So so sleepy...

So I've been meaning to post for a while but it seems like every spare second I get I seem to (almost unconsciously) make my way over to my bed to rest :) Mr Bradley has always been a great sleeper, when he was a baby I would have to wake him all the time in order to get all his feedings in. Then when we went to on demand feedings he would only wake up once a night to nurse and go right back to sleep. For some reason, about when he turned 7 months, that changed. Now we are having sleep issues!

Ever since Mr Bradley was born Kevin and I have held him/walked him/rocked him to sleep - which was never a problem, I actually love it! But I guess when you have to do it 10 times a night, it wears on you a little. THEN when he wakes up the second you put him in his crib - no matter how long you were holding him to make sure he was in DEEP sleep - then it becomes impossible! We obviously can't hold him all night long. Many people are saying "We told you so" to me. They warned me not to hold my baby all the time and not to cuddle him to sleep every night. But I couldn't help it! He's just so darn cute and cuddly!! :)

About a month ago I realized that I had 3 goals that I needed to work on - getting Bradley out of his swaddle at night and for naps, getting him moved to his own room, and getting him to learn to sooth himself to sleep. At least I've done 2 of the 3 :) Moving him to his nursery was also really hard on me. The night we did it I was so sad, Kevin kept having to console me. I thought I would be going in there to check on him every hour to make sure he's ok. Turns out we've been going in there about every hour - not to check on him but to get him back to sleep :) Oh well, I guess I would have been doing it anyway!

After a couple weeks of him sleeping terrible we decided we needed to do something. I bought a book and picked a night to start one of the "no cry sleep solutions". I just can't bear to hear him cry - I keep telling Kevin "Is it the worst thing in the world that he just wants his Mommy and Daddy? How can we deprive him of that!?" But I came to realize that no matter what strategy we used - there was going to be some crying involved. The one I decided to try - you sit by the crib consoling him until he falls asleep, you can offer words like "It's sleepy time" and stroke his face every now and then to calm him, but can't pick him up - then you wait. The book said some babies take 10 minutes to fall asleep, some take over an hour. I thought - considering my son is as stubborn as can be - it'd be more like 2 hours. Guess how long... GUESS!

4 1/2 HOURS - PLUS! I don't know how much longer he would have gone, but I couldn't take it any longer after 4 1/2 hours, I don't know how I made it that long! So that whole night left me feeling defeated and scared to try anything else. I think being in the room made it worse on him, I think he refuses to go to sleep as long as we are there so we might just have to leave - I haven't decided on checking in on him or not. I just want to do what's best for him and sometimes not knowing what that is makes me feel like a terrible Mom :(

Anyways, now I'll work on all my other posts to get you up-to-date on everything else that's been going on - and don't worry, you'll hear much more about the sleeping...