Nights

Léo has been such a joyous little toddler lately. He’s funny, loves to be chased, stares at people in the street until they look at him and then buries his head in Joe’s or my shoulder, babbles non-stop, smiles and hugs all the time. Daytime is splendid.

Night time is another story. In the past few months, Léo has been better at sleeping through the night a couple to a few times a week –that usually means 8 or 9 hours straight. He sleeps on average 12 hours per day –which is below average but still within an acceptable range. When he was a newborn and until he was about 4 months old –pretty much until we unswaddled him- he slept more than average: 20 hours per day when he was just born to 16 hours at 4 months. Then, as you know, it all changed and we’ve been struggling with night sleep. He still sleeps a lot during the day but nights are tougher. We have better nights than when he was 8 months old and woke up twice a day for up to 2-3 hours at a time during which he needed to be rocked. Now he wakes up once for one to two hours –and still needs to be rocked. Sometimes he lets us rock him on the glider but most nights we stand up and rock him while he sits straight –as if he were in the Ergo.

Last week was terrible because he was sick. Joe and I spent two nights taking turns rocking him for more than three hours. I cried and cried in frustration. Yesterday he refused to go to bed until 10. Now I know he’s only 14 months old so when I say he refused to go to bed I mean he refused to be rocked. I could have put him in his crib and let him cry but I just can't do that.

Long story short, I feel like a failure. I know sleep is important for his body and his mind yet I can’t bring myself to do sleep training. I know I created this routine that keeps him awake at night and I know I need to get rid of it but I feel too guilty to let him cry it out (plus we have neighbors who might not appreciate being woken by a screaming baby at 2AM). Part of me realizes that avoiding CIO is for me as much as it is for him: *I* hate hearing him cry and I’d rather rock him for hours than face his tears. But really, the boy needs sleep. Joe and I need sleep. So I’m going to try to find a solution that is not 100% CIO but that will allow him to constantly sleep through the night. I will talk to his daycare providers and try to enforce two naps a day -we're having a bit of an issue with that right now. I feel we’re back to square 1 (8 months ago when I first started sleep training).

Maybe I can hire a nanny that will stay with Léo while he cries it out and Joe and I go out for a drink or three. I wish…