Wow I wish I had found this site and this thread when I was going through many sleepless nights...
My little girl is now 28 months and it's only in the last say 8 weeks that we have turned a corner, purely through patience and acceptance that she will grow out of the need to wake at night.
I breastfed her for 18 months, with night feeds cut out from about 14 months. This alone brought out a lot of the older generation of mothers who said OOH NO, that's a bad thing, they'll be wanting boobs til they're 10, etc etc.
Rubbish. I needed to sleep in order to get to work the next day and function, so boobies were the quickest, easiest, and most comforting way for both of us to get back to sleep.
Once I stopped breastfeeding at night, Ivy still woke and cried, and when I walked into her room she would be standing up with her little arms out wanting to be picked up. How can you tell such a young child NO you can't have a cuddle? It was just terrible to hear so many people saying Just Leave Her to cry it out!
I would give her a cuddle for a few minutes, tuck her back in, and sit or lie on her floor til she fell back to sleep. Sometimes this would take up to two hours, as she would sit up and check to see if I was there, then lay back down. The minute I walked out, if she heard me, she'd be standing up again and crying for a cuddle.
Yes it was hard at the time, especially getting only four or five hours broken sleep then having a full on work day, but now - seeing a happy little girl who just grew out of a natural waking pattern and into a comfortable full night's sleep because she feels safe and loved - it's so worth it.
Just had to share.
And yes I agree that it's OK to leave a baby for a minute or so if they're crying, not to teach them a lesson, but because sometimes you've got other things that have to be done, like going to the loo, or helping a sibling, or serving hot food.
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