Night 2 of sleep training, Tuesday 9th of June 2009

Bedtime
Bath, only took one side when breast-feeding and had to be encouraged to breast-feed at all. I was in need of relief as after the feed at 5am, I didn't feed her when she woke up at 6.45 and my right breast was reaching beach ball proportions! I let her toddle around past her usual time of 7pm and made bedtime noises - "Fait dodo, Z?", that kind of thing!

Brought her up to bed, into sleeping bag, a moment or two of holding her and then into the cot where she seemed happy enough. Left the room. Crying started. Went back in, calmed her and left again. Calming her involved big hugs of her without taking her out of the cot, a bit of distraction and, towards the end, lying her down and stroking her and giving her sleepy bear. Repeat, repeat, repeat. This time she did fall asleep without me being in the room. Result! It took about 45 minutes which was about the same as last night but the crucial difference is I was not in the room for the falling asleep moment.

During the evening, I heard her stir and make some noises through the baby monitor. I took it as a good sign that she didn't wake up and seemed to be settling herself.

Night-time
Time spent awake by me in the middle of the night: 1 hour approx
Z woke at about 1am...12.56am to be precise. I went in, determined not to feed her or take her out of the cot and I didn't. Hurrah. I think it helped that there was no-one else home so I was not worried about disturbing anyone with her crying. She did cry. Hard. I patted and soothed and sang and hugged when I went in but I did leave the room between calmings. She seemed to drift off and I went back to my bed, snuggled down...and Z woke up. I went back in, determined not to feed or pick her up. This time..though my memory is a little hazy on the details...I did stay in the room for her to fall asleep. I sat and looked at her in the cot, reached out a hand to pat her when she sat up but she fell asleep again and slept 'til 7am. Yay.

Night 3 shall be a shambles as we are going out and she is coming too. Night 4 shall be tricky 'cause her fantastabulous father will be back in the house. While I think it would be good for him to be involved in the night-time stuff, I am not convinced he will stick it out without picking her up. Ho hum.