3 in a row!! Can I keep this up?

I had a thought tonight...Did Ferber have kids of his own?  I will be back, I am going to google that right now;-)

Ok, I am back...I couldn't find any info on Ferber and his own life...like did he have any kids!!

We have struggled with getting Faith to go to sleep.  She just seems to have her own clock when she is tired and likes to go by that...We however, are really getting tired of it and have finally decided that we are going to start trying some of the options out there.

I know that most of her issues are because of us.  When she was born we couldn't hold her much, when we came home she slept in the crib on her own, we put her in awake, but there was a machine attached to her.  She would go to sleep with very little crying.  It took a while for her to find her voice. 

Then the tube came out of her tummy and we were so excited!!  She could sleep in our bed now...it took 7 months before she could do that.  This is when we should have continued what we had been doing already and continuing to put her in her crib at bedtime and let her go to sleep...

BUT...

We could spend some extra time bonding with her, we could soak up the love, we could cuddle with no more worries...we could just let her sleep in our bed for a while, to help soothe her...now that there was no more food going in to help soothe her.

...and

that is what we started doing.  We don't have much issue with the whole idea of co-sleeping.  2 of our older kids slept in bed with us for the first year, and they finally ended up in their own beds with no issues. 

That was the plan with Faith.  I say that WAS the plan with Faith because she is almost 3 and we are really struggling to get her to sleep in her own bed.  It wouldn't be so bad if she wasn't so driven by her sensory need to feel flesh on flesh...imagine waking up to a foot up your shirt, and not just sitting there...she leaves bruises!!

We just can't do that anymore.  We are too tired to deal with it now...it is time for her to go to her own bed...and stay there.

All of our workers have suggested the Ferber Method.  I had heard about this method...kids crying it out, only going in at certain times...sounds harsh.  But, the other options were physically painful...we were also told not to start it until we were ready to go full throttle.

So, we waited until recently.  We started it on Monday, just this past week.  Up she went to bed.  She was MAD...and that is an understatement.  She was throwing things around, and coming out of the room every.single.second it s

eemed.

That first night it was just over 1.5 hours.  She didn't sleep through the whole night and ended up with us at some point (probably after 4am...which seems to be her waking time).

Tuesday, same thing.  Up into her bed, and left to cry.  This time there was a lot of ruckus going on (love that word:-)  She was extremely upset and we don't know what she was doing up there.  But, about 1.5 hours went by and she was finally asleep.  Again, not for the whole night, just a portion...and then back with us again.

I am sure Ferber would be mortified that we let her back in our room...but we are just too exhausted to deal with putting her back into her room...at 4am...

On Wednesday we saw marks on her right butt cheek.  We are worried now that she is self injuring while mad.  We are documenting everything now and watching for patterns...that would need to be dealt with in a totally different way.

Then, in Patton-like inconsistent behaviour, we reverted back to the old way of putting her to sleep.  She was going for surgery the next day and it was really bothering me that she was potentially self injuring...the heart won...

Same thing on Thursday night, she had a traumatic day and the heart won out again, she snuggled until she went to sleep. 

I know, it is not a good thing to start something and then let the inconsistency kick in...we probably totally confused her, but we got back to it last night.

Friday night, I sat outside her door while she cried.  I went in at the right times to check on her and she was just so mad.  She again, was throwing stuff around and crying at the door.  It really is hard to sit there and listen to her crying like that, but this is what they suggested...

This time it was only an hour and she was asleep, curled up in a nice little ball, on her sisters bed (who went to bed in another room). 

We will try it again a few more times, at least a week...possibly 2 and if it just isn't working then we are going to have to try something else.

I was reading about the different methods that are suggested out there today and this really seems to be the hardest one.  Very controversial too... it is called "graduated extinction".  How awful does that sound?  EXTINCTION!!   I am becoming extinct in my childs life?  Hm...

Another one is the same concepts as Ferber, but you remain in the room with your child.  You do not snuggle them, or cuddle or talk to them, you are just a presence in the room with them.  We have done that too, but it is still hard when she is wanting to sleep WITH us. 

Another one was positive routines.  This one says you wait until the child is showing signs of being tired and then you start to positively show them how to relax...problem with this one is...Faith never gets tired!!

And then there was Dr. Sears, I think, who says to pick them up when they are crying and put them down when they are not crying...(pu/pd method) which is basically what we had been doing, and it just is not working. 

This was one of the things we wanted to see changed when we changed the meds, but so far the only change has been that instead of waking up 2 times after midnight, she is only waking up once.

So, we try this method a little longer and see what happens.  We need to be rested, we need to sleep...and as long as this keeps happening, I don't really see that becoming a reality for us...