Zzzzzzzzzz
Monday, September 25th, 2006Once upon a time (an embarassingly short time ago), I had to nurse Finn to sleep, and then she’d wake up three or four times during the night wanting to be nursed again. She wouldn’t nap unless we wheeled her around the house in her stroller. I slept minimally, and David might have gotten a little bit more sleep if the cat wasn’t also waking in the night demanding to be fed.
The other sleep methods
We tried the No-Cry-But-Doesn’t-Work sleep method with the expected doesn’t-work results. I was almost ready to try the Ferber method, which is basically “let your child cry hysterically if you can tolerate it.” I started to look up “ferberize” on the internet, mostly so that parents who I didn’t know, in far away places like New York and California, would tell me that the Ferber method was ok, and that even good parents let their children cry hysterically sometimes.
The Sleep Lady
On a whim, I typed in some random keywords into Google. Things like “not Ferber” and “sleep without hysterical crying” and “sleep method for babies that actually works.” Which is how I found Kim West, the Sleep Lady, a woman who I’ve never met, but who has changed my life (and Finn’s) drastically. Look at her picture on her website… doesn’t she look nice, like someone you could meet for coffee? This smiling woman is not only nice… she’s a saint!! Her website says she was on Dr. Phil; HOW DID I MISS THAT EPISODE?!!!
Anyway, before I discovered that the Sleep Lady is a miracle worker, I bought her book, Good Night Sleep Tight; I paid full price, something I
never do with books, even though my husband is an author, and the author makes so much more money when people don’t buy dogeared copies for 6 cents plus $5.95 shipping.
The shuffle
We did the Sleep Lady “shuffle” (I might have called it the “scoot” but shuffle implies a sort of fun dance) exactly as proscribed, and now Finn can get herself to sleep at night and for naps. We just plunk her in her crib, surrounded by ducks, and she sucks her thumb, and falls asleep. And then we go downstairs, and do the dishes, and go back up and check on Finn, and watch tv. Then several hours later we fall asleep too, until the cat wakes us up to be fed.
So… go out and buy the Sleep Lady book, and pay the full cover price because this woman deserves to be a millionaire. And then pray for a book called “Good Night, Sleep Kitty.”