Wish List

CC relaxes in the park

I have an extensive wish list. It is a list of things that I would like to get accomplished prior to baby #2's arrival. Although there are still 5 or 6 months to go, the wish list is long. Most of the items deal with baby #1. For instance, potty training is one of the items. However, my husband and I deemed the most important to be sleeping through the night. Because the only thing worse than one baby not sleeping through the night would be two babies not sleeping through the night.

We had planned on starting last month, but decided to delay the training until after our NYC trip. We aren't letting her cry it out, or anything that I deemed too unethical. We have simply decided to remove the nighttime feeding. Most of my friends are surprised that I still feed her in the middle of the night. The way I explain it it that it was simply a natural extension of her feeding schedule. Approximately 3 months ago, she herself started waking up less often (once instead of three times). It was a relief that she was only waking up once, and she would immediately fall asleep after drinking a bottle of milk. One wake-up, I could handle, so we continued this way.

Yet the prospect of two babies waking up in the middle of the night to be fed drove us to action. I fully realized that by feeding her in the middle of the night, I was rewarding her, and thus encouraging her to wake up. However, just as she had cut out the other nighttime feeds, I was hoping she would naturally cut this one out on her own. I have been waiting over three months...

Night # 1 went not so badly. She fell asleep around 9PM, woke up a little before 4 AM. My husband tried offering her some water, whereupon she shed a few tears (not more than 10 seconds) and then allowed herself to be slowly rocked back to sleep in my husbands arms. This took approximately 1.5 hours. She then woke up for good a little before 7AM.

Night # 2 was a slight improvement. She fell asleep shortly after 8PM, woke up a little after 1AM, and was rocked back to sleep after 1.5 hours. She did not cry. She then woke up at 6:30AM for good.

Night # 3 was what we were hoping for. She fell asleep at 8:40PM, and made it to 6:20AM the next morning without a peep. There was one false alarm in the middle of the night, but she must have been dreaming because she was sound asleep when I went to check on her.

I was shocked that it had been this easy. Had I known, I would have started the training months ago. Now if only she could keep this up... I am half expecting her to catch another cold virus any day now, and disrupt our new-found bliss.