Sleeping

He will be different with Grandma. My son would let my mom rock him to sleep in her arms. Now other babies let me do that. It may have something to do with smelling the breast milk.
They know it's right there, they can smell it. When he is with Grandma, he wont smell it and should do much better. In the time untill you leave him with her at night, observe how different he is with her. Maybe leave him with her while you go to the store if you haven't left him with her before. Compare notes when you get back on how he behaves with her and with you. I hope I am right and he is calm for her at night.

I would talk to the lady you care for. If she is a mom she may be more understanding then you think about your situation and need to let your child learn to self comfort.

I agree with Jessica O. When we were weaning our 4 m/o of night feedings, my husband helped with the process. This is how we did it: We determined how many times a night our daughter awoke. It was usually three times. I gradually lessened the amount of her first and third feeding, and made sure she got a full second feeding. When she got to the point where it was obvious she was only sucking for comfort and not hunger (she would fall asleep after a couple minutes), my husband would get up with her for the first and third time while I continued to feed her the second time. We then did the same thing to eliminate her last feeding.

Our daughter more readily accepted other forms of comfort (rocking, pacifier, etc.) from him than from me. She hasn't been eating at night for over a month (she is 6 months); and now, if she does wake up, I can soothe her without her having the nursing expectation.

The process worked well for us. Hope this helps!

S.,

My 8 month old son is the same way. I have found if I send my husband in the room he will take a pacifier, and go back to sleep. But if I go into the room, he ONLY wants to nurse.

I think it will be very good for your son to spend the night with his Grandma! Grandma's love Babies, and Babies love Grandmas. He will problably take a pacifer, or bottle just fine from her.

I have found that Grandma's & Grandpa's are more tolierant then we are. They are great people, and wonderfull assets for our children!

I say keep your normal routeen, and he will be okey with his Grandma.

I believe that no matter what we do babies sleep through the night when they are ready, not when we are. If you
do what works for your family and trust in that I am sure your Mom will be able to support you and your baby. She has 2 nights to get through and she had many more with raising you (probably has done her share of sleepless nights). If you are able to relax and let her know what you usually do that works for you I am sure it will all work out for Grandma and David to figure out what works for them.
Take good care and best wishes to you and your lovely family.

You don't need to use the CIO method! it will break your established trust. honestly, i would recommend you read the baby whisperer by tracy hogg. she will give you many many techniques to help establish healthy sleeping.

So I have two months to attempt to get my six month old to sleep through the night.

I have 6 kids, all sleep like logs and have from birth, but what I do from the day they come home I play a lullabuy CD in the room when they go down for naps, nighttime, BUT it is ALWAYS the same cd, I do not change it one bit, after about a week they start to be lulled by the same routine and song and it becomes habit, my 18 yr old daughter who's room is right next to the little boys has to come upstairs because she starts to yawn & get drowsey when she hears the music in the next room.
this is also AWSOME when you go on vacation or camping, just bring along a portable cd player (you can get speakers for cheap) or use your computer speakers, and camping is a breeze, my kids pass out in mins. life has never been so good!

Our son had similar night habits. The night waking and nursing had me completely worn out and I was losing it. It took us a while, but here is what we worked out. He was not getting enough to eat during the day,and was making up for it at night. So we gave him warm bottles of chamomile tea with about 1 oz. of breastmilk, and rocked him back to sleep. It took about a week or two, but he worked his way to eating more during the day, and sleeping for about 9 hours at night. I then discovered that when he was woke up (more intermittently, or at 5 am) if I let him hold my breast he would fall back asleep. Now he sleeps for 11 hrs. He fusses a bit, a few times a night, but without really waking up, quiets down again.

I know some people who tried swaddling again at 6 months and it worked well for them. You just need a big swaddling blanket.

Good for you for giving yourself a couple of months to work on it. Keep reading his signs (he might be teething, even if you don't see anything, so you might also give him a dose of Tylenol and see if that helps), and don't let him cry it out. It will just make him clingier and fussier during the day.

