Dropping the swaddle

SJFTCA

I'm not sure that this has been discussed, but LO (10 weeks tomorrow) is consistently breaking free of his swaddle and waking himself up at night. He is "sleeping through the night" minus a reswaddling anywhere btwn 3 and 5. He also pitches a fit when I'm swaddling him (we use a miracle blanket), which makes it difficult to get a good, tight swaddle. Has anyone had experience w dropping the swaddle yet? I'm just not thoroughly convinced that his startle reflex is gone, so that's my main concern. My pedi said to go ahead and transition to a sleep sack. I'm thinking I may use the sleep sack swaddle w arms out for a few nights and then do the regular sleep sack. Just wondering if anyone has any experience or advice to share regarding the subject.

cdepperschmidt

I just posted in another thread about this. We successfully dropped the swaddle around 8 weeks. We were using swaddle blankets, but DS kept pulling them over his head. It took about a week for him to adjust to being put down in a sleep sack instead of swaddled, but we have no issues now.

taykerslake

Look into a specific swaddler. It velcroes up and keeps them nice and tightly swaddled. We bought ours from babies r us. We have the deluxe one that has a Velcro piece around his belly, folds and velcroes the leg part up and the sides. It even has a cushion and hood type thing to keep him nice and snug. We love it! On extra cold nights I swaddle him in a receiving blanket and then I put him in his deluxe swaddle.

HeatherFaye718

We dropped the swaddle at about 5 weeks. Little one always got his hands free. He sleeps just fine without it and just wakes up to eat.

angelinthepit23

My LO likes to be tight. He fights it for the first few min but settles in. I have to use the SwaddleMe with Velcro. I tried the sleep sacks with the swaddle and could never get them tight enough. He's 2 weeks and his startle reflux is definitely still present.

SJFTCA

We have tried so many different swaddles. He ALWAYS manages to get free at one point or another. In fact, it's really been happening all along; it just matters more now bc he really doesn't NEED to eat in the middle of the night. Twice now he has made it from 9-7 without breaking out of the swaddle and the other nights, he's close to that, but he has a fit when he gets out of his swaddle close to morning time. I'm hoping that like @cdepperschmidt, he will adjust quickly to sleeping without being bound up. He's down in his crib currently with the sleep sack swaddle w arms out. Fingers crossed!

@cdepperschmidt, did you just kind of let LO CIO? I hate to just let him lie in there screaming (if that happens), but I feel like I'll just ruin everything if I run in there every time he cries.

kmd91

My so has slept two random nights without being swaddled recently. I don't think he slept quite as soundly, but he'd fallen asleep on me and I just put him to bed rather than waking him up to get swaddled. I've been trying to figure out how I want to phase the swaddle out. Because I have a strong feeling that the transition to his crib might be hard without being swaddled, but I'm not quite ready to have him in the other room yet. So I don't know if it will be possible for him to still be swaddled when the time comes to move him to the crib (if he figures out back to belly rolling).

cdepperschmidt

@SJFTCA when we put him down if he startled awake I would pick him back up and rock him back to sleep If we put him down and he didn't wake, but was fidgety I would leave him and turn on white noise. I usually don't put him down until he is asleep. It seemed like the more we did it, the less sensitive his startled reflex was.

SJFTCA

kmd91 said:

My so has slept two random nights without being swaddled recently. I don't think he slept quite as soundly, but he'd fallen asleep on me and I just put him to bed rather than waking him up to get swaddled. I've been trying to figure out how I want to phase the swaddle out. Because I have a strong feeling that the transition to his crib might be hard without being swaddled, but I'm not quite ready to have him in the other room yet. So I don't know if it will be possible for him to still be swaddled when the time comes to move him to the crib (if he figures out back to belly rolling).

I've had LO in the crib since he was three weeks old. It was a really easy transition, I think bc we did it so early. It wasn't my original plan, but I haven't regretted it for a minute. LO sleeps great (minus escaping his swaddle!), and MH and I get a better night's sleep too. I think it's prob a good idea swaddle w arms out first. I've also heard to do one arm and then another, but I feel like that will just take forever and may not be entirely necessary.

dsty1213

We bought a zipadee zip for the transition. I saw them on shark tank and now can agree that their product works!! It is kind of like a sleep sack but a bit more confining on the arms so that the startle reflex will be controlled and the baby is still somewhat confined. Rhys does great with it.

bellie1223

I've been wanting to transition her out of her swaddle so when she starts rolling it's not an issue. Ped recommended doing one arm at a time so I started this week leaving her one arm out of the swaddle (been using the summer infant swaddleme--love it) and since doing that she's been sleeping 4-5 hours at a time instead of 2-3. After another week or so we'll let the other arm out too.

wimamaof2

LO hated to be swaddled since day one. He would scream. We use the Halo sack and works great!

