Mummy is so proud!

Dear Riley,
Mummy is so proud you went to sleep tonight without your bottle, and most importantly without crying. Not even a peep. Love you so much my little man. Please keep it up.
Love always Mummy. 

For those that don't know. . . we started to have some issues with Riley sleeping. He was no longer going down for the night (or day) with his bottle. He would just drink it and want to play. So we decided it was time to get tough on him and teach him how to sleep without it. We had agreed that would only do it while it was working but stop as soon as its not. I never intended to give my baby a bottle to go to sleep with and it was never something I was particularly comfortable with, but when you have a bubba like Riley you will do anything for a bit of sleep.

For a bit of previous history. Riley had/has pretty bad reflux, not so much now days but still at times. He was a very unsettled baby that didn't sleep during the day from VERY EARLY ON!!!! He would scream and scream and scream. It was horrible. We even went to sleep clinic at 3 months old. This is a place where you go with your baby and you have around the clock care to teach you how to get your baby to sleep. The success rate of these style of clinics is high. . . Unfortunately for us, Ri didn't understand this. We officially failed sleep clinic. The nurses wished me luck and said he one tough cookie. That's about the only thing they got right. So for the next 9 months it was struggle street. He would throw in the odd day nap but they were just cat naps and to make it worse he wasn't sleeping to well at night either. Lets just say it was doing my head in. The best way to get him to sleep was to give him a feed.

At around 1yo we made the decision that putting him down with a bottle would be so much easier then trying to hold him and then try and lie him down in his cot without waking him. It was brilliant. I finally got some me time. It worked a charm. He was having 2 day sleeps, 2 good day sleeps, which eventually worked its way to 1 really good day sleep. He was still waking overnight but not always as often (mostly due to his reflux though). I know I know, its not recommend because it could rot their teeth but by this stage I would rather a toothless baby then what I had. But Chris and I made a pack that as soon as it wasn't working or we could make him loose interest then we would take the bottles away.

We had managed at one point to wean him to just a bottle of water to go down with for his day sleep and the night. Then we had a spanner thrown in the works when he got sick and we had to do an overnight stay in hospital. We went back to milk in a bottle because it was the only way we could get him to drink anything. From there he went back to wanting it for sleeps. I tried to not but with the shop I just needed that break and to not have the screaming.

Which brings us to the last week or so. He started not having day sleeps but demanding a bed/bottle but only drinking the bottle and getting back up. Then it started at night too. Enough, it was time to go. The first night we took him for a drive at 9:40 on our 3rd year wedding anniversary just to get him to sleep. There was no way I was doing that the following night when he decided not to sleep. I tried to settle him in his bed a couple of times but it was becoming obvious it was just making things worse, so instead we deployed CIO (Cry It Out). I lied him down and told him enough was enough its bed time and mummy wont be coming back in. He was a little upset (emotional) when I first walked out the door but it quickly changed to just protesting. . . after 30mins he was a sleep.

The second night of CIO, was 30mins again but a lot less crying and not as loud. 3rd night we had a sleepover and we went to bed late so I gave him a sipper cup of milk which he drank half of before going into bed, but he was so tired and demanding bed that he dragged me there and lied himself down. I didn't have the heart to take is cup away (non-spill) and left him with it. Not a peep out of him. Then we come to tonight. I can't believe he actually did it. I'm shocked and so proud. We (Chris and I) went to have peek-a-boo (where we go in and look at him sleeping) it was so wonderful to see him happily a sleep, It brought a tear to my eyes. All the hard work, crap days and nights, they were all worth it. I was so PROUD!!!

And for a side achievement he hasn't had milk in a bottle for 3 days, only in a sipper cup. :)