A little tough Love

My goodness..he's finally asleep. I can't tell you how much this child fights sleep during the day!

This morning he was with a babysitter for a couple of hours so I could play the piano at church, and he was good until the last little bit. Then he got fussy and wasn't eating and his diaper wasn't dirty. I knew he was probably tired but would he go to sleep? Not a chance. So I fed him when I got there (after calming him down) and put him in the car seat and we drove home. En route, he fell asleep. Success! Except wait, he doesn't stay asleep for long once we get home. Sure enough, 5 minutes upon entering our house, he was awake again. I thought "hey, he's drowsy, maybe I can just take him out of the seat and rock him and he'll zonk out again". I was having success. I sang to him, he was relaxing. He actually tucked his nose inside of my shirt (I'm wearing a button down) and seemed to be just taking in my mommy scent. It was a nice moment. Then I put him down on the couch (belly down) and *BAM* he was awake again. Seriously child...I was starting to get annoyed.

So I made myself some lunch and let him fuss in his swing a little bit. After lunch we changed his diaper and I played with him, got him to giggle a bit, and then I fed him again. Keep in mind it had only been about 2 hours since his last feeding. He's not having a growth spurt. I'm thinking he's going to need to start solids soon because mommy's milk just doesn't seem to be satisfying him. Either that or he's teething and mommy's boob is the only thing that feels good on his gums (I doubt this is the case).

So he started to fall asleep again during the feeding. Success! Right? Wrong! I put him down on his tummy again and *BAM* we have an awake baby. At this point my patience is running dry. He was crying intermittently and I knew he was tired, but he just would not go to sleep. So I left him on his belly on the little couch where he usually takes naps, and decided to vacuum the living room. That worked when he was a newborn. Not this time. He was more interested in looking at what the heck mommy was doing.

So I finished the vaccuming and said "well hey at least I have a clean floor" and decided that I was not going to let him stay awake when I knew how tired he was. So I got out my laptop and strapped on my "tough love" attitude. He layed there and looked around at things quietly for a while (it's amazing how far this kid can hold his head up...I thought for sure he would roll off the couch at one point) and then he started crying so loud. But I was determined. I wanted to scoop him up and love on him, but I knew. After somewhere between 5 and 10 minutes of crying, there was silence. I looked over at him and he was zonked. Crashed. Totally out. He cried himself to sleep.

Now I have mixed feelings about the "cry it out" method in general, but I have to say that this time it worked. And it was the only thing that worked. I knew he wasn't in pain, I knew that he knew I loved him...he just needed to let himself go to sleep. And I'm so glad that a little tough love paid off in the end. Now the question is: how long will he nap? Hopefully for a good 3-4 hours. This is his first nap today (and probably his only one). He's due for about that long. Times to cross our fingers and see what happens!

UPDATE: 7:01PM
He slept until 6:30. Tough love works!