Ask Moxie: Q&A: rocking baby to sleep
Eric writes:
“I have been pouring over various entries in your blog for a while now and decided to ask you a few questions. Based on different books (Ferber, Weissbluth, etc.) and doctor recommendations, my wife and I tried CIO and it was miserable…for us and our son. It didn’t feel right and we were reassured when we read your thoughts on babies who increase tension by crying.
We have found some success by rocking our son to sleep though it often seems to take ages for him to fall asleep. This might seem ridiculous, but one question is about how to get our son into the crib without waking him once he does happen to fall asleep. On several occasions, he has fallen asleep in our arms by rocking him to sleep but awakens as soon as we set him down in his crib. Do you know of a successful way to put him in the crib without waking him up? Also, what is your stance on rocking him to sleep? I know that you suggest rocking as a way of calming a baby who increases tension through crying, but should we be letting him fully fall asleep in our arms? The problem is that if we don’t let him fall asleep in our arms and we attempt to soothe him while he is lying in the crib, it takes a much longer time and he seems to be more restless.
We are experiencing other sleeping problems (night wakenings), but would really like to try to first tackle the issue of getting him to fall asleep without the nightly battle that it always has been. I am not sure if his age would vary your response, but he is approximately 4.5 months old right now. He was born approximately 3 weeks early due to my wife’s development of HELLP Syndrome.
Exhausted and eagerly awaiting your response,
Eric”
Ooh. Three things I hate combined into one post:
1) HELLP Syndrome. For those of you who don’t know it, it’s like turbo-ultra-mega preeclampsia, and is very serious. If the baby doesn’t come out, the mother can seize and then her organs shut down and she dies. I’m glad Eric’s wife and the baby came out of it healthy. We should all keep a close watch on our blodd pressure and the protein in our urine while pregnant.
2) The 4-month sleep regression. It just sucks. There’s no way around it. 4.5 months minus 3 weeks puts Eric’s baby smack in the middle of it. It’s so so hard for babies to sleep at this age.
3) The cultural expectation that a baby that young should be able to go down awake and that if the baby can’t it’s something the parents are doing wrong.
Yeah, there are things you could be doing to screw up your kid’s sleep. Some of them are obvious, like playing loud music at 10 pm in the same room your baby’s in, or snorting coke while you’re breastfeeding. Some of them are not so obvious, like drinking coffee in the morning while nursing(caffeine has a half-life of 96 hours in a baby’s system–go figure–but it doesn’t seem to affect some babies at all) or putting a kid in pajamas that make him/her too hot and sweaty all night.
But aside from a really small group of things, there’s not much you can do to change the way your baby sleeps. It’s largely a function of personality and age. If Eric’s baby needs to be rocked to sleep, that’s the way the kid is. It doesn’t mean that he’ll be like that forever, or even a month from now. Just that it’s what’s working now. By Any Means Necessary to get everyone as much sleep as possible.
So I think rocking your kid to sleep is fine, as is putting your baby in the swing, or nursing to sleep, or using a pacifier, or having the baby go to sleep with a comfort object or white noise machine or anything else people use. (If you use a comfort object, make sure you have a spare in case something happens to the primary one, or you’re screwed.) You child will not need that thing forever, and you’ll probably have a good instinct about when you can switch that thing out of the routine. At the very least, you’ll do better making sleep changes in your child if you have some sleep under your belt, so think of it as strategic pacing.
But. If it takes forever to rock to sleep, I’d look and see if there’s something else that might work better. Eric and his wife tried CIO so they know that doesn’t work for their son. (In contrast, my second son didn’t want to nurse or rock down, so I tried letting him cry and he fell right to sleep after a few minutes. Stunned me, since my first son would escalate if I let him cry for more than half a minute.) Maybe swaddling would work, or something else. I wouldn’t be afraid to try other things, because they just might stumble onto something that will work faster than the rocking. Or maybe not, and the rocking is as good as it gets at this stage.
It’s just awful staring down the barrel of a long, long bedtime routine (those of us in the 3-year-old sleep regression can sympathize). You’re finally at the end of the day, and you know you’re still facing an hour of getting the kid to sleep. No way around it but through it, but it still just makes you want to cry, and ask for your money back.
How many of us have suffered through the problem of getting the kid to sleep but then not being able to put the baby down into the crib?! It’s the bloody hangnail of the first year of parenting. I’ve head suggestions of putting a heating pad/hot water bottle in the crib to leave it warm, then moving it right before you put the baby down, but I didn’t have enough hands to do that. You can let the baby sleep for 20 minutes to get deep into the sleep cycle before putting him down (and then let all the blood rush back into your arms) and that might help. I’ve also heard that in Australia they don’t have this problem because they all put their babies down to sleep on sheepskins, and the sheepskin magically keeps them asleep. Honeslty, I can’t remember if I came up with anything good at that age because I was so sleep deprived that not much stuck from that phase.
So, can anyone solve the problem of putting the baby down into the crib and keeping the baby asleep? If you can patent it, you’ll make mountains of money.
And if anyone else wants to sympathize or complain, please feel free.
Incoming search terms for the article:
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- snug & tug swaddle blankets
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Posted by: Dawn |
February 06, 2008 at 10:35 AM
My solution to this problem
was to lie down with the baby and fall asleep myself. Frequently
she would not allow me to lie down on the Actual Bed, but if I lay
down on the couch with her on my chest she’d stay asleep
and… honestly I don’t remember anything after
that because I was out so fast.
I have found that if my
baby has to fart (I love that word) or poo, she won’t go to sleep
properly and will wake very easily.
I read in one of the books
I read shortly after my child was born that they did a small study
where they had parents listen to a tape of a crying baby for 2 or 3
minutes, then they asked how long the baby had been crying and most
parents said 10-20 minutes. Meaning that maybe it’s not taking as
long as it seems like it’s taking. Looking at the clock when my son
began fussing and noting the time, helped me to realize that he
wasn’t taking nearly as long as I thought to calm down.
Your chiropractor will not
thank me.
- getting one of those
positioners or even some rolled up fleece blankets to put around
them. A lot of babies just hate that feeling of being surrounded by
lots of open space. (So do I, actually.)
Also, I don’t know the
age/weight limit for this, but the Amby Bed or other “hammock” kind
of suspension bed might be the answer for babes who need that
constant motion to sleep.
