I've never before realized how vital sleep is to a person until I had a new baby. In college, we tend to pride ourselves on the fact that we can pull all nighters and still make it to class the next day. But there is just something about constant interrupted sleep that just pulls a person down. I recently met a great lady who recommended the book "The Sleep Lady's Good Night Sleep Tight" by Kim West. I welcomed it during the nap-less days with my toddler son. But with a new baby, it has been really great to help me as I train her to sleep through the night. I was just talking to a friend who mentioned older children that she knows that still have trouble sleeping through the night because they were never taught at a young age to do so. Last night I tried some of Kim's suggestions with my almost 3 month old. She is breastfed and sleeps pretty well...but she still wakes 1-3 times per night to eat. I decided to try to get her back to sleep first before rushing to feed her. Obviously if she was hungry and signaled that she wanted to eat I was ready to feed her...but she ended up going all night without eating. Granted, I was up every couple hours offering her paci and shushing her...but she barely cried and slept wonderfully!!!! I hope that as she learns to put herself back to sleep, I won't have to get up as much. And, when I was up...it was only for a minute or two. There may be differing opinions on this...but it worked for us and I'm happy about that. Do you have a child with sleep difficulties? Kim West gives advice on children from birth to age 5. She offers a gentle approach that neither spoils the child nor leaves them to scream for hours on end ;-)
