“Wah, Wah, Wah!” are the sounds flooding the baby monitor as we jump from the bed at 1 am. I rush into the bedroom to find her fast asleep but crying frantically. I pick her up and rock her, check her diaper and nothing gives. Finally, I give her a pacifier and she is off to dreamland once again.
After a couple of nights of doing this, my wife and I decided enough is enough. Our daughter has become a pacifier junkie. We had gotten her so used to taking naps with it, that she would wake up in the night wondering where it went.
We turned to the Internet and friends, and everything read the same. Either let her cry it out or give it to her on demand. Neither option really appealed to our style of parenting, we went with option ‘C.’ We aren’t to the point of just letting her cry it out and actually feel it is a bit cruel. Instead when she starts crying we go pick her up and rock her back to sleep using the same routine we use to put her to sleep each night.
It was a sad sight as I held her screaming. She would stop to catch her breath and actually make the sucking motions with her mouth as if she had her pacifier. Almost like she was going through a withdrawal.
We are only one and a half days into the process and already are seeing progress. Last night was not too much fun, and neither was the first nap this morning. Each nap after that successively got better. Tonight when we laid her down to bed there was zero fuss. Only time will tell if our plan will work, but I am confident.
In fact, my only fear is that we are going to get her used to us coming in the room all the time. If we somehow create this problem, we will be forced to do the old shut the door and let her cry method. Although, this is the last thing I want to do.