Four questions to ponder before sleep training

I talk with many families when they are in the midst of deciding whether or not to sleep train. Today I offer 4 questions you should be pondering and thinking about before you take the plunge and decide to sleep train

4 questions:

1. How do I feel about crying?
2. Am I ready to get less sleep temporarily?
3. Do I have support? If not, how can I get my partner on board?
4. Can I commit to several weeks of making sleep my number 1 priority?

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Questions before sleep training

Hey Mama! This is Carianna here with your podcast episode today. And the very first thing I want to say before I forget, I'm worried I'm going to forget. This is our second to last episode in Season One, so I'm really excited that we have almost made it a whole season that we're going to take a break for the holidays, and then we'll be back for season two in 2022. But what I wanted to ask of you is, if you've been listening, please send me a DM at all the sleeps or if you're not on Instagram, send me an email, sleep at all the sleeps calm and just let me know what topics you would be looking forward to for season two because Kayla and I are going to start gearing up and getting ready for season two soon, so I would love to hear any feedback from you, and I'm just so glad that you've joined us for this season one. Now don't miss next week's episode which will be the last episode of season one, and we are going to talk about daylight saving time so you definitely do not want to miss that one. Now, on to today's topic, so we're going to talk about four questions to ponder before sleep training, and what I can tell you is I do lots and lots of free 15 minute calls with families before they decide to work with me, so it gives us a good chance to talk about their sleep situation and where they're at, talk about their goals that they want to achieve where they would like to be at. I'm able to answer questions for them about my services and courses that I offer, and then, time after time after time, the same common questions come up that parents usually have before they've decided to sleep train. So I thought, You know what, Let's make a podcast episode out of this because I know these are questions that so many families have, and I would just love to answer them for you. So let's talk about these four questions. So the first question I would like you to ponder before you decide if you're ready for sleep training is, how do you feel about crying. Okay. Because crying is naturally, something that's going to be a part of this process. Every child is different and how much crying, could be a little, it could be a lot. But what we really need to do is get serious about how do you feel about crying, maybe think through why you feel the way you do like when crying stresses you out or freaks you out. What are what's going on in your brain that's making you feel like this is the end of the world. But apart from that, just looking at how you feel about crying is understanding that crying is a part of the process and what I always tell families is that crying, is how your child communicates right and since we are going to be making changes. If we sleep train. It's natural that your child is going to have feelings about that that they're going to be frustrated that they're going to struggle. These are not in and of themselves, bad things, but the crying is how they're communicating that frustration and communicating that struggle. And what I also want you to know is that even though there's going to be crying, you can choose to be as hands on, or as hands off as you'd like to be. So the method you choose itself is not going to mean no crying, I am not a fan of the no cry marketing, I think that that is just baloney. Honestly, I think it's misleading I think it's even a little deceitful on some levels because kids cry. And I can't promise you that your kid won't cry during sleep training, I also can't promise you that your kid won't cry for any number of reasons. So, I'm not a big fan of pushing this like, oh no cry no cry, but I am a huge fan of finding the method that works for your family so if that means you are very hands on, you're right there next to the crib the whole time you're touching you're comforting you're talking to them. That's okay if that's the route you choose to go and I've seen that be very successful. On the other hand if you're someone who wants to leave the room and do checks, or if you just want to leave the room completely if that's where you're comfortable. I'm comfortable there as well so that's what I would say quite ponder how you feel about crying, and then accepting that crying is part of the process, and knowing that you have the option to choose how you're going to manage with the crime. Second question that I want you to ponder. Am I ready to get less sleep, temporarily, this is something that sometimes we don't think all the way through. But even though you may feel right now like your sleep situation is terrible and you're up a lot and you're just losing your mind or maybe you're feeling that way during the day, you can't set your child down when you make the decision to sleep tracking it is temporarily going to get worse before it gets better, and we get to the other side so that may mean, it's going to take longer for them to go down at bedtime, they may be up more frequently at night, they may spend more time awake at their night wakings their stretches at night may shorten before they get longer during the day naps are going to be an even harder process than they are right now, so just kind of accepting that that is the territory that comes with sleep training, and understanding that it's going to happen, and that's okay. It doesn't mean we have to stay stuck where we are right now, but I also don't want you to be blindsided when I know you already feel exhausted, and for a while you're gonna feel even more exhausted, until your child gets into the new rhythm and interrupting this episode is super quick, because I want to make sure you know that I have a sleep coaching Crash Course. If you're struggling with Night Waking short naps, early mornings, or you're just spending way too much time trying to get your baby to sleep. This course is for you. I walk you through step by step process all the information you need to successfully sleep coach your little one. So if you're ready for a positive sleep change, but it all seems too overwhelming, go check the description below. Okay, let's get back to the episode now.