Ah, the good old four month
sleeping NIGHTMARE. We got a little swaddler thing with a velcro
patch on it so the swaddle would stay closed when my daughter was
born. I think she was about 2-3 months old before we actually
started using it, but if we’d wrap her in it, then rock/nurse her
to sleep we could lay her down in her bassinet and she’d stay
asleep…for a little while. It got us over the hump of laying her
down without waking her up anyway. As for the night wakings…well,
we were kinda part-time co-sleepers, because the first time she
woke up at night I brought her to bed with us. By Any Means
Necessary included me sleeping with my boob out the rest of the
night for a while there.
We used the Baby Whisperer
modified version of sleep training at 8 months with great success.
I say “modified” because I worked around his schedule rather than
forcing one on to him and because I was willing to compromise on
the wake time because he’s just an early riser and likes a little
extra daytime sleep. It sucks but it’s not worth the fight to force
him to stay down longer. I liked that method because you don’t
leave the baby alone to cry. It was immensely time consuming for a
few days, but worth it. I wish we’d started it around 6 or 7
months, but no earlier than that.
One of the twins slept
partly in/on the sling for a bit, too, because for her it was like
the texture of what was touching her that counted – rock/nurse down
in sling or on a blankie, and then move the whole set, and she was
fine. Remove from one texture to the other? No go.
I am SO not an expert, but
we have found that our 2-month-old, highly sensitive and intense
fussbucket benefits from our adaptation of the Karp method of
soothing. We actually jiggle her to the point where it looks quite
suspect to newbies who haven’t tried soothing her down
themselves.
Ah you have my son there!
I’ll just describe what we did and see if it works for
you.
We’re now (7.5 mos) back to
just two feed wakings a night at roughly midnight and 4am, each
only lasting about half an hour (as opposed to the nightmare
pattern of: sleep 45 mins, up 1.5+ hrs that we got during both
regressions) which is very managable since we split the night.
Before two am, DH is on duty with a bottle of breastmilk (I pump
just before I go to bed) at the ready, and after 2am, he’s all
mine. That way each of us has the potential of at leat 4-5 hrs of
sleep in a block, and on a practical level can often squeeze 5-7
hrs into a night if we make a point of getting our butts to bed at
a reasonable hour.
Posted by: Arwen |
February 06, 2008 at 10:58 AM
Sixty million possible
methods. Keep trying! Eventually you’ll either find what works or
they’ll outgrow the issue. Either way, at least you’ll feel like
you’re ‘DOING SOMETHING’ – sometimes that is all I need to keep
sane is knowing I’m still looking and haven’t given up utterly.
Though giving up and just rolling with whatever is working is
probably more sane by far.
This was what eventually
worked, but for many months, we just had to hold her. I suggest
finding a way to get comfy in the glider/rocker/recliner and plan
to sleep with the baby sometimes.
- stand awkwardly by crib,
gradually easing top arm pressure over about a 1-2 minute
timespan
Our daughter (now 15
months) was borderline colicky, which forced us into Do Anything to
Survive mode, which I think actually made the sleep issue much less
complex for us, since we had no ideals and just did whatever
worked. At that age we had a well-honed system wherein I would go
to bed, and my husband would put the baby in the ring sling and
bounce her to sleep, then wait twenty minutes to the middle of her
sleep cycle and oh-so-carefully transfer her to my arms, where she
would sleep and nurse the whole night.
My first two were the same
way, never really fell asleep soundly enough to put down. With my
first, she screamed before she even touched the crib, no matter how
gently we moved towards it. We ended up pretty much exclusively
cosleeping for a while. I have a two month old who had me at my
wit’s end (I know, third child, supposed to be easier!), she wasn’t
sleeping consistently, nothing worked, she was always crazy tired
and mad, co-sleeping at night was fine, but what to do during the
day, with 2 other kids i can’t nap with her (I wish!)…One day,
just to see what would happen,I put her down in the crib on her
stomach, and voila…2.5 hour nap within minutes. It has made her
into a completely different child. I know it’s risky, and feel some
guilt, on the other hand, so is co-sleeping according to some, esp.
with older sibs in the mix. So is sleep deprivation, and a crazy
mommy. So we have nothing in her bassinet (a pack and play, which
is so not mushy!), she has very strong head\neck\arms (for a
baby!), so for now that is what works for us. Will talk to the ped
at her next apptmt (in a week).
For making the arms-to-crib
transfer, think about how you hold them in your arms initially.
When I have to rock any of my three to sleep (2 yo boy and 3 mo b/g
twins) I deliberately hold them in a way that will make the crib
transfer easier. Often I lay them on my lap with one hand directly
under baby’s head/neck, the other hand or forearm under
back/bottom. Doesn’t feel as natural as the traditional full-arm
cradle position, but its easier to lay them down with less
jostling. Every kid is different, and certainly I agree with By
Whatever Means Necessary, but do try a lot of trial & error,
that’s really the only way to find what works best. That’s how we
discovered the white noise machine, which really seems to help our
kids fall asleep. Its a tough road that seems interminable now, but
it will get better, really it will. Good luck!
Posted by: Virginia |
February 06, 2008 at 09:22 AM
We have never been able to
take the sleeping baby and lay him down and have him stay asleep…
or if we have it has been so infrequent it’s not worth
mentioning.
Posted by: Shandra |
February 06, 2008 at 12:27 PM
It does get better. You are
at what was my absolute low point – hopefully that puts it into
perspective a bit.
- carefully raise crib
side, leaving shirt in
Posted by: sheSaid |
February 06, 2008 at 12:14 PM
But yeah – the 4 month
thing made me want to give him back because we just didn’t know it
was coming, and we were sure he’d never sleep again without a boob
in his mouth. OK, maybe I feared that fate more than his dad. At
any rate, thank god we were wrong. It WILL get better. It
will.
I went through the
putting-down-and-waking thing too. I learned that the general rule,
at least for my V, is that if I suspect she’s ‘faking’ and is going
to wake up, I don’t wait and wait for the deep sleep to kick in. It
just doesn’t. What worked for us is putting her down, letting her
wake up, standing by the crib and starting her entertainment
devices (mobile and FP aquarium) and then slinking off while she
watched them with her paci in. While she wouldn’t go to sleep that
way, I’d get a break from the nursing/rocking and she’d be winding
herself down. When she was done with the crib, she’d fuss (I mean,
ahem, scream like a banshee) and then I’d know it was time for the
real session of nursing to bed. So I sort of have a tension
increaser-followed-by-decreaser in Moxie’s parlance.