S.,
I would continue your regular routine. Once he is with your mom, things will be different. Let her know what you do. Since she is a longtime mom, I'm sure her instincts will kick in and he will be fine. What I have found is that when our boys are with family, they are always different than when they are at home and actually better for other people.
Best wishes to you.

Hi S.,

Maybe you can try reading him the same book night after night and leave that book/s with your Mom when you go away for those 2 nights.

But I think that Grandma's are pretty good taking care of their Grandbabies and everything will be just fine.

K.

The general consensus seems to be that the Ezzo's book, "Baby Wise" really stinks! I, too agree that there are some very "stinky" parts to that book, but I was able to pick a few gems out of it that really helped my kiddos to sleep through the night as babies, WITHOUT too much crying. As simplistic as this sounds, for us (and many of my firends, as well), it was all about what I did with my guys during the day that made all the difference, and I did not have to let them be hungry or scream alone at night. Having a sleep-eat-play-sleep-eat-play schedule (or as close as your particular baby can come to that) during the day helps them to get enough food during the day and to establish good rest so that they are not so over-tired or hungry at night that they are up, up, up. Here is what I and my friends have found: you have to pick a morning wake-up time and a bed time and stick with it. I chose a 7:30 PM bedtime and 7:30 AM wake-up time. No matter what, even if you just nursed at 6:00 AM, you put baby back to sleep after nursing and then wake him up at 7:30. At 7:30, wake him up fully, give him as full a feeding as he will take, keep him awake as long as you can, then lay him down for a nap. When he wakes up from the nap, do it all over again. Then, at about 7:00 PM, give him his last feeding of the day (again, as full a feeding as possible), lay him down to sleep. Here is where the Ezzo's and I part company: during the night, when my babies would FULLY WAKE (I'm talking awake enough to scream for food, not just restlessly fussing), I would, of course, feed them, then put them right back down to sleep. I did not make them "tough it out" so mom could sleep. If your last feeding of the night comes not long before the 7:30 wake-up time, you will want to make it a scant feeding so that baby will be hungry enough to take a full feeding at wake-up time. The goal is to work up to around 3 1/2 or four hours betwen feedings during the day, though this is very individual to each child. This sort of schedule can be flexible. For instance, with my second son, I only produced a little milk at a time, so instead of a sleep-eat-play-sleep scheduele, I had him on a sleep-eat-play-eat-sleep schedule during the day so that he would get enough food to sustain him though his naps. There were some times when he was older that I did have to let him fuss a little at being put in bed, but i always knew that he was well fed and had lots of attention, so I didn't stress about it too much. My second son was VERY collicky for the first four months, so I held him a lot. But keeping him on the wake-up-and-eat day schedule even got that collicky baby sleeping 8-10 hours per night by 3 1/2 months. It may sound hokey that just by being consistent about feedings and naps during the day, a baby will start sleeping at night... but I have found that it really works, like magic. If you are consistent, the baby will eventually give up night-time feedings because his body knows he needs rest, not food. If you are interested in giving this a try, and my email is too convoluted to undestand, please feel free to email me at ____@____.com luck to you!!

You might want to try the SoundSleep CD. It has recordings of womb sounds and heartbeats. Since it is a CD, it is easy to take with you and it last for about an hour. If your CD player has a repeat button, it can play continuously if you like.

Personally, I don't believe in the cry it out method. We tried it for about 6 days and it definitely did not work. My 6 1/2 month old son would just scream in his crib. And I would cry too. How can that be good for anyone? We as parents are supposed to make our babies feel safe and secure, not scared and alone. I found a great book, though. It is called the No Cry Sleep Solution by Elizabeth Pantley. It offers many different gentle solutions to getting your baby to sleep through the night. You basically try the ones that you think will work for you and your baby. I just started reading it this past weekend, so we have not yet tried any methods.

Her suggestions in the book just seem to make sense to me. But every parent really needs to do what he/she feels is right.