Major sleep regression after dummy removal? Week 3...

[Sanne Panne]

We got rid of our 20 month old's dummy over the Easter weekend. She used to have it for sleeping (in her cot but also when it was nap time in the car/buggy) but she had started asking for it too often while awake (any time we put her in the car/buggy but sometimes even when out for a walk, it drove me nuts) so we decided to go cold turkey.

I keep reading these fairy tale stories where the child complains before bedtime the first and second evening and then moves on with life as if dummies had never existed. Well, not our child. She doesn't ask for it during the day any more and has become a much happier kid (so far so good) and even goes to bed fairly easily now (from happy "bye bye"when she had the dummy to major meltdowns the first few evenings without it to five minutes of complaining now) BUT she keeps waking up at some time between midnight and 3am and from then on needs our help to fall back asleep every 45 minutes to 2 hours. Last night was hell. She needs us to sssshhhh-ssssshh her at best, but more often I have to rub her back, reposition her on her pillow with all her soft toys in her arms... in some cases I've even given her a bottle of milk (she's been off bottles for ages) and I don't see any progress whatsoever. Whenever she falls asleep I lie half awake waiting for her to wake up again.

Should we ignore her requests for help/attention at night? We still share a room (we're in a one bed flat, will move in 3 weeks time and she'll have her own room but we can't deal with the broken nights that long - I'm 30w pregnant and need SLEEP!) and are considering moving our mattress to the living room so we can let her learn to fall back asleep on her own again. If she really screams or if she cries for more than 10 minutes we could go in to soothe her a bit but we can't keep getting up at the first little noise she makes and start soothing her because nobody is getting any sleep this way - not us but also not our daughter who is becoming more and more dependent on us every night.

Any advice? Should we move to the living room until she's slept through a couple of times? (except when ill/teething, she slept through from 9-10 months till the day we took the dummy away). How do we deal with this without letting her go into total meltdown? How do we soothe her (if we should do it at all) while still teaching her to go back to sleep on her own?

Edited a few times due to sleep deprived typos.

[kristymac1]

Hmmm tricky one - we have just gone through the dummy removal but our little one is 3yrs old. We have contemplated it many times in the past, but sleeping has been a major issue and to be honest we've been too wired to even contemplate taking the dummy away until now. So, how has she coped?? - really really well, so well that I think the dummy was more of a crutch for me and hubbie than for DD..... I do think it's to do with age though, we were able to reason with her and explain to her the dummy fairy: she collected up all of her dummies and put them in a special bag and hung them on the door handle, the next morning the dummy fairy came and she had left a brand new bike in the dummies place (we were planning on buying her a bike and so made it to do with that).

If you can bare to wait until your little one is older and so can understand, I'd really recommend it (path of least resistance/dummies do no real harm etc....)

Oh and we thought really hard about whether it was the right thing to 'reward' with something so big as a bike, but the dummy was such an important part of her day I really don't think it will set a precendence for anything else (fingers crossed anyway).

What ever you decide to do, good luck! xx

[ryedalema]

We're going to do the same thing. Our 2.75 year old is going to give them to the bin men on her 3rd birthday, in exchange for pressies including 'the bike'. We've managed to wean her to nights only and are happy with that as it's not affecting her speech.

My friend did the 'handing them to the bin man' thing and it really worked for her.

Good luck!

[sanity girl]

I had an identical experience to kristy, done just before my daughter turned 3, although my daughter's reward was not so big (I asked her what she would like from the dummy fairy and she said very precisely "a dark pink giraffe", so that is more or less what she got after a search on ebay!!). It was very successful. There were tears and a bit of restlessness I would say the first 3 bedtimes/nights, but after that it was fine, and now just over a month later she doesn't mention the dummy at all. So I would agree with Kristy, maybe wait until your little one is a bit older, if you can bear it?

[happydulwich]

We have been there! For our 3 year old's birthday, she had to give the dummy to the dummy fairy. She placed the dummy in a bag and then hung it on the tree in the garden for the fairy to take. The fairy took the dummy and left a number of presents. We had a few sleepless hours but she finally worked it out and now laughs at her baby sister and keeps telling her that the dummy fairy will be coming soon to collect her one!.

Please tell your friends/family what you are doing, so you all stick to the same story!

[Sanne Panne]

Oh no, 4 posts that make me think we should give it back and wait till she's 3 (she's nearly 21 months now)! I'm not against sleeping with the dummy at all - the thing is, she WILL ask for it outside the cot and it drives me insane, I really don't want her to have a dummy during the day (that bit I can't change).

I mentioned your posts to my husband and he said "don't go back, otherwise these nights of bad sleep have been for nothing", which is true - now that we got rid of it and made great progress during daytime we should probably persevere, especially since she'll have a little sister soon and once we start giving the little sister a dummy it'll be so much harder to get our toddler to give hers up. I'm really hoping she will beat the addiction before that time.

Thanks so much for the feedback so far, I think closer to 3 is probably indeed a better age to get rid of it but it doesn't work in our case with our daughter being such an addict. She doesn't actually say "dummy" anymore when she wakes up at night but something is clearly missing as she can't seem to self soothe after 2-3am. Heeeeelp!

