Battle for Bed - Day 4

Day three was a mixture of successes (napping on her own) and crying (by us and Maggie) Which brings us to day 4.

So last night we threw the whole cry-it-out method out the window. We got back from friends at midnight and Melissa decided to snuggle and get Maggie to sleep the way she likes and Maggie slept until 6am - she then woke up and then fell back asleep until 8am. No fighting with her, no listening to her cry. It was wonderful.

Today we had Maggie all over town and she missed some of her naps (or they were cut short). So it was no surprise that Miss Maggie was crabby by 8. Melissa took her up to put her to bed and as par for the last four days, Maggie began to cry. I was down stairs on the phone while Melissa was left to do the dirty work of letting her cry-it-out. After I got off the phone, I could hear Maggie crying and I figured MJ could probably use some support and a break, so I went upstairs. Maggie was frantically crying and coughing from being so upset and although I know we are trying to let her CIO, I picked her up anyway. Maggie was full of air from crying so hard. After that, Melissa and I talked about what our goals were and she mentioned her concern that by being “wishy washy” we are probably making it worse. Maggie may be learning to cry louder since her first cries “aren’t working”
At this point, I confessed that I don’t really agree with the cry it out method and it turns out, neither does MJ. We both agreed we are doing too many things to her at once. We are trying to get her to sleep in her crib, fix her bedtime and self soothe. In addition, I just can't help but feel like I am sending the wrong signal to Maggie. I have no doubt that the CIO method works. I have no doubt that Maggie is crying because she wants to be comforted by us. But I just keep thinking "What am I really teaching Maggie when I let her cry for 2+ hours? Am I teaching her to self soothe? or am I teaching her that she can no longer rely on us to comfort her at night? She is only 6 months old. She isn't even weaned and I am expecting her to self soothe??? That makes no sense to me. In addition, Maggie is too young to want to be independent. If she had her way, we would be with her 24/7. And I can’t blame her.
Thankfully, Melissa agreed with and had similar feelings about the cry it out method. So together we decided to focus on just getting Maggie to sleep in her crib and to get her bedtime back to 8:30pm. Once we decided that CIO was shelved- MJ snuggled Maggie up and Maggie was out like a light and slept in her crib until 1am when she lost her paci. MJ corrected the situation and Maggie was out again until. 3am for some food. She slept in her crib all night and when I left this morning, she was still asleep.
I am sure we will have to try this again later, but right now when Maggie cries – we are picking her up.