Brand Name Family: My Dog is Judging My Parenting Techniques

Excerpt from an Email Dated 1/21/16:

Hello More Experienced Parenting Friends!

I'm seeking advice on how to get a baby to sleep. Sarah is in a routine where she takes 2 naps per day, each usually 35 minutes long. She wakes up 4 times a night, approximately every 2 hours. Last night the longest stretch she had was 2 hours 38 minutes. This has been going on since approximately Thanksgiving. Matthew and I are both stressed and don't know what else to try.

Things we have tried (in no order):

Schedule - super strict for the past 2.5 weeks
Hold/rock until super asleep - frequently wakes up when we lay her down in the crib though
Let her cry - started checking on her every two minutes, now I let her go for 10 at a time before sleep and if/when she wakes up from a nap in less than an hour
Feed more during day
Add more solid foods
Routine prior to sleep - eat, diaper change, 2 books, song
No diaper change during the night
Quiet time for 1 hour before bedtime (dim lights, quiet sound, moderate activity)
Sleep log - I just started this week. The first day she got 11 hours and 48 minutes of sleep in a 24 hour period. From what I've seen, she should be getting 14-15 hours.
New sheet - kind of a velour rather than standard cotton
White noise - doesn't seem to make much impact
Heating pad under the fitted sheet - didn't see an impact, so stopped this
Cosleeping - she went back to sleep easier the two nights she slept with us, but didn't get any more sleep overall
Started reading the No Cry Sleep Solution - I'm only about 1/3 through, but so far we'd already implemented most of the suggestions, but do need to finish it for any more.
Early bedtime/wake up - 6:30PM to 6:30AM

Suffice it to say we were pretty desperate a couple of months ago. The worst part was that she was never happy and I was overwhelmingly stressed with dealing with a fussy baby all day and never getting a break from it. Beyond the waking up every couple of hours in the night, it was taking close to an hour to get her back to sleep most times. We finally committed to the dreaded "cry it out" method for naps because we were waking her up too often when we laid her in the crib and would have to start all over again. Also, this is what the doctor recommended.

The first couple of days of this technique were rough. I sat right next to her crib, where she couldn't see me and cried as well. After a few days, it got easier. It took a couple of weeks (I think) before we started seeing consistent results. Key to this technique was that if she woke up from a nap in less than an hour, we had to leave her alone (again for 10 minutes at a time) until the hour was complete.

Enter Casey. Casey, the dog who shows very little affection to any person other than me, including Matthew, who she has known almost as long and lived with for over 80% of her life. Casey, the dog who barely acknowledged Sarah's existence when we brought her home. The first few times that I let Sarah cry upon waking up from a nap 32 minutes in, Casey looked at me like I was crazy, ran and stood by the door to Sarah's room, and continued to be agitated until I finally went in to the room. She rushed over to the crib and put her paws up on it to check that Sarah was fine, then went back to ignoring her.

As if I didn't feel guilty enough about letting the baby cry...

So several months have passed. This past month has been my favorite because she is so smiley and excited until just before nap or bed time. She is up 1-2 times per night, but goes right back to sleep. I'm back in my bed within 11-15 minutes, usually. Her naps are usually 60-80 minutes long, sometimes a little longer. She does not sleep more than 35 minutes in the car, but if she has one bad nap, she can usually make up for it with the other one, and more importantly, SHE IS HAPPY!