Question for parents, caregivers who succeeded in letting their babies "cry it out".?

Question

I am a nanny currently listening to a 10 month old cry.  He goes right to sleep for his parents at bedtime and they let him cry "to a point" if he wakes up at night. 
 
A few weeks ago he started taking short naps for me and kept waking up and not going back to sleep - but was still obviously tired.  I had been giving him a bottle before nap because he only drank bottles when he was super tired.

So he transitioned to no bottles and I had to let him cry it out to get to sleep.  It was awful but now he goes right to sleep on his own at nap time.

Problem is, he still wakes up too early from his naps and will not go back to sleep.  He is so so tired. He will go back to sleep immediately if I hold him. I tried to bring him downstairs and let him wake up and he just screamed with his eyes closed. Clearly still tired, but it's been 48 minutes since he woke from his 1 hour nap and refuses to go back to sleep in his crib.

:-( Help.  It's way too early for him to be awake.

Anonymous · Answer

Feed him so much baby cereal at night he feels tired. Then he sleeps all night and you sleep all night.

LizB · Answer

If it had been my son I would just go and cuddle him for a few minutes to help him get back to sleep and take the second half of his nap. Or, if he really won't go back to sleep no matter what, he may just be going through a developmental phase that is disrupting his sleep and making him cranky, and there's nothing to be done but wait until he grows out of it.

My son was a lousy napper as a baby, too. Sometimes I could get him to take a longer nap by soothing him when he woke up, but sometimes I'd give him a few minutes to fuss and see if he'd go back to sleep on his own. It depended on whether he was just whining or full-on crying. And sometimes he was just awake. If the baby you watch will take a longer nap with some cuddles mid-nap, then just give him a cuddle until he falls back asleep. You won't be undoing the parents' progress with sleep training, I promise.

D · Answer

Put him down for nap earlier. Letting him get too tired will result in poor sleep. But once he's up, if he hasn't settled in a few minutes, he's up, and leaving him to cry by himself (likely hungry) is cruel and not teaching him anything at all except that care is unpredictable and inconsistent.

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Question for parents, caregivers who succeeded in letting their babies "cry it out".?

3 Answers