Aidan's now got to the stage where he won't go to sleep at night unless Mandy or I lie down on the bed in his room too. "Lie down, daddy," he says mournfully, if I look like I'm just going to leave after kissing him goodnight.
If one of us stays, we have to wait until he's asleep before quietly sneaking out. If we don't, he stands up in his crib, throws out all his pacifiers and stuffed animals, and cries and screams for about 20 minutes before conking out. We can go back in after five minutes and give him them back, but they'll be on the floor again before we've got back to the door .
Having to listen to him scream for so long is horrible - probably the worst thing about being a parent right now. We've tried to break him out of the habit a couple of times, but our will has collapsed after five minutes of listening to his cries. We're making a new effort now, but I don't know if we'll be any more successful. On the plus side, at least by throwing his pacifiers out too he's having to get used to going to sleep without them. On the minus side, this often means he'll wake up in the middle of the night calling for us, and it's much harder to lie in our bed and listen to half an hour of screaming at 3am.
I get the impression that general opinion is that we're not likely to cause him any long-term psychological damage by letting him cry himself to sleep night after night, but that doesn't make it any easier.
What do you parents out there think? Are we doing the right thing? Or should we just suck it up, give him his pacifiers and lie with him until he's old enough for us to be able to talk him out it?
