A friend of mine recently emailed me with a question about how we handled sleeping issues with Iliya. I replied to her, but then I thought that the information I sent to her might help someone else, so I thought I would devote a whole post to the very topic of sleep.

Those of you who have been with me for at least a year can very likely remember a post or two of mine lamenting about the lack of sleep on a few occasions. In all honesty, I have to give it to Iliya...he requires a pretty decent amount of sleep, so in comparison to other people, our work with him & bedtime has not been all that bad. I'm not sure how much of the ease can be attributed to his need for sleep vs. our methods for easing him into sleeping by himself. Nonetheless, here is what has worked for us......

We never got to see Iliya's room when we were at the baby home...but something I read (or heard) somewhere - before we ever even met Iliya - hit home with me. It was the idea that a child who has been insitutionalized for any amount of time is likely not used to sleeping alone in a room by himself. Because of this, I had grandiose plans of keeping a "grown up" bed in his room with the crib - so that he wouldn't get used to sleeping in OUR bed, but would have at least one of us in the room with him for a while once we got home.

That plan quickly changed when we realized that a grownup bed just wouldn't fit into his bedroom with all his toys & furniture. So the grownup bed was out, but the plan was still to try getting him to just sleep in his own bed - maybe we would make a pallet on the floor for one of us to sleep on for a while when we got home.

The key was that I absolutely would not...could not...let my child sleep in the bed with me. Please don't ask my reasoning behind it, but it's just the way I felt back then.

Scratch all that, though, once we went to Russia on Trip Two & brought him to the hotel from the orphanage.

On that first night, we got to the hotel very late, and he was very asleep...I laid him down in the hotel crib, and the child slept soundly through the night & well into the next morning. Score for us!, we thought, We've been blessed with a child that sleeps through the night!

HA. Ha ha ha ha. I'm almost embarrassed to admit that the thought had even gone through our minds.

As it turned out, that first night, Iliya had been so exhausted & overwhelmed, his little body could do nothing BUT sleep.

The subsequent nights were not as easy. Iliya fell asleep fairly easily (with me holding him), but then he would wake up (scared?) in the middle of the night. As many well-meaning parents do, I would go & pick him up, rock him for a couple minutes - and when he wouldn't go back to sleep in a fairly reasonable amount of time, I'd just lay him between me & Nathan. And we would all drift back to sleep - Iliya was not an acrobatic sleeper at the time - so it all worked out.

And we arrived home with a child who would start the first couple of hours in his bed and then end up in the bed with us somewhere in the middle of the night. Just what we had said we would not have happen.

Somewhere between that second night and our trip home, I'd had a change of heart, in a way. I knew that I ultimately wanted Iliya to sleep in his bed by himself...but that, for the time being, sleeping in the bed with us for a portion of the night would not do any harm. If anything, I felt it would be a positive thing and foster his security with us. So we took baby steps toward our ultimate goal of him sleeping confidently in his bed all night...

1. When we first came home, I rocked him to sleep & would lay him down in the crib & sneak out. In the middle of the night, if he woke up, he'd just come to bed with us.



2. After a few months of doing that, I would put him in his bed, tell him good night, and stay with him while he fell asleep. No talking to him, no looking at him, really. Just making sure he knew I was in the room with him. This would sometimes take an hour - other times, it took a few minutes (I got to where I'd take my laptop, a book, or something to help me pass the time).......the key to all this was helping him learn to self-soothe himself to sleep. If he woke up in the middle of the night, he'd still come to bed with us
   



3. If I went back through my blog, I could probably tell you the exact date (or close enough), but after several months, Iliya developed acrobatic tendencies while he slept. I got to the point that I just couldn't sleep in the bed with him in it...so if he woke in the middle of the night, I would go to him (change him if he needed it), and tell him that it was still "sleeping" time and that I would stay in the room with him. After telling him that, I'd sit down (sometimes fall asleep) in the rocking chair and he stayed in his bed. No more talking to him or eye contact. At first, it would take him an hour or more to go back to sleep, but in very little time, he was falling back asleep within 10-15 minutes. (the beginning of "Stage 3" is probably when you remember me lamenting over having very little sleep)
   



4. We've been at "Stage 3" for close to a year, now, and I'm JUST to the point that I can go out of the room before he's fully asleep (when he first goes to bed)...and if he wakes in the middle of the night, I go to him...make sure he's not soaking wet or sick or too scared from a dream. And I tell him, "Iliya, mommy is very tired. It's still sleeping time...I'm going back to my bed, but I'm still in the house. I love you" and I leave.

Our main goal has been to make sure Iliya understands that we are here, when he needs us, no matter what...and we feel that understanding has helped build his confidence in his ability to fall asleep on his own.

So that is my story of sleep. I'd say, though - if I were in the business of giving out advice - that once you start with working on sleep issues, if you REALLY want to make it work, then you've got to be consistent. And realize that success may take a while (and it may not, who knows?)...oh, and that every small step is a successful movement toward the ultimate goal.