[Claire29]

My litte boy who is nearly 2 loves his dummy, sometimes he will try and put 2 in his mouth, he always ask's for it during the day and it has driven me mad so now i'm allowing him to have it in the car, and sleep time either in buggy or cot. It is hard and sometimes i do give in just for an easy life. My older son gave his up just before 3 and we were expecting lots of tears and tantrums but it was ok he was old enough to know dummies were for babies.

If you can stick with it i'm sure it will be worth it, but sometimes doing things for an easy life is an option worth taking and if it means you get a decent nights sleep dont be hard on yourself if you do relent and let her have it. It's only a dummy and she will grow out of it. Good Luck!

[littleEDfamily]

Yep - we had the same major sleep regression (at 2 and a bit), but persevered and eventually got there - took about 2 weeks though and it nearly broke me. Then lo and behold at 3 years, she discovered her thumb - much much worse than a dummy!!!!!!!! I have to say, we have never been able to replicate the good sleep routine we had while she had a dummy (she loved that dummy so much she always went to sleep first time -it was her end of day treat, and we virtually never had bedtime dramas). I wouldn't beat yourself up for letting her have it for a bit longer, esp if just for bedtimes.

[littleEDfamily]

PS I'm the same stage of pregnancy as you are, and given you're being woken in the night, I say RELENT!!! There's no way I could have persevered if I'd been up the duff. We need every ounce of our rest!!!

[alieh]

You could sneak the dummies back in and try again when she's a bit older?

Or if you decide to persevere, you probably want to stick with a fairly consistent way of responding to her when she wakes. If one time she gets a bottle, the next time she gets a pat, the next time she yells for 10 mins before anyone comes, etc, I think they get confused and even more thrown off kilter (though we all go through many desperate measures in the dead of night...been there!). It's like she needs to learn a whole new way to fall asleep and needs to know what to expect each time. I'm no expert but have done lots of reading about teaching babies to sleep better (zzzzzz)! Does she have a lovey or other kind of comforter like a muslin? If not, you could try to get her attached to a specific thing.

If it were me, I would probably move the mattress while she's getting used to falling asleep independently again. Could you keep the mattress out until you move in a few weeks or would that just be too miserable for you?

For gentle sleep training, I like the Baby Whisperer. You could choose either the gradual withdrawal method where you start by sitting by the cot with your hand on her, then after a few days take the hand away and just sit by the cot, then move a bit further away, etc. Or you could do some kind of walk in/walk out, where you leave the room and listen...if she's just chatting or complaining/yelling, you stay out. If she gets upset, you go in, quickly soothe, and then walk out again, repeat, repeat, repeat. This link explains the different methods: http://www.babywhispererforums.com/index.php?topic=80750.0

I think the key is the repetition of the exact same steps every time she wakes. Takes alot of stamina, especially pregnant! But I would think you would see a big improvement within a week?

But I wouldn't feel at all bad about giving the dummies back if I were in your situation, so good luck whatever you decide!

[ludoscotts]

hi our little one will be 3 in nov and planning on getting rid of the dummy then too but if its the daytime that is bothering you could you not trlent for the night time but stick to your guns during the day? would she understand that she can have it for sleeping but not daytimes. It used to drive me mad that ours wanted hers during the day but we managed to get her to leave her dummy upstairs in a pocket on her bedguard in the morning and she wouldnt have it until she want back to bed. If she needed a nap she could have it for in the buggy to sleep but when she woke we would whip it straight out. it worked and after a couple of days she knew the routine. (we have regressed and she has it again now as she got quite sick and it was a comfort to her but now she is on the mend we are going to start the process of no dummy again.) might be a good compromise for all of you.

[Fuschia]

I don't think I would go back, having got so far. But I'd have a look at the No Cry Sleep Solution and try to introduce some other sleep cues/props for her to use during the night.

GL! x

[Sanne Panne]

Thanks so much for all the advice and encouragement. We slept in the living room last night, leaving mini Panne in the bedroom by herself and it went extremely well. The rooms are right next to each other so we would have heard her cry but all I heard was her babbling for a while at 4:30am. She woke up for the day at 6:45am. Looks like the main issue was that she could see/hear us whenever she'd wake up at night and she'd think it was a good idea to have us help her fall back asleep again... the same happens during the day: she can play by herself for 20 minutes without a problem (I keep peeking through the door every minute without her noticing and she's "reading" or playing and chatting happily) but when in the same room she involves me in everything she does, gets fed up much more easily and seems unable to entertain herself. That's fine during the day but not at night...

Don't want to draw conclusions too soon (which I always do) but so far it's looking good! We'll sleep in the living room another couple of nights and if things go well we'll move back into the bedroom after that. I may get a big screen of some kind we can put between her cot and our bed so she doesn't realise we're there (although my husband's snoring will give us away anyway).

Really not keen on going back to the dummy (even at night) as we've come such a long way already and I'd hate to make her (and us) go through the whole process all over again. We'll do it if she regresses dramatically but let's hope it won't be necessary.

Thanks again for all the input.

[The Nappy Lady]

Brilliant news SP, fingers crossed from here, it sounds very positive. I think a screen could really help, though as you say hearing Daddy may be an issue!

Still, not long til you move!

Best wishes, Molly