Behind Bars

Well we finally decided to do it... After a week of being sick and sleeping in our bed, we decided to let Jarem go back to his crib. If you noticed any bags under our eyes today... we appreciate you telling us we, "look great today".

It was a lot harder this time around, because we're working on Jarem's "Self Soothing". Basically what this means is that we've mastered Mommy soothing (calming him at night with milk) and Daddy soothing (bouncing and doing laps around the kitchen and dining room in the middle of the night when Mommy soothing doesn't work). Now we've graduated and are working toward mastering self-soothing. Basically we start the bedtime routine: bath, singing, and a good dinner then when he's doped up on the warm milk but still awake, we put him in his crib and say goodnight. We put him in awake so that he knows where he is, and associates the crib with sleeping. Before, we would get him to sleep in our arms and then place him somewhere. When he wakes up he's like, "What the heck!? Every time I shut my eyes the whole world changes!" (I have an audio recording of him saying that... I'll work on posting it online.)

Then after 5 minutes of talking, sleeping or crying, we go back in to his room and calm him if necessary. We let him know that we're still there for him and can hear his crys. Then we say goodnight again and wait 7 minutes... then again at 10 minutes and up to 15 minutes. If he's still crying after 15 minutes, we pick him up, calm him down, fix whatever is wrong (hunger, diaper etc.) and start the cycle over again.

Last night was a little rough, we had to go through the cycle 1.5 times before he would drift off to sleep, and then I had to get up a few times through the night and assure him that everything was okay... the funny thing is that between me getting out of bed and getting to his room... he was already back asleep... I think he was just trying to test me.

The wonderful news is that I started typing this post while starting the first cycle tonight... and he's asleep! Jamie and I only had to go into his room once! What a wonderful baby. Wish us a good night!