That said, do what works,
if it’s rocking, then rock on.
My cousin had HELPP with
her last one and it’s so scary. I’m so glad everyone is
okay.
4 – This is not your fault.
Everything that you are dealing with is totally and completely
normal, and anyone who tells you otherwise is not being
realistic.
On a GOOD night I can put
her down but you have to put her down at the right time. I wait
about 45 minutes, I have my laptop to play on while she sleeps. If
I do it BEFORE she’s been asleep for 20 minutes, then she’ll wake
up at that 20 minute period that most babies awake a tiny bit from
their sleep cycles… so I let her pass that tiny awake and then a
littel more. Sometimes she will simply wake 1 hour after I put her
to bed, so some nights I wait 1 hour and 15 minute to pass that 1
hour mark that she sometimes wakes at, it’s easier if she’s still
in my lap to quickly give her the bottle/boob or rock her to keep
her asleep vs being in the crib or bed where she seems to be harder
to get back to sleep.
4 months just sucks and
then sucks some more. That was one of our hardest lowest points. We
did discover that we were trying so hard to get the baby to sleep
we were actually keeping him awake, too much
motion/rocking/shushing…but we also never discovered how to put
him down asleep. we had to pat him for ages when we lay him down
and even for ages after we thought he was asleep we had to keep one
hand on him…we also moved our son out of our room at this stage
because we worked out we kept waking him up everytime we exhaled
too deeply! the good news is that suddenly this crap stops or at
least scales down and becomes just like a horrible dream that you
have thankfully woken from. things just keep improving after that!
courage! it’s shortly about to get better.
Posted by: rudyinparis |
February 06, 2008 at 09:07 AM
oh yeah, after I read some
other comments I remember that I used to let Alex fall asleep on me
in our bed, then I could roll to my side, still holding him, settle
him on his side, still holding him, pull one limb away, still
holding him, repeat till he was on his own. I could then arrange
his legs so that he’d naturally roll to his back from his side
without me having to completely lay him that way.
Posted by: Heather Terrell |
February 06, 2008 at 09:22 AM
Posted by: kelly |
February 06, 2008 at 09:42 AM
We were worried that she’d
always need the sling to get to sleep, but she started eschewing it
at about six months, and stopped wanting to sleep in my arms at
around the same time. Now she goes down quite easily thanks to a
well-honed bedtime routine, and sleeps in a crib (well, a crib
sidecar, but we always planned to have her in our room the first
couple years).
Posted by: anonymous |
February 06, 2008 at 11:59 AM
anyway, the one thing that
i have found to help with transitioning to a crib is, right after i
put her down, i gently bounce the mattress on either side of her
head. that and having something soft (like a fleece blanket) under
her head, and not just cotton, like people have said, has
helped.
At around 4 months, we
started solidifying our bedtime routine. I honestly can’t remember
if that helped at the time, but we were glad to have the routine
later. It helped a lot when we moved her to her crib at a little
over 6 months. That move, a bunch of colds, the 8 month sleep
regression… oh that time sucked. But we got through and are
getting halfway decent sleep now.
Posted by: caramama |
February 06, 2008 at 12:10 PM
- slowly rise, swaying.
Keep pressure on both sides.
Posted by: sheSaid |
February 06, 2008 at 12:16 PM
No time to read, quick
note: Flannel sheets are less cold if they notice temp change. And
some kids react to rotation, while others react to ’tilt’. One of
mine could be slipped onto the crib from one horizontal angle to
the other provided there was NO ROTATION. Which meant rocking him
to sleep in exactly the position (which side ‘up’) he could
maintain in the bed. Another could be rolled over sideways without
a stir, but tilt his head or feet at all from the angle of start,
and he was UP. Totally flat settling worked, then roll him into his
space (he also eventually was one who would ‘roll himself away from
mommy’ after nursing down most of the way – the other one tended to
‘skooch’ rather than roll).
One thing that helped us is
a Gro-bag. They are awesome little baby sleeping bags, and it helps
to minimize the temperature difference between your arms and the
crib a lot. Also, everything everyone else said – lots of good
stuff here (I like the “wedge the head in the corner” suggestion -
that helped my son a lot).
We didn’t transition to the
crib from our bed until 5-6 months, but when we did, we were at a
loss. Our son sleeps terribly, so we’ve tried a lot of
things.
I rocked my boy to sleep
every night for 15 months. I stressed myself about it for the first
8 months, and then realized that it was a great way to unwind after
a long day. I’d sit in the dark room, cuddle my little man, and
relax. At 15 months, he decided that he was done with all that, and
we moved on from there. I miss rocking him.
To trasnistion him to the crib, I always watched for him to go
limp. Then, I watched the clock and waited 3 more minutes just to
give him a little extra time to really transistion into sleep. To
get him in the crib I slowly lowered him into the crib with his
feet slightly lower than his head. Make sure the feet touch first!
It worked most nights.
I’m very glad your wife and
family are healthy. And also, so great to hear a thoughtful
question from a Dad–I’m always a little perplexed by the scarcity
of questions or comments in this community from dads. So cheers to
you!
Posted by: effective nancy |
February 06, 2008 at 09:17 AM
I found that swaddling
definitely helped when our girl was small. We only stopped when she
could flip herself over onto her tummy while swaddled.
Posted by: Fahmi |
February 06, 2008 at 09:14 AM
Posted by: Shelly |
February 06, 2008 at 08:18 AM
We use a sheepskin. There.
I said it. Don’t call the SIDS police, please. We’ve had it since
he was about 5 months old, and it has revolutionized our
transitions. No more arched-back/leg-kicking/tear-inducing
transitions to the hard crib mattress. We still have to be pretty
careful of the way we swing him into the crib, etc, and there are
lots of great suggestions for that above. I do the nurse/rock to
just rocking to stand&sway to lower carefully, leaving arms and
chest on him/remove contact carefully type of transition described
previously. It sounds more complicated than it is.
What works best for us is
walking him around to calm him down and put him to sleep and he
usually does that pretty quickly, but putting him the crib always
wakes him up. We pat his chest (patting has always been a comfort
to him since his severe colic days)… we pat him until he falls
back to sleep and then we keep on patting! He has a motion detector
so often he wakes up when we walk away… but then we just pat him
some more and try again.
