Sleep Training is DREAMY! Wednesday - September 24, 2008

Since our kiddos were all on the road to being healthy… last weekend we decided it was the perfect time to officially sleep train the babies.

Our sleep challenges to date with the twins have been:

1. Matteo would cry until he’d puke on himself… and that took less than 15 minutes of crying.
2. Both babies tend to be light sleepers.
3. As a result of #2, they'd wake each other up if they cried because they sleep in the same room.
4. Rocco was still waking up once or twice during the night, at minimum… sometimes for just a pacifier, and sometimes for a bottle.

So, we decided to start sleep training last weekend. Just before nap time, we would be sure their little tummies were full. Then, during their normal nap hours, we started putting them in their crib when they were wide awake, but tired. It went well for the most part with no puking and minimal crying (under 15 minutes and not hard crying – just fussy cries). Prior to this, we would usually wait until they were tired or showing signs of being tired and then “shush” and bounce them a little until their eyes would get heavy and then lay them down. Imagine doing that with TWO, 20lb+ babies, for 3 naps daily each.

We knew night-time was going to be our bigger challenge. Night-time is the fussy time for our little men, as it is for most infants. Their job is to fight sleep, right?! Rocco & Matteo usually begin getting tired in the six o’clock hour. And, we usually start the *stuffing* (stuffing = Dan & I FILLING the babies with solid food). In the past, we would take one baby up at a time… work on getting that baby to a sleepy state for 10-15 minutes. Then, do the next baby. Then, play defense with any unruly babies who might have decided they needed to be wrestled to bed. This process would last 1 hour at minimum. It was getting exhausting. Not to mention… our little men were then still choosing to wake up in the middle of the night, on most nights.

Not anymore… HOORAY!

On Monday night, we started our stuffing routine at 6:30pm, then we made bottles and both Dan & I bring the babies up to their bedroom. We rocked and snuggled them while they drank their bottles. When they were done, we put them in their cribs at the same time and kissed them goodnight.

On Monday night, Matteo cried for 10 minutes pretty hard. He didn’t puke on himself and he fell asleep. Rocco cried for 15 minutes hard… and in an effort to not let him wake Matteo, Dan went up and rocked him for 5 minutes. Rocco fell asleep and Dan put him down. BOTH boys slept 12 HOURS!!! TWELVE. YES… T-W-E-L-V-E! Hallelujah!

On Tuesday night, we did the same routine. Both boys were happy for about 2 minutes and then started crying. Both boys cried for about 8-12 minutes and then fell asleep. BOTH boys slept 12 hours AGAIN. Yes… A-G-A-I-N! 12 hours!

Tonight… we did the same routine at the same time. Both boys fussed for about 3-5 minutes and fell asleep.

I have to say… this all seems SO DREAMY to me as we were never able to do the sleep training with Gabby because she had colic. Trust me when I say we tried. I read all the sleep books… and the sleep books said the training and techniques would rarely work on babies with colic. But we tried. When we tried sleep training Gabby, she would scream for upwards of 2 hours… and it got worse every night… we quit after trying it on her 2 different times, after 3 nights.

Anyway, if you have a baby with colic… I feel for you. Honestly, I do. It is SO HARD. Whenever someone says “Twins… wow… that must be so hard.” My first reply is always “Twins are SO much easier than a baby with colic. Trust me!”