Last night sucked. It was the longest night since Jack was a baby. His new sleep routine has been working awesomely when it comes to putting him down for naps or putting him to bed. He lays right down, doesn't even try to get up, doesn't cry and we can leave the room while he's still awake and he goes right sleep. The problem is when/if he wakes up in the middle of the night. He's not getting the hang of putting himself back to sleep. A couple of times we've caved and brought him to bed and that's really biting us in the ass. The last few nights I haven't even sat in his room while trying to get him back to sleep. Just put him in bed until he stayed and then shhh'd him a bit and then left. It seems like the nights that we have sat in there with him.....waiting for him to fall asleep.....he doesn't. The slightest movement and he pops up to see if you're still there. One of the main reasons we're doing this is because I can't sleep in there with him anymore. Just sitting on the floor for long periods of time is hard for me too. I won't do it anymore. Problem is....Jared will. We're not doing the same things and the inconsistency is blowing the whole thing.  

Not to say that the reason this isn't working is Jared's fault. He's doing what we're supposed to do....sit in there and shhhh  him and verbally comfort him until he falls asleep. It's just that I can't do it. It takes too long and it's hard for me to sit/lay in there that long. That and the fact that he will go to sleep without us in the room at nap time and at bedtime....I think means he can handle doing it in the middle of the night as well. I was ready to step it up a notch so I did.

So last night Jack cried from 12-5 and I was determined to handle it myself so I never woke up Jared to take a turn at it. From 12-2:30 I went in and repeatedly put Jack in his bed until he stayed and then I left. A few times he was quiet for a few minutes but then would start to cry again when he realized I had left. The first time I let him cry 5 minutes, the next time about 7 and then 10 minutes. Then I went in there every 10 minutes until 2:30. He would not stay in his bed. He would not calm down. So from 2:30 until about 4:30 I only went in there maybe every half hour. This is major crying it out but I really feel like he's old enough to handle it. He needs to know I'm not going to cave. Everytime I went in he reached for me to pick him up and I know he was wanting me to just give in and bring him to bed with me and it was NOT going to happen. 

By 4:30 I was kind of delirious and not really sure how much of the crying was real, how often I went in there or how much I was just dreaming. By this point whenever I did fall asleep, I was dreaming about trying to get Jack to quit crying and go to bed so it's all a blur. There were definitely quiet times when for all I know he was sleeping on the floor in his room. I heard him at 6:20 and decided it was time to get up. I opened his door and he followed me back into the bedroom while I got dressed and asked to "nuggle Mama?". We snuggled for like a minute and he was dozing so I made us get up. He's exhausted so today will be trying I imagine. I just hope tonight if he wakes up, he realizes I'm still not going to cave.