Yay…finally a post about
something that I’ve gone through and can offer advice, or at least
sympathy! I’m with Moxie…whatever gets you there, and every
baby’s got their own preferred style of falling asleep. If you’re
lucky, there’ll be more than one way. Mine only ever wanted to
nurse before bed.
That time is pretty fuzzy
now but I do remember my husband, mom and I laughing as we’d watch
the one put him into his bassinet so slowly and quietly – it looked
like a movie in super slow motion.
2 – During the sleep
regressions we never found a solution to the waking as soon as you
put baby down in the crib. Sometimes having the pacifier in her
mouth helped, because it would calm her before she could cry. Other
days it was just rinse and repeat until she would stay
asleep.
Can I just say I love Eric?
I can only assume he was writing this while his wife was
sleeping.
- if your baby has good
head and neck control and you feel comfortable with it, you could
try putting him to sleep on his belly. Our son wouldn’t sleep any
other way, and we had none of the risk factors for SIDs, so I was
fine with it. You can check with your ped, of course.
It won’t last forever. You
are doing a brilliant job. You are wonderful parents, and you’re
obviously a gorgeous husband. We are all with you….around the
country…at 3am…shushing and rocking and singing and despairing
and loving.
Posted by: Laura |
February 06, 2008 at 08:47 AM
I didn’t read all of the
comments so I might be duplicating some things.
My son, 13 weeks, will also
not sleep in his crib. The transition kills the sleep. So, we
co-sleep at night and during the day, the boy sleeps in his car
seat. And we swaddle for all sleeping. The genius thing about the
car seat, for us, is that when he stirs or wakes a tiny bit during
and after the transition into it, we can just rock it back and
forth (most car seats can be put into an easy rocking mode by
bringing the handle to the front). This puts him back to sleep or
helps him get into a deeper sleep. And it also means he doesn’t
have to spend quite as much time in our arms, which is good for us.
And, unlike in the crib, the car seat + swaddle means he is snuggly
and surrounded. He doesn’t go from the warmth and surround of our
arms into a cold and wide open space (the car seat also has a
fleece liner). The sides and head supports of the car seat help him
feel like he is still being held. This won’t be perfect forever,
obviously, but it sure helps now.
I use a wrap during the day
so that when he is out I can do my business and he keeps on
sleeping. we did rock but bounced to sleep so the wrap keep my arms
sane for that! If I nurse him down for a nap or at night we lay on
a bed and I nurse him down and then wait and wait and wait till it
feels like I am missing the entire world and then I roll away and
he stays asleep (for about one sleep cycle aka 45 min then I run up
and repeat). Sometimes I take a book with me then I don’t mind it
at all.
Also, and this may sound a
little weird, sometimes around that age if I lay down on the bed
and put her (warmly dressed, on top of the covers) between my legs
– her head towards my ankles, her
feet kicking me in the crotch (hence the covers to dull the blow),
she’d sleep for hours that way, and so could I. It was kind of
served the same purpose as swaddling, but with human limbs instead
of, you know, blankets. I couldn’t roll over or anything, but at
that point who sleeps lightly enough to roll over.
Posted by: hedra |
February 06, 2008 at 10:33 AM
We co-sleep (despite my
many fears about it initially) and the munchkin is in a little
‘nest’ on top of the duvet. That way I can breast feed her lying
down and doze while I’m doing it and when she has finished and is
asleep, I can just role away. Usually (although not last night) she
is asleep within 3-5 mins and will sleep until 3am-ish, when she
starts waking every hour or two hours. We started co-sleeping
because, like your little one, our munchkin would wake every time
we put her down in the cot. If your wife is breast feeding, it
might be worth a try to co-sleep and feed lying down.
I always thought maybe I
just wasnt letting him get allllll the way to sleep (I had long
since given up putting him down awake) so I’d give him another 10
mins in my arms and then put him down… only to discover I had
wasted an extra 10 mins when he woke up again 30 seconds later. I
dont have any advice… we just muddled through it, waking up every
5 minutes, putting him back to bed, just getting comfy ourselves,
and having to go back into his room.
After we came home from a
month away, the transition back to crib was very difficult for our
16 week old son. He seemed to have some kind of crazy crib fear.
Screaming as soon as i placed him in
And its still tricky, but its getting better. We follow a routine
that doesn’t change. Bath, breast , then swaddled in a miracle
blanket , pacifier and rocked in the rocking chair with the same
song every night. Then when he’s drowsy he goes in. At first he
hated it, so i’d “reset” every time he cried, which meant picking
him up and rocking and doing some loud shushing, sometimes I’d even
go back to the chair. The first night I did it about 8 times, the
next time it was less, and now I don’t need to take him out.
I’m not sure what your crib is like, but once or twice if I kept
holding him for about a minute as he was lying down and kept
whispering the lullaby it helped him feel more secure in the crib.
It felt very awkward but helped him feel comfier about the
crib.
Then once he is asleep, when he wakes, and its not about boob I go
back in and pat and reassure, trying to be efficient, calm and not
engage too much with him. If he is crying I take him out and
reset.
Sticking to a routine has definitely been the best thing for us. It
now takes us less time from swaddle to crib to sleep. He knows and
is really comforted by the repetition. Also getting him there
earlier in the evening has helped a lot. He’s not so over
tired.
My second child (daughter)
S L O W L Y taught me the lesson that it is much more about the
baby’s personality – something inborn – than it is about what we as
parents do to teach them to sleep. My first, my son, was a
wonderful sleeper and I thought it was because we did everything
right – HA! Pride goeth before a fall, right? These sleep
regressions you speak of, we could hardly identify them in DD
because they all just ran together. Anyway, the one thing that did
help us immensely with both babies (though it didn’t make DD sleep
well) was swaddling. Tight swaddling, and white noise, made DS (who
already slept pretty well at 2 months) magically sleep twice as
long – and from there his sleep only progressed to longer and
better. No real regressions at all. We continued swaddling him
tightly for months. And at 5 years old, he still sleeps with his
“ocean” on. The swaddling is what allowed us to lay DD down without
waking her. Although, not to make Eric feel worse, that never did
make her sleep LONGER. But it let us lay her down asleep and get an
hour or two many times. Like you, Moxie, and some previous posters,
I am now firmly in the camp of By Any Means Necessary to get the
most people the most sleep possible. And NO GUILT over it!!! What
ended up being a long cosleeping arrangement for us could have been
a lot more pleasant if I could have let go of the guilt.
