Mama's Lullablog

It was a few weeks before Christmas when our 3.5-month-old son started fighting naps.

He was a contact-napper, so when I say fighting, I mean fighting. Writhing in our arms. Attempting to roll away from our embrace. Face-palming us as he arched his back and neck, his forehead and ears and cheeks flush pink from screaming. 

At night, we’d rock him to sleep, and then delicately place him in his crib, praying he wouldn’t wake up when his head felt the mattress. (This was around the time I started researching newborn sleep, and I became very confused by this “drowsy but awake” business.)

L would proceed to wake up every couple of hours, and some nights, he refused to fall back asleep. There were two rough nights I distinctly remember between Christmas and New Year’s when I held him for two hours between 3:30-5:30am just so that we could both get some sleep.

I sent my husband a text on Dec. 22 with two links: Signs of Sleep Regression in Babies and What to Do About It and Is Your Baby Going Through the 4-Month Sleep Regression?

His response: “that’s definitely what we’re dealing with”

My next text? Sleep Training for Babies. 😂

Like a lot of new moms, I wasn’t thrilled about the idea of listening to my baby cry without interfering, but after L turned 4 months old, my husband and I were ready for relief.

When I started looking into sleep training, I discovered The Ferber Method.

What is The Ferber Method?

Essentially, The Ferber Method is a gentler version of “cry-it-out” (CIO) – meaning you allow your baby to cry for a certain amount of time before intervening. 

For example, the first night, you start by waiting 3 minutes before checking on your baby, and then increase to 5 minutes after the first check-in, and then 10 minutes, repeating 10-minute intervals for as long as it takes for your baby to fall asleep.

I liked this incremental increase in CIO time because I always had a minute-mark to look forward to when either me or my husband could pop in to soothe our son and remind him that we were still there and that he was safe.

According to The Sleep Foundation (linked above), The Ferber Method is usually successful within 3-7 days.

We were skeptical, but hopeful.

When did you start sleep training?

We began sleep training our son shortly after he turned 4 months old. It’s recommended to wait until a baby is 6 months old, but we needed a solution to save our sanity.

Bedtime routine & nursery set-up

I want to share a bit about his routine and his nursery because those things could have influenced his experience with sleep training.

While researching the 4-month sleep regression, I learned that an earlier bedtime could help improve sleep duration. We decided to adjust his bedtime routine to begin at 6 p.m. (previously 7:30 p.m.).

Routine

• Bath
• Diaper + lotion + boogies
• PJs
• Bottle – L is formula fed, and we sit in a rocking chair with him while he drinks. We start his Hatch lullaby music during his bottle.
• Burp
• Paci + “Goodnights”

The entire routine takes about 20 minutes. It’s simple, and we don’t include any stories because he LOVES books and reads several times throughout the day. A bedtime story would likely energize him.

Nursery

In addition to his routine, his nursery has blackout curtains over his window and a Hatch sound machine, which I programmed to play Brahms Lullaby for two hours before fading out. I chose an amber orange color for the first hour, and then a deep ruby red color for the second hour at a slightly lower volume. After that, it remains deep ruby red but stops playing music.

He sleeps in his own room, in a crib with a Newton mattress — no blankets, pillows, or stuffies. We put away all his toys and books before bedtime, so the floor is clear. I do this partly because I don’t want there to be any distractions if he wakes up, but also so that we don’t trip over anything in the dark!

How did your baby respond to sleep training?

Here are my notes from the week we sleep trained. As you’ll see, night one was the worst!

Saturday, Jan. 10

6:30 p.m.

• Rocked until sleepy, laid in crib without swaddle, gave Gripe Water + Orjajel paci.
• CIO 3 minutes – Soothed with paci, “shh-ing,” and holding his hand.
• CIO 5 minutes – Soothed with paci, “shh-ing,” and holding his hand.
• CIO 10 minutes – Fell asleep 3 minutes in (paci had fallen out, so no paci); total of 11 minutes CIO until sleep.

9:00 p.m.

• Woke up, immediately provided his paci, fell back asleep.

12:00 a.m.

• Woke up, immediately provided his paci, fell back asleep.

12:15 a.m.

• CIO 3 minutes – Soothed with paci, placing a hand on his chest.
• CIO 5 minutes – Soothed with paci, placing a hand on his chest.
• CIO 10 minutes – Fell asleep at 10-minute mark.

12:55 a.m.

• CIO 3 minutes – Soothed with paci, fell back asleep.

2:45 a.m.

• CIO 3 minutes – Soothed with paci, fell back asleep.

4:00 a.m.

• CIO 3 minutes – Soothed with paci, fell back asleep. Woke up a few minutes later but rolled over and fell asleep again.

4:45 a.m.

• CIO 5 minutes – Fell back asleep without intervention.

Sunday, Jan. 11

6:40 p.m.

• Rocked until sleepy, laid in crib without swaddle, gave Gripe Water + Orajel paci.
• CIO 5 minutes – Replaced paci, stopped crying and closed his eyes.

11:53 p.m.

• CIO 5 minutes – Replaced paci, fell back asleep.

12:03 a.m.

• CIO 5 minutes – Didn’t end up needing intervention; fell back to sleep after a few moments of crying and never lost paci.

Monday, Jan. 12

6:30 p.m.

• Rocked until sleepy, laid in crib without swaddle, gave Orajel paci.
• CIO 10 minutes – Fell asleep within a minute.

12:30 a.m.

• CIO 10 minutes – Paci, back to sleep.

5:00 a.m.

• CIO 10 minutes – Paci, tried to fall back asleep but still awake at 5:20 a.m. Trying to see if we can get a later start to our day.

Tuesday, Jan. 13

7:30 p.m. (This was an hour after we’d laid him down initially at bedtime. I didn’t make any notes about bedtime CIO because he fell right to sleep without crying!)

• CIO 12 minutes – Fell back asleep on his own after 8-9 minutes.

3:36 a.m.

• CIO 12 minutes – Fell back asleep on his own after 12 minutes (right before I was going to go give him his paci).

5:25 a.m.

• Prepared bottle, but he fell back asleep on his own before I went into his nursery.

Wednesday, Jan. 14

11:10 p.m. (This was roughly 5 hours after we’d laid him down initially at bedtime. I didn’t make any notes about bedtime CIO because he fell right to sleep without crying!)

• CIO 15 minutes – Fell back asleep on his own.

12:32 a.m.

• CIO 15 minutes – Fell back asleep on his own in 13 minutes.

Thursday, Jan. 15

No notes! Little man fell asleep right away and didn’t require any intervention overnight. Woohoo!

The Ferber Method was successful for us within five days. Occasionally, he’ll have a rough time falling asleep, and we’ll implement the same incremental wait times before checking on him. When this happens, we usually start at 10 minutes because it’s rare (if ever) that he won’t be able to put himself to sleep within that time frame.