Ceridwen77

I use the halo sleep sack and LO escapes every night. I don't think she's ready for arms out though because she sleeps really well at night vs naps and the difference is she is swaddled at night. She also still has a startle reflex (10w).

When I do transition to arms out I will do 1 arm then the next. Not sure why op you think this will take forever as i read you can do 1 arm out for one night and then both out the next.

poupoule

We have not swaddled her at all and she sleeps great.

angelinthepit23

Whe we do transition out of the swaddle I think I'll do 3 nights with one arm out and 3 nights with the other arm out and see how that goes. The 3 night thing seems to work well for my LO adjusting to change. Let us know how it goes and what you decided to do!

AmoLovesAud

We started swaddling LO arms out starting around 2-3 weeks. We use the swaddle me, and just do it under her armpits. It took awhile for her startle reflex to go away (it's not really gone, just doesn't wake her nearly as much), probably bc we started so early, but now at 9.5 weeks she's actually half decent at getting herself back to sleep. Which is great for putting her down for bed bc that always wakes her up a little bit. At first I'd pick her back up and rock her if she woke, then started trying to soothe her still in the bed before scooping her up, now I just have to roll over and offer her a paci or stroke her face gently so she knows I'm there. If I hadn't started earlier I'd be doing it now, she's not rolling but she 'discovered' her hands recently and loves to put them in her mouth; I often wake to her occupying herself happily with that activity.

SJFTCA

Well, I don't know if it was just a fluke or what, but LO slept from 9-6:45 last night in the Halo sleepsack swaddle w both arms out. He did so well! He looked quite content on the monitor with his arms in all kinds of different positions throughout the night (I woke up multiple times and checked the monitor). Naps today have been a different story. He's made it about 40 mins at a time. For his third nap, he only made it about 20 mins, so MH went in and gave him a paci to soothe him (twice), and now he's been back down for about 20 more minutes so far. I still just can't believe how well he did last night, and I'm just hoping it continues!

Jeenyus

We originally started with a Halo ... She hated that and always broke free. We tried the summer Swaddlers, which she also hated but wasn't able to break free from. Around 5-6 weeks she found out how to break out of those, and we tried a Woombie. She went from waking every 2-3 hours to sleeping one, and now two 6 hour stretches. It allows her to move her arms while still providing some closeness for the startle reflex. At 10 weeks I started using an open armed sleep sack for naps, but we will continue with the Woombie for a bit.

smnewby

dsty1213 said:

We bought a zipadee zip for the transition. I saw them on shark tank and now can agree that their product works!! It is kind of like a sleep sack but a bit more confining on the arms so that the startle reflex will be controlled and the baby is still somewhat confined. Rhys does great with it.

We use the swadde up which is like the zipadee but on amazon and cheaper. Lo was breaking out of her swaddle at 10 weeks but needed a swaddle to stay asleep! This has been a godsend and lo loves it!

We had used the halo w velcro and lo was always a bit squirmy in it for the first few moments. She does not protest the swaddle up and we can feed her and change her diaper in it wo disturbing her arms and torso.

angelinthepit23

@smnewby the swaddle up 50/50 is just what I was looking for! I didn't want to spend the money on a zipadeezip if I couldn't transition the arms out. Buying one tomorrow!

mommiewee

We stopped swaddling around 3 weeks, it made little man more angry than comfy, and also he had pretty much outgrown his receiving blankets. He slept fine, never startled himself awake, only woke up to eat. We have a bigger blankie now that we can use to swaddle if he gets cold or overtired, but he'll be 12 weeks on Tuesday & has done fine without it.

SJFTCA

santababy1215 said:

The Woombie is escape proof and G sleeps great in it!

I wish this were the case for us. LO can get his hand up out of the top of the Woombie. We are also, unfortunately, between sizes. He's in the "big baby", which is 14-19 lbs. At his two month pedi appt (about a week and a half ago), he was 13 lbs 3 oz. Luckily, we are having success w the swaddle transition using the sleep sack w arms out for now.