I’ll also go ahead and
second the swaddling suggestions others have made. For our
Weebeastie we used the Miracle Blanket thing (tighter in the early
months, then looser towards the end, and left his feet out when he
got too tall for the little pocket) until about 6 mos when he began
to really, really, really, really want to have his hands free
during the night and would fight himself awake trying to get out
and then scare himself to death with the flapping arms. So, as part
of the 6 mo sleep regression, since we weren’t going to get more
than an hour of sleep at a time anyway, we also went kinda cold
turkey on the swaddling. I don’t recommend that, but it worked out
in the end. It sucked a^* for about three weeks, especially with
teething thrown into the middle of the mix. We have typically split
the night, my husband and I, but as a bridge for him and us this
time, I just slept with him in the guest bed for a couple of weeks
to help him learn that those crazy flying things in the night
wouldn’t kill him. The arms! They attack! Where did they come from!
Help!
Posted by: Jojo |
February 06, 2008 at 11:00 AM
Recently, at just about 7
months, she has actually started falling asleep watching those
things. So yay! for no crib-transfer. Not every night, but
sometimes.
So… that’s our trick for
putting him back to sleep. Patting.
Alright, I know this is
going to sound “duh” but it is something that took us a while to
figure out, so maybe it will help you but maybe not!
One thing I did back then,
and I am not sure how well it worked, or if I was deluding myself,
was do the rocking in a sling. And once the kid was asleep, put the
sling down on the bed and shrug out of it, leaving the baby inside.
And about twenty minutes later, when the baby is in deep sleep,
ease baby out of sling and in to the crib. It made me cry when
after all that, he would still wake up, but it worked just often
enough that I kept up with it.
Anyway. Eric, sorry you are
having a rough time… I wish I could say something to make it all
better.
Posted by: Shelly |
February 06, 2008 at 08:25 AM
Posted by: Chaya |
February 06, 2008 at 08:10 AM
Posted by: Kelly |
February 06, 2008 at 09:10 AM
Aha, we’re at exactly the
same stage, the dreaded 4 months. Day time sleeping isn’t working
for us at all at the moment, but we have cracked (at the moment)
getting to sleep at night for our little munchkin. What works for
us is a combination – we do the last feed downstairs and try to get
as much into her as possible. We then go upstairs into our very
dimly lit bedroom – we always keep it very dim and never put on a
light during the night.
Posted by: Nutmeg |
February 06, 2008 at 09:25 AM
Posted by: Jennifer |
February 06, 2008 at 07:09 AM
At that age, we were still
using the moses basket. We found that a lot easier for gently
putting Pumpkin down, because we could lean right over it and still
have the baby in our arms in the basket, and then sloooowly remove
our arms. Hubby was far better at this than I was. He would also
sometimes parially lift the basket and bounce the entire thing. We
also swaddled, even though she inevitably kicked/squirmed her way
out within an hour- it helped with the transition because we
bounced her in the swaddle and so she got to stay in her nice
snuggly blanket (OK, so it was summer here and it was a nice
lightweight blanket) when we put her down.
Posted by: effective nancy |
February 06, 2008 at 09:14 AM
(at night – it’s a whole
other story – just know that whatever evil you wish on your
nonsleeping child is TOTALLY normal. This morning I informed my
husband that the 9 month old is clearly the spawn of Satan.
Yeah – do what it takes,
whatever it takes, to get as much sleep as you can. What It Takes
right now is probably going to be vastly different from What It
Takes at the next (sorry, yes, there are more) sleep regression, so
I wouldn’t worry about long-term effects.
As my mother says, our kid
is going to go to Six Flags just to digest her lunch and get a good
night’s sleep. Nevertheless, it works!
Currently my girl won’t
make it more then 1 to 2 hours in the crib, she used to sleep 5
hours but then has this awful gassy period around 3 months and I
wound up co-sleeping so I sort of created a monster.. but oh well I
guess.
But you know what? I
actually don’t care… in the begining I didn’t WANT to put him
down. And then I WANTED to be away from him and now as long as I
get some me time I kinda like him sleeping on me.
I should also mention that
the Sleep Sheep from cloud B is a total godsend; we laughed when we
got it as a gift, and then have used it ever since.
Posted by: liz |
February 06, 2008 at 11:07 AM
Posted by: Amy M |
February 06, 2008 at 12:26 PM
- s-l-o-w-l-y lower into
flannel sheeted (less “cold feeling” than cotton) crib, maintaining
warm pressure on chest. (Rial down) Extract bottom arm; slide baby
up against crib at the top (my son STILL sleeps with his head in
the corner at 2.5). Keep top arm on!
So here’s what I tried
(among every other method out there):
At four months, my girl
wouldn’t rock. I would walk her around and put her down when she
was really sleepy — trying to hold her in the same position and
all that jazz. If she seemed wakeful, I’d keep my hands/arms on the
mattress beside her and jiggle the mattress — that worked
sometimes. Also, here’s the big admission — she slept on her
stomach, or sometimes her side. Everything has changed so much over
the months, though. Now she’s 9 months, and I can’t walk her to
sleep. The only thing that works is letting her cry for a little. I
hate it, but walking or patting or whatever just makes her more
awake. And she doesn’t want to nurse to sleep. I mean, it makes her
mad if I try. It’s all so different from just a few months ago. We
also use a fan for white noise. I love it. Way to go to a Dad for
helping with it all. I’m going to go look up 9-month sleep
regression now.
Didn’t always work, mind
you, but it worked better than just putting him in the
crib.
Posted by: maureen |
February 06, 2008 at 12:07 PM
Do you think that it may be
the temperature change that is rousing your babe? You could try
warming up the crib mattress with a heating pad set on low. You’d
have to remove it a minute or more before laying him down to get
the temp right. Or, you could try snuggling babe up with a warmed
rice sock as you lay him down. The warmth and weight will make it
seem like you are still there. I have friends that have had great
success with this. For a double whammy, wrap the sock in a nice
mommy smelling shirt (as suggested above).
Oh the 4 month sleep
regression. It almost killed me… several times. And then the
8month sleep regression almost killed me again… several
times.
- gradually transition from
rocking to holding in one arm with the other arm over him
(sandwiched), let top arm get heavy
You have my sympathy; I
promise he’ll get through this and start sleeping
easier.
