Rocking My Baby

I still rock my baby to sleep. I know that I should probably stop, that I need to give him the chance to learn to fall asleep on his own, but rocking works so well for us. And I love it. Those are some of the most tender moments I've experienced as a mother.

For the most part, when I rock him to sleep, he goes down for naps and for the night quickly and with little protest. If I lay him down "drowsy but awake," on the other hand, his eyes will pop open the moment his head hits the mattress and he'll kick and flail and roll around until he gets stuck and needs to be rescued. Or, lately, until he falls to the side from a push-up position and hits his head on the crib rails and I rush to comfort him.

However, for the past several weeks he's been waking up MANY times a night, and I wonder if sleep training would help that. I've tried just rubbing his back instead of picking him up when he cries, and that worked for exactly one night. The second night he was having none of that — backrubs only made him more upset.

But last night was wretched. I don't know if I can take much more.