p.s. I forgot to mention that we’ve never done CIO. I’m not saying this making any sort of judgement, I’m only saying this to let you know that you dont’ have to do CIO to see improvement in their waking patterns. For us it was getting things better under control with better meds, having some serious testing done to find out what exactly was going on, dealing successfully with MSPI, and TIME. As they get older and spend more time upright, it’s better for them– so sitting, crawling and definitely walking, should help your situation. For us, it was really the walking that helped. Lucas still wakes at nearly your ‘good’ night schedule, but it’s a huge improvement from his former nights. He always wakes more when teething or sick. It’s been a long road. I will take on anyone though, who would like to suggest that he does this out of habit. For some babies, maybe, for mine, definitely not. So I’m very sympathetic to the mothers who really feel their babies are in pain, but are getting pressure to do CIO, especially if you have found that it makes things worse, like you mentioned. Laura is right, there are several other things you can do. There is also Elizabeth Pantley’s “The No Cry Sleep Solution” which is very insightful. Another mom on here, Tiffany (Ally’s mom, I think is her screenname) has a lot of good advice on sleeping as well. She’s also had a hard time with sleep issues.
My final solution to me getting the rest I so desperately needed, (since I’m breastfeeding, and for many other reasons, it had to be me getting up with him) was co-sleeping. I never really thought I would do it but it’s been my life-saver and has literally changed my life in terms of keeping a small level of sanity. I can’t say enough good things about it in our situation. Sorry to overrun you wtih ideas, but I know hte desperation when you don’t know what to do and need some ideas fast. Please email more questions and more description of your situation and we can try to help as best we can.