I had a dream

I had a dream...

No, that's it - I had a dream! Guess why? Mr. Nate slept from 7:30 to 2, and 2 to 7 for the last two nights! The first night I was stupid and went to bed at 1, last night I was asleep at 11. Blissful.

I am proud of myself for following my instincts regarding his sleep and Cry-It-Out techniques. Everyone I talked to seemed to think that he was getting up too much during the night, including my pediatrician. She urged me to "Ferberize" him. Well, even Ferber doesn't think a kid should be Ferberized prior to 6 months! Stewart and I toyed around with a few techniques, and we settled on this: If he wakes up between feedings (ie: less than 3 hours before the last feed), we let him cry for 5 minutes. Often he put himself back down. If it went on longer than that, or was really screamy, one of us went in, picked him up, and cuddled him. "They" say you're not supposed to take him out of the crib, but patting him on the back just pissed him off. So we cuddled him for a minute or two, and whether or not he stopped crying (about 50% of the time), we put him back down in the crib and closed the door. He usually cried for another minute or two, and that was it!

If it had been 3 hours, I just went ahead and fed him. I figured he'd start sleeping longer when he was ready, and look what happened!

My opinions and instincts on babies have really changed since having one. I'm such a cliche, I know! But I knew what was right for my kid, and I followed my gut. Having him sobbing and screaming, by himself all alone, was not right for us. Comforting him, while still trying to teach him to fall asleep on his own, was. And it paid off!

On another note: I am so relieved that I fought Stewart on using the first name Henry. I do like it, but everyone in the universe is using it! The kid in the next block is Henry, and I just found out an old friend was planning on using it if his girl was a boy. Plus two of the blogs I read, and the middle name of two friends. Phew!

(No offense intended to anyone who has a kid named Henry or is planning on using Henry. It's just really popular around me right now!)