LO only falls asleep on the boob. Help meee

ErikaB123

My 5 week old won't fall asleep unless he has just nursed with my boob still in his mouth. The whole "eat, play, sleep" method isn't possible with him only sleeping after feedings. The other major frustration for me is trying to transfer him into the pnp without him waking up. Suggestions please...is this normal? Anyone else going through this?

deviduke412

If you let him fall asleep while nursing, that will be his norm. You'll have to do all you can to keep him awake while feeding if you want to break that habit and have him do eat, play, then sleep. We put our lo down awake so we don't have to worry about the whole transfer issue.

EmEeGee

Does he sleep through burping? Even if mine falls asleep nursing usually burping is all it takes to wake her up unless she's comatose.

ErikaB123

Meg, he wakes when I burp him, I have to be honest, I don't always burp him when it's the middle of the night. Devi, I know we have to break this cycle, it's just going to be really really hard.

EmEeGee

ErikaB123 said:

Meg, he wakes when I burp him, I have to be honest, I don't always burp him when it's the middle of the night. Devi, I know we have to break this cycle, it's just going to be really really hard.

I'm guilty of skipping a night time burping here and there but my girl has reflux and I try to be good about it. But if he wakes up burping I would just burp him, immediately engage in some play time and then mine usually starts getting tired an hour after her feed time. Then I rock (most of the time it's walking around) her till she falls asleep. Transferring can be tricky. It can take 2-3 tries before she stays down for a nap. GL.

ErikaB123

He is just not a very good sleeper so when it does happen we are so relieved that we dont care what caused it..even nursing. Do you play with your LO even during MOTN feeds?

SashaDenn25

I let LO nurse to sleep and then transfer her, but I dont mind while she is this little and ill just cross the bridge when I get there, but for night time it usually takes a couple times of putting her down just like @megvaddi s LO does. When she wakes up I usually dont nurse her then ill just keep rocking until we finally actually get her down unless shes fussy and roots then ill nurse her again even though its usually a shallow latch and I can tell shes just seeking it for comfort.

ErikaB123

Sasha, yeah a part of me feels he is just too young at 5weeks to really sleep train. He has been up for 2 hours now, I tried rocking and then putting him in the pnp. He cried like crazy and I caved after maybe 2 minutes. I'm now nursing him...he wins again. Ugh.

EmEeGee

ErikaB123 said:

He is just not a very good sleeper so when it does happen we are so relieved that we dont care what caused it..even nursing. Do you play with your LO even during MOTN feeds?

No playing during the night. Our routine is diaper change, nurse and then right back to bed (rocking after nursing if necessary). We keep the lights low and I don't talk to her except for some soft "sshhh"ing if she's fussing. Low stimulation is our goal for keeping her a little drowsy. I'm fortunate and she's a pretty good night time sleeper so she goes back down after eating without much problem.

candicejeff2013

Ya. I nurse to comfort and she usually dozes off. Especially in the evenings.... Nursing is almost the only thing that gets her down for the night. Mid day is different. I'll nurse till she is content then we will talk and coo at each other for a bit and I'll lay her in the swing when she shows me that she's somewhat sleepy and then she will eventually snooze in the swing.

cseley321

megvaddi said:

ErikaB123 said:

He is just not a very good sleeper so when it does happen we are so relieved that we dont care what caused it..even nursing. Do you play with your LO even during MOTN feeds?

No playing during the night. Our routine is diaper change, nurse and then right back to bed (rocking after nursing if necessary). We keep the lights low and I don't talk to her except for some soft "sshhh"ing if she's fussing. Low stimulation is our goal for keeping her a little drowsy. I'm fortunate and she's a pretty good night time sleeper so she goes back down after eating without much problem.

This exactly. I haven't had great luck yet, but I try and keep everything dark, quiet, and no stimulation until after 6 am.

SashaDenn25

ErikaB123 said:

Sasha, yeah a part of me feels he is just too young at 5weeks to really sleep train. He has been up for 2 hours now, I tried rocking and then putting him in the pnp. He cried like crazy and I caved after maybe 2 minutes. I'm now nursing him...he wins again. Ugh.

Persistance is key for me on the transfering part. I let her nurse to sleep at night, BUT bedtime she goes in her crib it doesnt matter how many times im up rocking or nursing back to sleep. I absolutely do not let her cry though, which is a personal choice. I actually have to wait about 30mins solid after shes down and asleep without waking until I can go to bed because I watch the monitor for her eyes to open, make sure she doesnt just adjust and fall back asleep (she does this napping in my arms alot) and then go get her to rock back to sleep. Its up to you how you want to do it, but my baby does go down at night for 5 hour stretches regularly and has slept through 2 nights at almost 6 weeks it just might take a bit to get her down and every now and then its REALLY HARD to get her down (went from 10 to 130 the other night) but typically it only takes less than an hour sometimes only 20 mins. I feel like thats a good start for almost 6 weeks old for working on shorter put down times when shes old enough to work with her.

