Progress on the sleep front

We're trying to phase Miles out of napping in the swing, which is where he takes all his naps both at home and at daycare (I was a little relieved to hear that Judy relies on the swing too!). Judy would like to put the swing in storage since Miles is the only baby who uses it and she has new toys she'd like to use instead... which of course is not the main reason for this endeavor, but gives us all a kind of goal. The main thing is he is old enough not to need it, and moreover, I believe the swing extends his naps overmuch because every time he starts to wake a little, the swinging motion lulls him back down.

He's been going down at night pretty well. The key being to time things right, get him into bed when he's tired but not too tired. We'll talk a little, read a story, sing a song, and then it's quiet time. If he's hungry he'll nurse, otherwise he gets his binky. I often shush him to sleep, but sometimes he doesn't need that or doesn't like that. He usually just turns on his side to hide his face against me, and falls asleep - sometimes this takes as little as 15 min, sometimes much longer.

So for naps now, I'm just doing the same thing, but shortening the routine. No books or songs, just napping. And it seems to be working! He takes shorter naps that way - more like 45 minutes than two hours - but that's part of the point. Judy also said yesterday that it took him a while but he fell asleep on his own at her place too.

I feel like a total rockstar when he falls asleep in bed with no rocking or swinging, even though I know it's not my accomplishment.

I must note that he sometimes will fuss and whine a lot when falling asleep - he just gets tired and whiny. I am right there next to him but he fusses and cries anyway. I'm not going to get on a CIO or non-CIO soapbox because I'm trying to get away from these false choices and mommy propaganda. But I will just say that I do not, in fact, believe that crying for a couple of minutes while falling asleep is causing him psychological damage, and it certainly isn't a sign of his feeling abandoned since I am literally right there. It makes me angry to think about the barrage of guilt that we mothers are subjected to around all these totally ordinary parenting challenges, but that's another post for another day.