Cosleeping, which we
started around 13 mos, was a lot easier.
I have found with the sleep
cycles timing is everything, also making sleep associations so when
he/she wakes inthe crib some things are there such as paci/lovey
etc.
Posted by: G’s momma |
February 06, 2008 at 08:32 AM
Posted by: Heather |
February 06, 2008 at 08:59 AM
Posted by: meggiemoo |
February 06, 2008 at 10:20 AM
i have a 6 1/2 month old
who has never napped for more than 30 minutes (did this more or
less three times a day until around five months, when we slid down
to 20-25 minutes and have been there ever since) and still wakes up
several times a night. i just wanted to say that the very worst
thing about all of this for me has been moxie’s point #3–feeling
like i’m doing something wrong. or worse, doing something bad to my
baby by not….i don’t know what. making her cry herself to sleep?
in the light of day, that just seems so backward. in the middle of
the night, i’m convinced i’m ruining her somehow. and that is way
worse than the sleep deprivation.
Haven’t read all the
comments so sorry if am redundant.
First, Eric my sympathies.. 4-month regression SUCKS THE BIG ONE.
It does get better. I bought the pantley book around that time and
discovered that some ideas in it helped which now I know are pretty
universal.
We started our bedtime routine with roughly the same bedtime around
this time which didn’t help immediately but helped in the long
run.
We would lay with the baby and many nights I went to sleep with him
because i was exhausted (we are cosleepers).
We would take turns and give each other 3-4 hour chunks as much as
possible through the night.
Whatever it took we did. Some nights it meant that he slept
essentially with the boob in his mouth and other nights we let the
baby sleep on the couch with us while we sat in darkness and
watched TV on Closed captioning.
I remember we had about 1 week of pure torture with 8+ wakings a
night and then just a few weeks of 4-5 wakings which after 8 plus
was a relief.
As for the crib thing, when we did lay the baby on his own for
sleep we did the sears trick of putting our hands on his chest for
about 5 minutes after laying him down and that worked for
us.
We had great success with
swaddling until Dude was about 5 months old. IMO, 4 months is way
too early to start “sleep training”. They’re still confused about
how they got here in the first place ; )
We found that if MM slept
in the swing (on the side-to-side setting) for the first part of
the night, that it was easier to put him in his crib for the second
part of the night. Somehow, getting that very motion-filled rocking
sleep geared him up for the still and quiet crib.
As for Eric’s issue, we
just kept trying to put her down, as slowly and gently as possible,
and she would wake right back up anyway. At this point, we were out
of the swaddle and she was rolling over regularly. So, we went
ahead and put her down on her side or her stomach, and that helped
a lot, eventually.
5 – Also, we did some
cosleeping during the 4 and 8 month sleep regressions. There comes
a point when you would rather get not-so-great sleep than no sleep
at all.
Posted by: Bobbi |
February 06, 2008 at 11:05 AM
Didn’t read through ALL the
posts but just had one thing to add… a lot of young babies have
such a strong fall reflex (there is a more official term to this
but I can’t recall it right now). One of my boys had an overly
devloped fall reflex (at least compared to my other son), so that
if we went to put him on the crib moving directly vertically down
(i.e., he was horizontal – on his back – and we’d lower him down to
the crib so he stayed horizontal the entire way), he would have one
of those reflexes and wake up. We had a lot of success fully
swaddling him (helped that reflex and really comforted him) and
then lowering him in so he was sideways. Then right when he was on
the crib we could roll him over very gently and not suddenly and it
would avoid that reflex kicking in and waking him.
One thing we did was wrap
little g in a blanket or t-shirt that smelt like mommy. Then when I
put her in the crib I kept that same item with her. She seemed to
sleep easier and longer with this item. Perhaps it fooled her into
thinking I was still holding her – I am not sure. This was about at
the 4 month mark.
Posted by: Maria |
February 06, 2008 at 06:58 AM
I have no advice – in the
light of day, I’m able to rationally look at the tiny improvements
that happen (Alex used to ONLY sleep ON us – for 8-12 weeks – now
he’ll sleep beside us, sometimes rolls over and falls asleep on his
own … finally got himself down to 0-1 nursings between the hours
of 9p-9a.
When she was a newborn it
was almost impossible to put her down without a swaddle or in a
swing or chair. I think this had to do with her tummy because she
had a a lot of gas and spit up problems.
Posted by: z |
February 06, 2008 at 11:09 AM
Good luck… hope you guys
(all three of you) get some sleep.
I have sometimes found that
putting her down casualy rather than carefully works better, but
that is probably just random fluctuations. Sometimes I think it
helps to leave my arms around her a while when I have put her
down.
Posted by: lucy |
February 06, 2008 at 11:23 AM
(moral of the story – you
)
will forget a lot of this stage
Posted by: Dawn |
February 06, 2008 at 10:33 AM
Posted by: Virginia |
February 06, 2008 at 09:12 AM
Posted by: Kristine |
February 06, 2008 at 09:14 AM
Oh! and the comment about
me not caring was more about letting go of my own guilt than
anything else. because oh yes the fear that you are ruining your
kid and you are trying to rack your brain to find any new technique
to make this kid do what he is expected to do – that is horrible
worse than not sleeping.
For what it’s worth, my
experience is that although there are some parents who really don’t
want to co-sleep with their babies and toddlers, there are many who
don’t mind it or even enjoy it, it’s just that societal pressure
makes them feel like they *should* be having their children sleep
in separate beds. Or they’re afraid that if they let the baby sleep
in their bed they’ll never get him out, which is a valid fear
because it can be a difficult transition… but weaning and
potty-training can be difficult transitions too, and yet no one
warns that if you dare to nurse or diaper your baby you’ll be doing
it forever. Embracing co-sleeping has been one of the best
decisions my husband and I have made as parents.
I always read the comments
first, but I just couldn’t bare to think about those tough months
between 3.5 months and 7.5 months in which we did Any Means
Necessary. And reading the comments started to bring me back there
too much. I am too fragile right now to re-live it. I’m sure they
are lovely, helpful comments though.
In all cases we support her
head to make sure it stays in the same rhythm and plane as her
body, all in-arms jiggles are about two inches total amplitude, and
the rocking is just enough to plant each swaddled shoulder onto the
mattress for a millisecond. These are really, really small
movements overall, but fast (upwards of 80 bpm) and fairly uniform.
