The Backstory
We started sleep training our baby at 6 months. We had used the Ferber Method before with our 3 year old (at about 9 months). But, this time around, my wife and I ran into some snags. Maybe a month after starting the sleep training, we spent a week on vacation to the East Coast. During this time, we spent a good deal of time traveling via plane and the four of us shared a room. We purposely let our progress slide since we wanted the baby to sleep as much as possible on the plane and we wanted to get him to and back to sleep as quickly as possible in the shared room. This was probably not the best decision…
What we created was a baby who only wants to fall asleep nursing or with myself rocking him. We continued this path for 6 weeks thinking that things would naturally progress back into healthy sleep habits. We grew content with either rocking or nursing before bed and and an additional 3 – 4 times at night since it was quick and easy.
The Problem
The real problem arose when my wife had a minor surgery and was unable to lift the baby for 6 weeks. It didn’t take long to highlight the issue with our current sleep predicament. I believe, because we shared the responsibilities of getting the baby back to sleep, the burden was not too great for either parent. Additionally, we altered who ‘got up’ with the baby, so it only felt like 1 – 2 times a night and for less than 5 minutes each time. Now; on the other hand, getting up with the baby 3 – 4 times and preparing 1 – 2 bottles a night was too much and we needed this fixed before we made it any more difficult on ourselves.
The Solution
We have had success with the Ferber Method in the past, and it is pretty straightforward and easy to follow. The hardest part is listening to your baby actively being in distress. But, if executed well and consistently, you’ll have less crying in the long run and a happier family too.
“There is evidence from an evolutionary standpoint that we are wired to respond to children’s cries,” … “This is a very deep drive, and it kind of goes against our natural inclination to ignore this.”
Craig Canapari, M.D., director of the sleep medicine program at the Yale School of Medicine and the author of the forthcoming book, Never Too Late to Sleep Train.
The Plan
The baby’s crib had previously been in the guest room because of some remodeling, so we moved it back into his own room. We moved a rocking chair in there and added some books nearby. I also made sure the sheets were freshly washed and the room nice and clean, since this would be a ‘fresh start’, I wanted everything fresh. We laid out our new bedtime routine as follows:
- 5:30p solid food, followed by milk
- 6:30p bathtime
- 6:50p go for a short walk outside
- 7:00p read a book in his bedroom and put to bed
One additional part of the plan is that once 7:00p hits and the baby is put in his room, he is not to come out until the next morning. Hence, the need for the rocking chair, for feeding ect…
Important Additional Information
Right away I know that my baby can’t be comforted without being picked up – which per the instructions, we are not supposed to do. For the first couple of nights, I will have to pick him up, but only to get him to calm down. I’ll also try to condition him to allow me to comfort him without picking him up by singing Twinkle Twinkle Little Star and patting his back in a slow heartbeat-like rhythm. Once baby is calm, I’ll lay him down and continue singing and patting for about a minute. With a bit of luck, he should begin to associate the song and patting with “Calming Down”.
Next, we are also going to try to cut off his night time feedings. So we’ll have on hand some milk, but we’re going to try to limit to amount.
Last, he’s really really stubborn, so expect some long nights…
Night 1 
Sept. 21, 2019 – (23% of the night crying)
Phew! This night was tough. Luckily I went to bed at 9:00p to try and offset some of the lack of sleep that I was in for. I got the baby down pretty easily following the Ferber Method. He took about 35 minutes total to go down. So… 3 mins, 5 mins, 8 mins, and 10 minutes. I do think I cheated a bit on that because each round, he was falling asleep on my shoulder, so the last time, he may have just been closer to falling asleep. Each time also, I left him after about 1 minute of patting his back and singing.
The biggest challenge came at 11:10p when the baby woke up and wouldn’t go back to sleep. We tried the normal 3, 5 and 8 minutes before deciding to give him a small bottle. After the bottle and a fresh diaper, we restarted the method (11:45p). Whoa boy…
This round took the most stamina. 3, 5, 8, 10, 12, and 15 minutes. At the very end of the 15 minute frame, at 1:10a he fell asleep completely on his own. Now, you might be thinking, “Hey Ross, these times don’t quite add up.” Well, there is 1 – 3 minutes between each frame to calm him down and oddly enough, after almost every frame, he would lay there (or sleep?) for a few minutes, before crying again.
I guess I should finish with how the night ended. It ended really well actually. After the 1:10a final bedtime, the baby woke up again at 6:50a cooing and chatting happily. We’re ready to continue this experience…
Night 2
Sept 22, 2019 – (11% of the night crying)
Night 2 went better but I still cheated a lot, accidentally; of course, but at least when we were starting out, the baby kept falling asleep on me or with me patting his back. I’m starting to understand the importance of not picking him up, although as mentioned above, currently that is my only way of calming him. However, tonight he did much better with me calming him by singing and patting his back.
The numbers speak for themselves, but as you can see above, he woke at 3:10a. I was able to calm him down and get him back to sleep, but only for 30 – 40 minutes. When he woke back up, we figured he must be hungry, so we fed him and changed his diaper, he took a good bit of settling, but after a big burp I knew he was going back down. Huge sign of improvement here too, he went back down on his own and stayed down the rest of the night.
Night 3 
Sept 23, 2019 – (9% of the night crying)
Things are definitely getting smoother. The transition into bedtime went great. I still think I have been cheating a little because he was so tired at bedtime, that I practically had to wake him up for his story and bed. He moaned for about a minute before falling asleep. Tonight was; however, different in that he wok up twice and managed to get himself back to sleep in less than 5 minutes! That part was a huge success and 3 nights in we’re absolutely seeing positive progress.
The biggest challenge came at 2:50a. We waited 8 minutes, tried to soothe him, again for 10 minutes, tried to soothe, and ultimately decided he was too hungry to go back to sleep. My wife fed him, and after a quick burp, he was heading back to sleepy town. Again, we kind of cheated here because he was so tired that he was falling asleep on my wife and ultimately went back to sleep seconds after getting in his crib. He slept till morning and this was the first night in a long time that I have not felt exhausted in the morning.
Night 4 
Sept 24, 2019
Oh man we are seeing some progress now! My wife and I chatted about how we have 2 separate goals here. The first is to get the baby to be able to fall asleep on his own. The second is sleeping all night. We discussed it and felt it was better to focus on one at a time, sleeping all night. Tonight when the baby woke up at 2:05a (It is strange that he is waking earlier), we went ahead and fed him. He went right back to sleep with no problems and didn’t wake again until 6:50a. Total time awake all night – less than 20 minutes. He again woke up 2 other times fussing and crying but again, he was able to calm himself back down and fall asleep.
Night 5
Sept 25, 2019 – (9% of the night crying)
We’re pretty consistently getting the baby to fall asleep on his own now, the middle of the night wakeups for eating are pretty tricky. As described above, that’s 2 goals/problems. I think it’s safe to say that the sleep training has worked.
Night 6 
Sept 26, 2019 – (8% of the night crying)
Last night of documentation… We’re at only 8% of the night spent awake/crying (technically it was only a few minutes of crying since part of that time he was eating). I might do another blog on how to wean him from his nightly eating, but I think as far the Ferber Method, it was successful and works great!