My Daughter - The Weeble

OK, so the wife is back at work and we have decided that some changes have to be made if we are to survive. The most obvious and pressing change concerns sleeping. To whit, getting the baby to sleep more than 45 minutes at a time during the night. While Mom was off work, she could better deal with the exhaustion, but not now. So we have been talking about letting the baby cry it out.

Last night at about 8.30 she woke up and I went like usual to sit with her and pat her on the back until she fell asleep again. She wasn't having any of it, and after 45 minutes of sitting with her while she screamed I couldn't take it any more and decided it was time to let her cry it out. I told her I loved her, gave her a kiss and split. Now she must have been pretty exhausted by then because the crying only lasted for about ten minutes more, but she would NOT go back to sleep. F no! She sat in the crib, she crawled in the crib, she stood in the crib and she flailed in the crib, but she would NOT go back to sleep. Eventually after almost 3 hours we realised (we are watching all this on the video monitor a friend leant us for this very occasion) that she had fallen asleep while sitting up. The poor little weiner, she was wobbling almost half over and then pulling herself back up straight. Doing the head bob and the startled jerk. She is soooo stubborn. Anyhow, after 11 I relented and went in and laid her down on her belly. She didn't get up again until 3.45, and that is ok.

As I type this now she has been awake for about 15 minutes. Crying off and on and sitting in the middle of her crib. I went in when she first sat up and laid her down and told her I loved her, and will go back in and lay her down again at the half hour mark. It breaks my heart, but I know from my experience when the teenager was wee that this will work.