We always taper off the motion to get to stillness rather than just
suddenly stopping. THE BEST PART: this last bit takes place on the
mattress in her bed, so all we have to do is take our hands off the
top of a sleeping child, rather than trying to extricate our parts
from under hers or having to set her down–she’s already
down.
Try it on your kid
tonight!
Also, we got pretty adept
at changing the subject or blowing off the question when
people/extended family asked about him sleeping, and that got most
people off our backs with the unsolicited and/or unhelpful advice
or my-child-slept-through-the-night-at-6-weeks stuff that we just
couldn’t bear to hear right then. NOW I can be more cheery about
their luck, but 3 weeks ago we would have considered a statement
like that reasonable grounds for homicide.
Posted by: Melissa |
February 06, 2008 at 07:26 AM
So for example, she would
nurse to sleep or be rocked to sleep in my arms, lying on her side
(in cradle nursing position). She would fall asleep (hopefully into
deep sleep). I would get up from the glider, tip toe to her crib,
and put her down still holding her as close to my body as possible.
As some point, I got the idea to nurse/rock her with a lovey
between her and my stomach and when I put her down, I did so with
the lovey. It was a decent sized stuffed animal, and I would drap
her arm over it so that she was snuggling something when I layed
her down on her side (mimicking how she was in my arms). And then,
I would bit by bit move my body parts away from her.
Hope it goes better for you
soon
Posted by: terri mac |
February 06, 2008 at 08:52 AM
- while slowly lowering the
baby down, wedge baby in one of the corners of the crib, so they
feel surrounded on their head and one side. keep your arms around
them for a little while (hello, chiropractor!) and even gently rock
their body from side to side in the crib.
Posted by: LPV |
February 06, 2008 at 07:48 AM
Some things that helped us
with the transition to the crib were introducing a lovey (little
bunny blanket thing from Carters) and also using a fleece sheet
that someone made for us. It fit the crib mattress just like a
regular sheet but is made of fleece so the mattress didn’t have the
cold sheet feeling when we put her down, instead it felt soft and
warm. Random, but it did help (we live in a cold climate so the
cold sheet syndrome was a problem for us). Also, don’t rule out
teething. Our daughter started having teething pains around 4
months, even though her first tooth didn’t pop through until
several months later. But it definitely caused her difficulty with
sleeping. Finally, I second what everyone else says- do what you
need to. So many of the sleep books lead you to believe that it’s
just a control game you have to play with the kid and if you don’t
succeed, you’re a “soft” or unskilled parent. Baloney.
Of course, this method
won’t work for everyone I’m sure. In the end, it’s always by any
means necessary. We just had to do something different because no
one was getting the sleep they needed.
We just finished the 8mo
sleep regression, finished it off with a bang with some virus that
gave our little one fevers of 106 for a week with a few days in the
hospital… and now he thinks he needs to get up at 11pm on the dot
to eat, eats 2oz and then goes to sleep. Wish I could get past that
one, but… it’ll end too eventually (I hope).
Posted by: Sarah2 |
February 06, 2008 at 09:53 AM
We knew from the 4mo
regression (which seriously almost killed us) that it would pass,
that the transition back to the crib would be OK in the end, and
that we just had to muddle through.
- cosleeping works wonders
for lots of families, if you’re open to that.
- alternatively, keep your
hands firmly on their belly (or back, our DS was a belly sleeper)
so they feel that connection. Lessen the pressure incrementally
until your hands are barely resting. Then remove.
I never realised before how
crucial sleep is and how much I would miss getting an 8 hour
stretch. Hang in there!
Posted by: George |
February 06, 2008 at 09:23 AM
One thing i want to mention
FWIW is that cribs are very firm and sometimes that is what
affected our panda was to go from the softness of our bodies to the
firmness of the crib and so when we lay him on our bed free of
pillows and sheets but on our nice foam mattress the immediate
wakings were less.
- while rocking, drape with
a worn shirt to provide proper scent.
After vigorous rocking in
arms (that is, our dancing side to side, bouncing up and down, AND
jiggling her like a frantic ’80s air guitar solo), we can usually
get her eyes to close right until she hits the mattress. As needed,
our extreme measure is to hold the baby with two hands, one on head
and holding in optional pacifier (she’s not good with the inanimate
latch) and the other on her torso; we brace the sidecar bassinet
against the bed and roll her from side to side for a few minutes.
Usually drops her right off. We cross our hands at the wrists both
so we can see her face through the Y of thumb and forefinger on her
head, and to stabilize the rocking motion so that her head and body
stay synched up.
We have also always
Now my little darling is 6 months it is a bit easier
struggled with putting the baby down – so did my parents! – it’s a
known issue
than at 4 months so this is probably something that gets easier
after a while.
Posted by: tinyQ |
February 06, 2008 at 06:29 AM
Posted by: Cecily T |
February 06, 2008 at 11:41 AM
Posted by: Kellee |
February 06, 2008 at 11:40 AM
With Younger we definitely
fell into the By Any Mean Necessary method, so I was a lot more
willing to co-sleep (with Eldest I was afraid if we started that
way she’d end up in our bed for years. So she was in her crib.
Until we moved her into a toddler bed, and she’s been in our bed
ever since. Funny how clever we think we are, isn’t it?)–Anyway,
knowing more the second time around, and being more tired, Younger
was in bed with us and I found–along with a few of my other Mommy
friends who went through the same thing–that at about the 7-8
month mark the amount of sleep gained by cosleeping begins to tap
out (the kid’s bigger, kicking more, they’re more aware of you and
your presence is waking them up, etc.) So, contrary to what I would
have thought, it was a pretty easy transition to the crib at about
the 8 month mark. My point is that cosleeping now doesn’t commit
you to cosleeping forever. But, if the crib does indeed work
better, I agree with a PP that keeping our hands on the kid after
she’s been put down a little longer helps. A friend of mine swears
by a method of: rocking while in the chair, stand up with child
while maintaining rocking motion, walk to crib, still rocking with
arms, lift child over rail and slowly keep the rocking motion as
you slooowly lower the child… You get the picture.
Posted by: Susan |
February 06, 2008 at 10:42 AM
During the hot summer I
found that it was the temperature difference between my arms and
her cot sheet that would wake her up. I took to loosely wrapping a
muslin or a very light cotton blanket round her while feeding her
down and then placed the blanket and herself in the cot. Once she
was lying down still asleep I could open the blanket so she didn’t
overheat.
