QE2 Rehab

There is a very generous and free service available for families here called the Queen Elizabeth the 2nd Centre, which helps you work through eating or sleeping troubles you may be having with your infant or toddler. We had signed up to do this a few months ago (it's a long wait list) to see if they could help us make some changes that would help Hailey wake up less at night and to fall asleep without needing to breastfeed. I have enjoyed a beautiful 14 months co-sleeping with our angel and to be honest, really enjoy it a lot. But she's growing up and it's time for her to have her own bed! During the months preceding we actually had made some progress and were getting better sleep. Still not where we wanted to be ideally, but I could easily have a bad night come up and it didn't affect the next day much, whereas I'd be out for the count before.

I was having a lot of anxiety about going to this centre. I know lots of people it has helped out and it seemed they would help you come up with solutions that you feel comfortable with and will work for your family.  But from what friends seemed to be saying, they pretty much use the "controlled comforting" technique that we decided wasn't the way for us. But since they said they don't have you do anything you don't feel comfortable with, no worries right? Surely they have some other ideas up their sleeves than sitting by the bed and patting with soothing words while your little one cries?

First hours:
I checked in at 10:30, and Hailey was getting pretty sleepy by an hour later so we decided to go for a nap- a normal feed-to-sleep nap, possibly our last good rest for the next 4 days! I know they will be bringing Hailey a toddler bed so I ask if I need a do not disturb sign for the door. They said, no, they don't have those. So we go to our room and I sit on the bed feeding Hailey and just as she falls asleep in my arms, a loud knock and woman rocks in saying she has a bed to put in here. I indicate to my now awake baby and that we are just having naptime. She seems very unapologetic and asks how long we'll be (??) and then says she'll just leave it in the hall. Good idea! So I get Hailey to sleep again, sit up and read for about 20 minutes and then lay down. I finally fall asleep and a few minutes later comes another loud knock and another woman comes in asking for a book with Hailey's health record. She sees us both laying on the bed (both now awake) but doesn't seem bothered. I, very confused, say 'we were both just asleep'. She says, 'okay, I'll come back in a few minutes then'. What kind of sleep centre is this? I get Hailey up and we get her book and take it to the nurse (a different one) and tell her how we were awoken twice during naptime. She tells me about their schedules and needing to get some things done (understandable), and unwillingly says sorry in the end. I ask again if I can get a do not disturb sign. She says no, they don't have them. So as I walk back to my room, pretty upset over my first few hours experience in the "sleep clinic" I see the door of the room next to me that someone has just checked out of:

Nice. The next nurse on her shift turned out to be a lovely woman, I really enjoyed her help, but for some reason we weren't able to communicate well about what each other's expectations were. I came in as a parent who would like to make some improvements, but without the crying method - fussing okay, just not real emotional crying. Rather than offer suggestions or ideas along those lines, I felt like they just kept trying to tell me - 'She will protest', and 'it will be hell' but not really explaining exactly what was expected to happen or tell us what to do past sitting by the bed and patting and offering soothing words. They just said, "if you can't handle it at any time, come get us and we'll go from there." Go where? Why is there no step-by step plan being delivered to me? I'm supposed to make decisions in the middle of the night when I'm tired and emotional from my daughter crying? We planned to allow for fussing and try it out, but stop when it seemed too much. But not really knowing what was going on, that first night went on for 2 hours, I was feeling like we've done the wrong thing and poor Hailey never fell asleep until I fed her to sleep and then sniffled and hiccuped all through the night in her sleep, awaking with puffy red break-up eyes.

I know many, many people who have turned to "crying it out" methods to help their kids learn to sleep without adult intervention. Some have been lucky and had it work without lengthy crying sessions, and others not so lucky, but it worked in the end. Brian and I just didn't feel this was the way we wanted to handle the situation and after lots of searching found a book written by Elizabeth Pantley called "The no-cry Sleep Solution". We had read several sleep books, manuals, watched videos, and talked to countless people to try and find what was right for us. I read Elizabeth's book and it seemed every new paragraph echoed word for word how I felt and all her suggestions and research really resonated with me. I felt 100% comfortable trying out her methods and was very comforted by the fact she had not only used her personal examples but did a test group of 60 different families who used her method as well. It meant being more patient for the changes to take place (10 days for some, 3 months for others, 1 month for most) - definitely something we were willing to do if it meant using a process that would be gentle for all of us.

I suppose my hope was that the centre could help us along the lines I had been reading in this book. I didn't come to them with a plan, but assumed that surely other parents had come to them wanting a more gentle approach and that they would have suggestions. It felt like Lost in Translation the whole time we were there. Probably with fault on both sides, we were both speaking English, but it's like when your English friend says "wahtah"and it takes like 5 repeats before you realize they're saying "water".

After talking with the nurse about our feelings and revelations from the night before, we tried to clarify what we wanted. It felt like they said, okay, then what exactly do you want to do? Well, weren't we there to have them help us figure that out? I asked if they had any alternative methods to offer than what we tried the night before. Not really. I sat down and wrote 17 ideas I had from reading or friends that I thought would help with sleep. Some direct, some indirect. A few they had help us to incorporate at the centre like earlier bedtime and nighttime routine and increasing protein and dairy during the day to fill her up more. Other than that, Brian and I devised our "no-cry Sleep Solution" plan and decided to do that the second night. No one attended us all night. We decided we didn't need to be there 2 more nights using a plan that they couldn't support or help us with and after an actually really beneficial talk with the nurse that morning we all decided it would be best to continue with our plan at home.

One of the very good things we did take away from the centre is that Brian was able to have a go at trying to comfort Hailey through the night. We've continued with this at home and after two nights of sticking to our no-cry sleep plan we had a major breakthrough. Brian got Hailey to go back to sleep all on his own. How amazing! It may take awhile, but we're going to stick with it. In the end, we're glad we went to QEII - we learned a lot about what we want and don't want and gained confidence to try things out we just weren't ready to because we were scared of losing even more sleep.  Wish us luck! Especially our beautiful Miss Mai. What an angel.