I am by NO means an expert at sleep (take a look at some of my posts
), but at least read this if you are at the point I have been at, so desperate for sleep, you start thinking everyone else can't be wrong, maybe it will be OK to let your lo CIO.
Well, my lo, 10 months this week, has never slept through the night until one night last Wednesday. I was beyond excited. It was the first time I had slept a stretch longer than 2 hours in, well, 10 months. He didn't cry until 4:30am.
I called everyone I knew and got the same response from everyone "...if he cries tonight after falling asleep, just let him be and he will learn..."
That day my ds went to bed as usual, and a 9:30 I heard his first cry. It wasn't a cry of desperation, we all know that cry, just a cry of "I'm up". As I walked to his nursery everyone's advice of just letting him cry was running through my head and I was kicking myself for being such a wimp that I couldn't do it.
It was then that I went into his room and saw my lo sitting up holding his blanket COVERED in vomit. The entire crib was covered, the walls and even the floor. He was sitting in a literal puddle of vomit. Only when he saw me did the real cry start and from there the night didn't end.
As soon as I picked him up, he was asleep in my arms, probably from the pure dehydration and exhaustion from all the vomit. In my gut, I was sick thinking, what if I had just let him cry? He would have fallen asleep probably right where he was, in a puddle of vomit, alone, scared and hurting. He would have thrown up again (as he did all night) and could have aspirated in his own vomit, all because I would have wanted some sleep?
?
What about all the other babies who have been left to "cry it out"? How many are scared, sick, or hurt that may have needed their mom or dad at night but knew that crying wouldn't get them anywhere or anyone because it hasn't in the past. How many fevers have gone undetected until morning when it was "time" to get the baby up.
Believe me, I have been desperate enough that the thought crossed my mind. But, your baby is only your baby for so long. Sleepless nights only last for so long. We need to think every time we are at the end of our ropes and are feeling like we just can't take it any longer and you almost resent that little being keeping you up for 2 hours in the middle of the night....you have been given a gift that needs to be nurtured, loved, and cared for and you must be thankful every day for it, because if you read through some of the recent posts, it can be taken from you at any time, for no rhyme or reason.
What's a little lost sleep.