I rocked my baby to sleep
, by any means
until he was almost 11 months. From about 11 months he was able to
go into his crib not fully asleep, and fall asleep on his own. Now,
at 12.5 months, I rock him for about 3 minutes and he goes into his
crib fully awake, then falls asleep no problem. So, point being, I
do not think that rocking your young baby to sleep will set you up
for a lifetime of sleep problems! I always felt I was instilling
good habits by getting him to sleep at all
necessary…
Good luck to all going
through this! It really does end eventually. I didn’t think it
would, but it has and we can do the transfer to the crib
successfully regularly now!
Posted by: Sherry |
February 06, 2008 at 09:48 AM
We gave up and started
co-sleeping, or should I say “admitting we were co-sleeping.” We
tried the crib, the bassinet, the moses basket, the side-car crib,
the car seat, the swing, swaddling, not swaddling, a lovey, a paci,
a heating pad. On and on and never got more than 30 minutes in the
crib. Ugh. Baby boy (6.5 months) just wants to be in our bed, and
he still wakes every two hours (at least). I agree with whatever
gets the most people in the house the most amount of sleep. I’m
curious to read some transition techniques, though.
Just want to add, DS (5)
doesn’t NEED his “ocean” to sleep anymore, just likes it. I was
terrified of creating an association that we couldn’t break and
would be weird or difficult for him as an older child. It did not
pan out to be an issue; we swaddled more and more loosely until not
at all – he gave it up willingly sometime significantly before his
1st birthday – and he gave up the paci on his own at 1 year. The
“ocean” he could take or leave now, but likes it sometimes and I
like that it masks our activity outside the room. Just FWIW on
sleep “crutches”. Of course, he’s the “good” sleeper so probably
not a good example, either.
We used a laundry basket
and then a crib later because the crib was too big, but if your
baby sleeps okay the rest of the time, that may not be an issue. So
ok, the protocol, once we were in the crib stage:
My theme here echoes
Moxie’s: By Any Means, And In Any Configuration, Necessary. Eric,
try to believe that this will pass!
Posted by: pixie |
February 06, 2008 at 08:11 AM
@tinyQ: Oh, no! An 8-month
regression?…we are making such good progress at 7 months.
Nooo!
As one of the PPs said- my
Mom and Dad talk about how hard it was to put me and my sister down
in our cribs. So this is not some new problem created by modern
namby-pamby parenting!
3 – We rocked/held/nursed
to sleep until DD was 10.5 months old. Starting at 6 months, I
would try every 2 weeks to put her down awake. It wouldn’t work and
she would get so worked up that it would take 60-90 minutes to calm
her back down. Suddenly at 10.5 months she was able to go down
drowsy but awake. Sometimes she cries for 2-3 minutes, but now she
seems to release tension by crying instead of increasing
tension.
As another thought, we then
switched to walking our son to sleep and then the key was the chest
pressure, so we would (this is pathetic) basically LIE OVER HIM for
two minutes while he adjusted to the crib and only then straighten
up.
1 – I agree that
experimentation is a great idea. We found that just holding worked
as well as rocking, and it didn’t matter if we were in a dark quiet
room or in the living room in front of the TV…so for a while we
just took turns holding her while watching the tube. That way we
didn’t care if it took her an hour to fall asleep. We also tried to
wait until her arms were limp, so she was in a deeper sleep. Try
different positions and techniques.
Posted by: Sky |
February 06, 2008 at 10:56 AM
My question is how and when
do they outgrow the rocking to sleep thing? My 15 1/2 month old
still rocks to sleep and it often takes up to an hour for her to go
down. She has to be out cold before she will go into the crib. How
do we transition to putting her in the crib when she is partially
awake so that she can fall asleep on her own? We have tried CIO and
it was miserable. She is an active kid who does not want to miss
anything so unless she is totally asleep putting her in the crib is
akin to torture.
Ugh…been there. You have
my sympathy. All I can say is, it WILL get better…
The poster’s baby sounds
exactly like our son (now 2) at that age. I would rock and rock and
rock and then ever-so-gently lay him down in the crib. The actual
motion of coming down through the air from my shoulder would wake
him up sometimes. Um, gravity isn’t something I can really get
around.
I found that Elizabeth
Panley’s book “The No-Cry Sleep Solution” was quite helpfull for
ideas on how to get the baby to sleep quicker (keep everything very
calm for quite a while before trying to put the baby to sleep
etc.). The Sears also have a book on sleep which I think has some
more ideas about putting the baby down (also their website lists
most of this I think – http://www.askdrsears.com)
Another thing that seems to
help is more blankets (a heavier weight on top of her) than most
books recommend. She seems to need the weight of the blankets to
keep her asleep. Another thing I do is to speak softly to her as I
am transferring her to her pram to sleep during the day – some
reassuring noise from me sometimes helps her stay
asleep.
Posted by: Cloud |
February 06, 2008 at 11:28 AM
I think when having him in
our bed it too much trouble I might just do a mattress on the floor
in his room and lay down with him till he’s asleep and roll away.
Though sometimes he nurses, gets drowsy looks up at me and rolls
over away from me and goes to sleep on his own!
So hang in there, Eric. Try
everything you think might work, know that your baby is just doing
normal baby things and you guys aren’t doing anything
wrong.
Oh, and 4 months just
sucks. There is no way around that. Lots of sympathy! You are not
alone!
She’s over the sleep hump
now (*crosses fingers*) and is only waking once a night, at around
4am. I’m in heaven! If I go to bed at a decent hour, I can have
upwards of 5 or 6 hours IN A ROW!!!
Posted by: hydrogeek |
February 06, 2008 at 09:43 AM
Oh, and I see nothing wrong
with nursing and rocking babies to sleep. It is how we are designed
to do it. They will learn to fall asleep on their own when they are
ready, as have all people throughout history.
Case in point – my 16 month
old just finished a phase of terribly light sleep during which I
discovered that having a humidifier in her room really helped
(white noise). Then she got a fungal diaper rash from all that
moisture, so I had to switch it out to a normal fan. Then she got
SOOOO thrilled and distracted by the fan that she couldn’t get to
sleep (kept popping up from nursing saying, “Fah!!!!
HAHAHAHAHA!!!”). So i took it out of her room entirely.