Third question that I want you to ponder is, do I have support. And if I don't have support during this process, how can I get my partner on board. Okay, so if you are single, grab a friend and maybe your friend isn't going to stay with you while you sleep train, but somebody important in your life friend or family member who knows your sleep training, who is supportive of your decision, and who you can be texting through the process, and, you know, kind of a shoulder to cry on, ask them to be your cheerleader, have someone like that. Now if you have a partner, then you really need that partner on board with you especially if your partner is present at all during the night, waking up during the day. Because what we don't want is a partner who is not on board, and who is second guessing everything you're doing, telling you not to do it. You know who's undermining the work you do. So make sure that you're on board, and hopefully I don't offend anyone with this but I tell families a lot because oftentimes I will work with families, or talk to families before we work together, who one parent really really wants to do this because they are just dying with their current sleep situation, the other parent isn't very affected by the sleep situation, and they're like, Oh, we're not sleep training we don't need to sleep train, If that's your situation, I would encourage you to tag your partner in for the night wakings for getting the child down for the NAPS wherever the problem area is start tagging them in more, and once they understand how difficult the situation is for you, they're going to be a lot more agreeable to make changes, but if they're just sleeping all night. Their sleep is fairly uninterrupted, they're not going to understand that Sleep Train is your next step. Okay, so get them on your team get them on board. See if you can get them to experience what you were experiencing so they understand the other just extra thing I would tack on to the end there is even if you do have support whether that's family, friends, partner. Sometimes families do need that extra outside professional support and that's okay if that's where you find yourself. I will tell you from my own experience with my first son, we DIY did, and we were great with my second son, DIY, it was not going to cut it, and I needed a professional outside perspective and help. And so I totally get both sides of it. Just to refresh you guys, I offer various one on one services, where I put together plans specifically for a family, we have a call to talk through things, then we either have, you know, two days of email support or two weeks of email support, depending on what level of support you feel that you need to be successful and I am not at all, one that's going to push one or the other on you. I really leave it up to parents and I say, what do you feel like you need to be successful, and does that fit in your budget. And then on the other end of the spectrum, I do have more of a DIY course where families can take all the information in at their own pace, when it works for them, and then start implementing my day by day plan so if you feel like you need more support, whether it's the high end of support or the low end of support, I want you to know those options are available and those are things that I love, offering to families, I'll put a link in the show notes to those various offers so you can check them out if you'd like to. Alright, last question that you need to ponder before sleep training before deciding to sleep train, can I commit, several weeks to make Sleep, my number one priority. So look at your schedule, are you thinking about starting sleep training tonight, but then this weekend, you have two nights, you're going to be gone and your child's going to be way off schedule or with a different caregiver. Okay, so you have to figure out where you can fit it best and it may not be perfect, because some of us, rarely have two weeks where there's absolutely nothing going on, but you want to pick the best possible time to sleep train so that you are setting your child up for success, and maybe you'll get through the process, and things are going great, well before two weeks. That would be awesome. Maybe it takes a little longer than two weeks, but you want to have a plan, set up for success, so that you aren't, training, and then traveling for a week and then coming back home and feeling like you're starting from scratch again okay we want them to have time to learn the new skills, to have consistency to have their nap schedule honored to not be keeping them up late to not have visitors where we feel like we can't actually follow our plan to not be traveling so they're sleeping in a weird random place, we really really need to make sure we're setting them up for success, if we're going to go through that sleep training process. So, look at your schedule look out two weeks, maybe three to four before you decide when your start date is. Okay. Alright, so those are the four main questions honestly I could throw a fifth one in there, which is just, okay, now how do I sleep train, I don't know how to do this. But as I'm sure you guys know that is way too much for one podcast episode, but if you are interested in getting more help with the sleep training process and you want to know more about the various services and courses I offer, again I will link those in the show notes for you guys, and I'm so glad that you guys were listening, if you tuned in today, would you just take a moment to either head to Apple podcasts, and just drop a quick little review rate and review. Make sure that you are following this podcast if you aren't already. And if you really appreciated this, I would love to see you screenshot this and share it in your stories and just tell more people about this podcast because more and more people are finding it and it makes me so excited that we can spread the sleep info. This practical advice with as many families as possible so thank you so much for being a part of this dream of mine.

Questions before sleep training