We sleep trained our now 6-month old just after he turned 4 months. This weekend my MIL was guilt-tripping and judging us so hard for sleep training our little boy. She said he wasn't going to be securely attached to us and she worried about him. How you sleep train is a very personal decision and based on the needs of your baby and your family. I want to share our story for those worried about starting Cry-it-out (CIO).

Before we did CIO he was waking up every 1 - 2 hours. We had to bounce him to sleep anywhere from 5 to 35 minutes. Our son would cry once we put on his sleepsack and he realized we were putting him to bed. Often he'd wake up the moment we set him down in the crib. We were desperate and it was really impacting our mental health. It didn't seem good for our son either, who cried out for us often in the night. It came to a point where we knew it was best for the health of our family to try CIO, even though we were nervous to try it.

We read Precious Little Sleep and tried a few SWAPs with minimal success before doing SLIP (aka CIO). We waited to try it until he had a somewhat regular bedtime (7:30 - 8:15pm).

Night 1: Cried 42 minutes. Woke up twice to nurse. Fussed 12 minutes to sleep MOTN. Cried 60 minutes early morning.

Night 2: Cried 27 minutes. Woke up twice to nurse. Cried 20 minutes early morning.

Night 3: Cried 44 minutes (extinction burst). Nursed twice.

Night 4: Cried 15 minutes. Nursed once.

Night 5: Cried 6 minutes. Nursed once.

Night 6: No crying. Nursed once.

Night 7: Cried 7 minutes. Nursed once.

Other observations:

-The first few weeks he had more days crying to sleep (25 minutes or less) than no crying. It takes time to adjust and they might cry longer a few nights and it'll seem like things are getting worse, but stick with it!

-Two months in and our baby usually goes to bed happy and fully awake. He cries once per week, probably because of a screwed up nap schedule.

-Watching Survivor while your baby cries (we watch using headphones) is a good distraction :) We still watched him on the monitor.

-After sleep training there will always be bad days. We overanalyze our every move when this happens, but sometimes babies just cry themselves to sleep and that's okay.

Now when we put our son to bed he is so happy throughout his bedtime routine, although there are always off days. Last night when we placed him in his sleepsack he smiled big and kicked in happiness. He loves going to bed! What we used to dread is now often one of our favorite times of day.