Crying it out, day 432

Ok, I think it's only day 7. And we didn't *really* start until Monday, so maybe only day 6...

Things are tough here. Two nights ago we thought we had a breakthrough when Thomas slept for 2 hours in a row after only an hour of crying. (Yes, that's how bad things are.) Last night he cried for 4.5 hours before we couldn't stand it and brought him into our bed.

You see, since he's a good sleeper in our bed, we had decided that we were trying to teach him to go to sleep on his own but that we would let him sleep in our bed once he woke up to nurse. As it turns out, this was a bad idea. Thomas is nobody's fool: he's easy-going but very tenacious when he wants something (anyone out there think this sounds like his father?) and he's obviously very smart. So our smart little guy figured out what we were doing began crying until we brought him into our bed - even if it took 4 or 5 hours. This is bad.

We're exhausted & our stupid book had no ideas for us. (I actually hate the book: I nearly threw it across the room last night.) We decided that since we're really doing more Ferberizing, we should buy the Ferber book & André took Thomas out to do just that. (Typical decision in this house: things are bad? Try a new book.) Of course, poor tired Thomas fell asleep in his stroller on the way home from the expedition and got the best nap he's had in a week. Personally, I think that bodes well. André read (re-read, since we've read this one before) as much as he could & we've tweaked our sleep plan.

The problem is that I start work tomorrow (and, if you can't tell from this post, which I know is a little disjointed & which I have no intention of fixing, I'm falling over tired) so André has become the sleep parent. This means that he is going to be checking on Thomas every 15 minutes until he falls asleep. Now, it's 9:15 right now & he's already slept a little, but he's awake and crying as I write. I'm about to go to bed - so when you read this, think of André because he may well have been up all night. He's prepared, but the deal is that 1) I have to get home ASAP tomorrow afternoon so he can nap and 2) he reserves the right to be in a bad mood until he starts getting sleep.

I think we're ordering out for dinner tomorrow night.

Wish us *more* luck.

Oh, and today Thomas is 8 months old. He can stand up & cruise a little bit. He talks a lot & he definitely has a "word" to tell us when he wants the lights turned on and off, on and off. Today he also successfully got a spoonful of food in his mouth on purpose. He won't sleep, but he's still a good eater and a happy guy. That's got to count for something.