SashaDenn25

candicejeff2013 said:

Ya. I nurse to comfort and she usually dozes off. Especially in the evenings.... Nursing is almost the only thing that gets her down for the night. Mid day is different. I'll nurse till she is content then we will talk and coo at each other for a bit and I'll lay her in the swing when she shows me that she's somewhat sleepy and then she will eventually snooze in the swing.

This is us during the day too. For naps its usually eat, play, sleep, but weve had a lot more wake time in the last week and she often has 2 feedings before shes showing tired cues for a nap now.

ErikaB123

I wish my baby wasn't so difficult. He really fights sleeping unless done as I mentioned in the original post. I let him nurse just a few minutes ago and then tried keeping him awake which worked, but now he is still wide awake. Daddy just got home and I immediately handed Beau to him lol. He held him in the carrier for about 20 mins and now just put him down in the pnp. He is quiet right now but we will see if he goes to sleep. Hoping this works guys! We are both tired and feeling rather defeated in this battle of the wills. During the night, Beau usually gives us about 2 hours of sleep at a time. Hoping this stage is over SOON. 

ErikaB123

Still wide awake...Dad now walking him around the house. 

SashaDenn25

ErikaB123 said:

Still wide awake...Dad now walking him around the house. 

Do you watch for tired cues? If hes overtired this can continue to happen. When her eyes get red and she starts rubbing her hands by them a lot I know its time to start getting her down but even then sometimes it can take 20 plus mins of swaddle and butt patting to get her into a deep sleep.

kristigirl02

Rather than start a New post I'll just ask my question here. I'm a FTM. Why do you have to eat, play, sleep? I'm EBF and my lo nurses to sleep. Also wondering why that might be a problem? Throughout the day she will breastfeed then nap, usually on me, then we play. Repeat. At night she nurses while swaddled, then she it's in the mamaroo and she sleeps several hours. She only gets up twice at night and I change her feed here put her back down. Am I creating bad habits?

ErikaB123

Sasha, yes I look for those cues and try to catch it early but he really will only nurse then sleep. We finally got him to sleep by swaddling him. I was worried about doing that tonight because it's so hot in our house and we don't have AC. It worked though! He's sound asleep.

ErikaB123

Kristi, I think the eat play sleep deal comes from the book Baby Wise? Could be wrong. I think the bad thing about nursing to sleep is that they become dependent on you to get them to sleep rather than getting there themselves.

SashaDenn25

ErikaB123 said:

Sasha, yes I look for those cues and try to catch it early but he really will only nurse then sleep. We finally got him to sleep by swaddling him. I was worried about doing that tonight because it's so hot in our house and we don't have AC. It worked though! He's sound asleep.

Glad you finally got him down...my LO wont go down at night without a swaddle!

SashaDenn25

ErikaB123 said:

Kristi, I think the eat play sleep deal comes from the book Baby Wise? Could be wrong. I think the bad thing about nursing to sleep is that they become dependent on you to get them to sleep rather than getting there themselves.

It seems it is a babywise thing but @kristigirl02 I just do whatever baby seems to cue for. Typically during the day my LO moves towards the eat, play, sleep cycle on her own and at night she nurses to sleep with no play in between.

kettlekitten

I think the eat play sleep thing is just a thing that mothers have been doing since the dawn of time, but someone put a name on it and sold a book about it. The 'baby whisperer' (?gina ford?) has something similar, I think it's called the EASY method - eat, activity, sleep, 'you time.'

Yep, once they get used to a comfort item it can create a habit. When their sleep cycles change and they start waking fully every hour or so, you'll be stuck nursing them to sleep hourly all night... Most likely, but maybe not. I probably wouldn't worry too much about it at this stage.. perhaps pick one or two times a day to practise settling another way, and promise yourself you won't get frustrated if it doesn't work, but keep trying...

We had to rock our DD to sleep for months and when she hit a sleep regression at 6 months we were stuck getting up every hour to soothe her back to sleep. BUT we managed to get her out of that habit using a sleep training/cry it out method.. I'm not gonna lie it was tough! But there are other ways to do these things if you can't deal with crying - ours would cry whether we were there with her or not so it seemed like a good idea to our sleep-deprived selves...

ErikaB123

Ladies, I have a victory to report! He fell asleep not on my boob, but in the swing! I nursed him and played with him and put him in the swing and ta da! Thank you all for the help! Persistence was very crucial in this battle.

SashaDenn25

Yay!! Im so glad you won the battle...now keep the persistence up and FX it gets easier over time! We have that same swing btw!

ErikaB123

Sasha, thanks for your advice, it really helped.

SashaDenn25

No problem! Im so glad something worked!