Are you trying to sleep train a strong willed baby? Read this.

I noticed that when some people refer to successful sleep training stories as "luck" it rubs the wrong way and I get that, because behind every success there was research, sacrifice, and consistency. And after sleep training three VERY different babies, I fully believe its down to temperament and timing to find the right solution and that solution most likely won't be written in a blog post because you'll be making it up as you go - and when someone gets a baby that is receptive to sleep training that is a bit like luck but that doesn't always mean it was easy. If you were super excited to do sleep training as soon as your baby hit 4 months but you're still on this sub months later, tired and exhausted and sick of sleep training but also obsessed with it, and you're looking at your baby wondering why they don't know this is all in their best interest and to just go the f#@& to sleep! - read my story, I'm here to spread some hope and maybe something in my experience will help you.

I made two great sleepers first (read: easy going temperament) who responded really well to traditional sleep training methods basically when I wanted them to and I thought it was a great idea to have another. My third child was born two weeks past her DD and hasn't really done a single thing so far that she didn't first decide to do herself. She does the opposite to the norm/expected at every opportunity. She refuses a bottle. Refuses a dummy. Refused solid foods until she felt like it. Refuses to roll but happily lunges for the remote. Crawls backwards. Only slept when it was on her terms and even then she fought it. I was really tired all the time and nursing to sleep meant it was all on me, and nothing that I could get from sleep training guides, traditional methods, and online experts was working for us because it always seemed like I was doing something wrong - her naps weren't long enough as though I could control that, daring to leave the house with her at any point in the day, nursing her to sleep and not successfully changing that association, laying her down asleep rather than awake because I just wanted two hours kip and laying her down awake made her hysterical.. like. she couldn't catch her breath. And logically I knew that this was working for her, maybe not for me so much, but this process was getting her off to sleep for regular naps and as part of a consistent bedtime routine and was giving her more sleep overall compared to letting her CIO for example, because the girl never stopped crying. I watched wake windows like a hawk and made our sleep routine consistent but that was the only role she would let me play. So why did all this advice make me feel like a failure? Because unless you pay for a dedicated one on one consultant, it's a one size fits all solution (re-packaged under different names) made for easy going babies and my baby is anything but conventional. And I found that ironically, the gentler methods are outright rejected by strong willed babies even though they seem to be made for them? And as a result, parents like me question everything and almost stop paying attention to our instincts and baby's cues, to the point where we stick with sleep training when baby is crying out for comfort during teething or whatever else because CONSISTENCY and everyone is miserable.

I'm here to tell you that you're doing nothing wrong by doing what works for your strong willed (or any type of temperament) baby. And to remind you to trust your instincts because when they're ready for independent sleep, they find ways to show you. The main way they show us is by fighting back against what used to work for them. Here's how it happened for us:

I would nurse to sleep and then move her to her cot. This worked 90% of the time. If she woke, I picked her up and did it all over again. I noticed something was changing when she started pulling away from the breast with her eyes closed and was trying to roll onto her back. If I continued to hold her she'd return to the breasts but repeat that over and over. She started doing it at each nap and bedtime so I started laying her down at that moment. She weirdly didn't scream like usual, she wasn't happy, but she wasn't angry anymore. I let her fuss/cry for up to 10 mins depending on the intensity and I never let her get hysterical because she doesn't forgive and forget so easily hah. If after 10 she was still upset I started over and put her back on the boob and she'd fall asleep and stay asleep in her cot. A week or so later she'd fuss for less than 5 mins and then fall asleep independently for naps. And then a few more weeks pass by and she's doing so well at nap times but bedtime is still a little uncertain and she won't sleep past 5am. So we upgrade the bedtime routine because even though she's tired, it felt like she was signalling that the routine wasn't enough to get her into a bedtime headspace and she cried for longer than seemed necessary. Now that she FINALLY accepts solid food placed in her line of sight, she had some dinner, then a bath, and then I nursed her downstairs instead of in the dark room. My husband then took her up with the lullaby's playing and put her into a sleeping bag, cuddled for a few minutes and then lay her down and left the room. The first night she fussed for 8.5 minutes. The second night she didn't cry for even a second, and was asleep in 5 minutes. I cried. I cried with relief, after months of obsessing and thinking I was failing and wondering if I'd ever have a girls night out again or sleep for more than 2 hours or have a baby that was content in herself and independent.

She now no longer wakes up crying after naps. She doesn't rely on me to nurse her to sleep. She doesn't wake screaming because she's woken up in a place she didn't fall asleep in. Since this new routine, she wakes less frequently and sleeps later. Today she woke for the day at 8am I thought I was going to burst with happiness and pride.

If you read this far I thank you. And I hope that if you're like me and at the wrong end of the first year with a bad sleeper, that this is a reminder that sleep is developmental for most babies and they'll tell you when they're ready. And if I caught you earlier in your journey, maybe I can save you from some of the heartache. Please hang in there you're doing such an amazing job.

Disclaimer: if you sleep trained successfully early on you're also doing a great job, I know that took work! ❤️