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Dad tries 'cry it out' method, but ends up climbing into crib

"You don't get extra points by letting your child cry themselves to sleep."
/ Source: TODAY

As a father to two young daughters, Muhammed Nitoto is learning new lessons about parenting every day. And, since his first daughter, Zendaya, was born two years ago, Nitoto has shared those lessons with other parents on his Instagram account, the Chronicles of Daddy.

In a recent post, the San Pedro, California, dad shared video footage from his daughters' baby monitor, showing him climbing into the crib with his youngest daughter, Zuri, 1, when she wouldn't stop crying out for him at bedtime.

"Tried to let her 'cry it out' but didn't have it in me to commit," Nitoto wrote in the post. "It's something about hearing my daughter crying that gets under my skin ... I just want to pick her up and hold her close until she stops. I know I can't do that all the time, but right now we gonna take our time on this growing up thing and I may or may not lay in a crib I don't fit in so that she will sleep."

In the sweet video, baby Zuri stops crying as soon as Daddy lays next to her. But Nitoto says prior to his decision to jump over the crib railings, Zuri had been having a tough time settling down.

"She had been fussy all day, so at bedtime I kind of expected her to be difficult," Nitoto told TODAY Parents. "We did our bedtime routine like normal, put the girls into their beds and left the room. They both laid down, but Zuri wouldn't go to sleep — she started fussing."

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Nitoto says he tried to let his daughter cry it out, but when he realized his method was unproductive, he decided to try another approach.

"I went in to check on her and I wasn't going to get in her crib, but I didn't want to take her out — I wanted her to sleep in her own bed," Nitoto explained. "She really just wanted comfort and you don't get extra points by letting your child cry themselves to sleep, so I climbed in and she laid with me and went to sleep."

Muhammed Nitoto with his partner, Hejira Thompson, and their daughters, Zendaya, 2, and Zuri, 1.
Muhammed Nitoto with his partner, Hejira Thompson, and their daughters, Zendaya, 2, and Zuri, 1.Muhammed Nitoto

After about a half hour, Nitoto climbed back out of the crib and left a sleeping Zuri on her own.

Nitoto says he shared the experience on Instagram because he knows every parent has dealt with a fussy child and the desire to handle the situation in a way that's best for their kid.

"Crying it out in my experience is hit or miss," said Nitoto. "Sometimes it just makes a child a lot more irritated and that makes things a lot worse. I changed my mind because it was late, I wanted rest and most of all I really wanted her to calm down so she could sleep. I think as a parent, you have to have more than one way of doing things."