A Walk Down Memory Lane

When we were in the hospital with Ashton, the nurses kept commenting that we were laid back parents. We were completely fine with Ashton sleeping in the bassinet and letting her stay there. She loved sleeping so we did not see the reason to wake her up constantly just to look at her. When we left the hospital, we had to wake Ashton up every three hours to eat, which was annoying but was necessary for her to grow. Once the doctor told me I could stop doing that, life was even better! Ashton slept anywhere, any time, and for several hours at a time. Here are some pictures of her early sleeping styles.

Flash forward two and a half months and Ashton sleeps pretty well at night still (maybe one feeding a night). However, her daytime naps and wake periods were getting difficult. Ashton would take 45 minutes naps and then struggle to stay awake longer than about 45 minutes. To get her down for a nap, I would walk, rock, shush, swaddle, stand on one foot and jump (not really but that's what it felt like) for an hour to get her to sleep. Normally, she'd be crying for most of it until she lost all hope and crashed. Then at nighttime, Joseph and I switched off every half hour or so trying to get Ashton down to sleep. Once she was asleep in our arms, we'd put her in the crib only for her to wake up ten minutes later. Literally from about 7pm to 10pm, one of us was in her room walking circles trying to get her to sleep. Needless to say, we barely saw each other at night. Joseph and I talked about how to best help her sleep better and everything we read said, "Do whatever it takes until 4-6 months when you can do some sleep training." We discussed waiting until after her four month shots because her two month shots were a shock to her sleep cycle.

Flash forward to yesterday. Ashton took four naps, each being at least an hour, two of them being 1.5-2 hours long. She went to bed at 7:30pm after I laid her in her crib with her eyes open and then woke up at 6am. She didn't cry at all before falling asleep ON HER OWN! How did we get here? We let her cry it out.

I know, research says don't do that until the baby is 4-6 months old. But, we prayed a lot about it and felt it was best for us. And we called our pediatrician and my mom who said go right ahead. Friday night was our first night and she and I both cried strongly for about 20 minutes. Then she fussed and went in and out of sleep for another hour. At 10pm, I fed her quickly and she fell asleep immediately. Saturday we started to see a difference in her naps already. While they were still on the shorter side, she was falling asleep after being swaddled and held for about five minutes! Saturday night, she cried strongly for ten minutes and fell asleep. Sunday, she took a two hour long nap and we had to wake her up for Church. She cried for a few minutes Sunday night but not too much. Monday, she took two long naps and fell asleep while grocery shopping. And last night, no tears at all! We also started a bedtime of 7-7:30, which is great because it gives Joe and I a chance to catch up in a quiet house.

I'm sure she will need to relearn the skill of putting herself to sleep again but I must say it was not as bad as I thought it would be. And we feel she is old enough to know that we still love her. Every morning when we come and get her, she smiles and coos at us so she still loves us.

Here are some pictures of her from the other day happy as can be with bubble making.