everyone. (OP) co-sleeping is not an option and neither is dropping the night feeds. I do think she’s overtired from not napping. We have to keep working at it.

Ferber doesn't work unless you drop the night feeds. Dropping the night feeds is step one in ferber if you read the actual book. You have to gradually reduce them one at a time first. Signed, someone who ferber'd a tough 7.5 month-old

Have you every actually read Ferber's book - he clearly says night weaning and sleep training are different and they should be separated.

Right. and He says you can't sleep train until you have night weaned.

OP doesn't want to do it.
But I second night weaning. There is zero reason to feed in the middle of the night. The fact that the Dr is not against it is just that - nobody is against night feeds, but night feeds are not compatible with sleep training. At 6 months baby can't tell if he'll be given a boob in the middle of night or ignored, hence the distress. Ferber works in less than 10 days when done properly.

Yeah, always stem to anonymous people on the internet before your pediatrician. /s

[Anonymous]

OK, I think you should try for longer naps. So, here are some tricks:

1. put her to bed sooner for her naps. Once a baby is yawning and rubbing their eyes, they are OVERTIRED. Yup - it's true! So after 2 hours of being awake, especially at that first morning nap, put her down. Now, I'd strongly encourage you to put her to bed in her crib and put your hand on her tummy and gently rock her side to side. perhaps with forehead rubs or hair rubs as well.

Dark room, not holding her, have her learn to fall asleep in her bed - even if it takes you 20 minutes or rocking and rubbing at the beginning, that's fine! Now, at this point you might need to have her get drowsy in your arms and then transfer her to crib, but that often gets them revved up again, so I tend to just start them in their cribs from the beginning. If you feed her, then change her diaper after the feeding so she is a bit awake before putting her down.

2. be alert! The first second she starts to waken, get in there and, without saying a WORD gently rock her tummy and get her back to sleep. No talking at all. Might take her 15 or 20 minutes (be patient, calm yourself, get your heartbeat down, breathe rhythmically, etc - a calm parent begets a sleeping baby so FAKE it till you make it) You want her to learn to sleep through that weird wakeup thing they have about 30 minutes into their naps (REM, non-REM, I can't remember the scientific terms right now)

She will NOT fall asleep on her own - you've had 6.5 months to figure that out. You need to help her at this point.

3. do this for every nap. see if she can sleep a 2 hour nap at 7am (ish) then a 1 hour nap 2 or 3 more times in the day.

4. Honestly, babies are crazy, and often need to have their first nap only 2 hours (or 1.5 hours) after they wake up in the morning! Seems so crazy, but whatever. They can often go a full 3 hours mid day, but not before that first nap.
So wakeup at 5;30?
first nap 7:30am - start at 7am THEN
wakes up at 8:30? next nap starts at 11am-ish
wakes up at 9:30am? next nap starts 2.5 to 3 hours later

5. Do all these things - placing baby on back, gently rock and rub, help her to go back to sleep after she wakes 10-20 minutes into her nap.

6. As she gets settled with you more quickly, (3 days? 5 days?) you will start to back off and rock her to mostly drowsy, then lift your hand and let her fall asleep herself. drowy, eyes fluttering, heavy, staying closed more than open.... that's what you are looking for and you lift your hand, or make the rocks slower. Then a few days later you back off a bit earlier, and so forth. DON'T WALK AWAY - these babies SENSE your presence. But eventually, you will be able to give her 5 minutes of rocking and rubbing and walk away, so that's the goal - let it take 2 weeks to get there, though.

Again, during this last stage, if she needs help to go back to sleep after the 20 minute nap, do that, but she should get better at learning to sleep through that sleep transition.

While you are working on naps, keep doing the same thing at bedtime with rocking the same length of time, etc. Just, if she sleeps better during the day, she should sleep better during the night because she's not so exhausted.

Keep feeding her at night, but after burping her (if she needs it) place her back in the crib and put her back to sleep - nurse/feed in a darkened room, no lights, no music, no dancing or talking or partying with parents.

She should be able to get it with this consistent, slow approach to TEACHING her how to fall asleep. The goal is that you kiss her on the forehead, pop her in her crib and walk out and she nuzzles and wiggles and falls asleep on her own.

Because when a child falls asleep on their own without an adult presence or help, then they can fall asleep in the middle of the night without an adult's presence or help. But - you need to lead her that way gently.

This might take 6 weeks, but it should work. And it might take less time! Try it. I couldn't stand, as I'm sure you cannot, listening to a young baby cry for an hour every night for 10 days, and not see any difference (I mean, she should be at least crying for less time by now or something!) So this isn't working, try a more gentle teaching approach.

Not everyone quits smoking by going cold turkey, others wean down and eventually get to nothing.