Pacifiers Are Evil

Sleep-training a baby is not for the weak. We keep telling ourselves that there is a light at the end of the tunnel, but that was hard to remember last night when I was bent over the toilet, hoping to throw up because I was so tired that I was literally nauseous. Try not to be jealous of our glamorous life.

When I say training, I use the term loosely. We didn't read a book that promised our baby would sleep through the night at two weeks old. We just decided to try the good ol' fashioned, "let her cry it out" method after five whole months of waking up every hour and a half to stick her pacifier back in her mouth. Do you know what five months of no REM cycle will do to a person? If you're a mom, then of course you do.

The entire issue of the pacifier kind of snuck up on us. With Bella, we used a pacifier a couple of times, but she just naturally gravited towards her thumb. And I don't care what people say about the benefit of being able to take away the child's pacificer, but not being able to take away their thumb...I LOVE that Bella sucks her thumb. It's stinkin' cute and it's always there. The soothing aspect throughout her toddler years alone has made the potential future cost of braces totally worth it.

With Little Miss Evelyn, Steve and I finally decided that we had to do something. I don't know if what we're doing is right, and I'm sure there are so many other ways of doing it, but this is what we're trying. Our strategy is two-fold: (yes, I said "strategy"; we're not messin' around, people) We're trying to break her of her pacifier habit in the hopes that she'll learn to soothe herself by sucking her thumb, and we're also not going to get up in the middle of the night with her if she wakes up in-between feedings.

Last night was miserable. Basically, she cried for hours. It sounds super-cruel, but you're so tired at 3:00 AM that you just want her to be quiet, and you care less about whether or not she's happy. We followed the same method all through naps today, and she's doing pretty good at falling asleep without a pacifier. She cries for about 10-30 minutes, but falls asleep on her own. The bad time is when she wakes up in the middle of the night and doesn't easily fall back to sleep.

I used to go into her room everytime and try to soothe her by giving her the pacifier, or eventually giving in and nursing her just to get her to go back to sleep. The problem is, after having her sleep in bed with us for the first three months and getting up with her anytime she stirred, she definitely depends on my closeness for comfort. Which a big part of me absolutely loves! I've realized, though, that whatever I do in these first few months will train her for how she sleeps throughout her first year and beyond. I want her to be a good sleeper like Bella, and I'm hoping that this is the way to help her develop those skills.

We keep telling ourselves that there really is a light at the end of the tunnel, and that she will eventually master this on her own. Hopefully, it's before Steve and I break down and start crying in public.