Sleeping woes

Only a few weeks into blogging and I am already talking about the subject that strikes almost every family with a toddler at some point: sleeping (or lack thereof).

Reagan has been a good sleeper for a long time. We transitioned her to a toddler bed in October so that we could have the crib for Bailey when she arrived. Reagan did great with the toddler bed. For months and months, when it was time for bed she would willingly walk up the stairs, Bill would get her in her pjs, and she would walk over to her bed and climb in and say "ni-night." There was no crying, no tantrums, just good old "ni-night."

I don't know where or how we started to go wrong, but a few weeks ago she started resisting going to bed. She would hop back out of bed after us and start crying and would stand at her gate until you came. As soon as she saw you she would stop crying and go back to bed. But try to leave, and the crying and standing at the gate would start again. We have tried every known method and plenty of our own improvisations to get her to go to sleep. Even once we got her to sleep she would wake back up and we'd start all over again. Two nights ago it was over two hours and after 10pm before she was finally asleep for the night. Despite all of our efforts things were getting worse, not better.

So, as the last ditch effort last night we did the dreaded "Cry it Out" or "CIO." This isn't a method I don't believe any parent uses lightly. Unfortunately, it seemed like our last option. So, Bill put her to bed, walked out, and the crying at the gate began. And it continued. And continued. And continued. Part of the reason we don't do CIO is because Reagan is often as stubborn or more so than her parents. I will usually cave long before she is out of stamina. But not last night. We let her cry and 1 hr and 15 minutes later the crying stopped. This was half the time it took her to get to bed the night before but far more gut wrenching for us.

About 15 minutes later we went and checked on her. Had I not have been 99% postive I would have woken the slumbering beast, I would have taken a picture of what we found. It was the cutest, most pitiful thing I ever saw. When we walked up to her room at the gate, all you could see was two little feet. When you looked further, you could see that the poor baby had fallen asleep sitting up and leaning against her laundry hamper that happened to be right near the door. This is astounding because other than in her car seat, Reagan has never fallen asleep sleeping up or outside of a bed. Bill picked her up, put her in bed, she cuddled one of her babies, and stayed asleep until morning. She actually woke up in a good mood this morning. Something that is a bit of a rarity.

So all of that to say, I hope we are going to get back on track again. I'm hoping she/we don't suffer through another hour of CIO but I remind myself that it was till half the time of putting her down without it. Keep your fingers crossed that the sleeping fairy sprinkles her with plenty of magic dust tonight so she goes down without so much trouble. I want my good sleeper back!