Sleeping Concerns...

JMZiskie

My baby is six weeks old and will not sleep in her crib or pack and play. My boyfriend and I have been doing shifts since we came home from the hospital, 10pm - 4am/4am - 10am, since someone needs to be up holding her or watching her sleep in her swing. That was working out until he went back to work two weeks ago and now I'm going back to work and we are going off of 2-3 hours of sleep. I have tried everything to get her to sleep in her crib! When I put her down within minutes she is screaming. Anyone else have this problem? Any suggestions?

jrouge12

I don't know if any of these will help but they helped with my LO:
-swaddling? My DD responds well. We can only keep one arm in the swaddle though.
-white noise? Helped us reduce the amount of time she spent crying as we got her to sleep. We went with the Dohm. Just plain old air whooshing, no frills.
-When I lay DD in the crib I am very slow to remove my hands from her. If she fidgets or opens her eyes I put a hand on her chest and shush her. Just so she knows that she is safe in her crib. 
I hope you are successful! 

mrsgetz4000

She's still really young. She may still want to be real snug. My mother in loaned me a rock n play my daughter, who is also 6 weeks has been sleeping in and it works great. PP had great ideas too. At 6 weeks she could likely be hitting a growth spurt and is waking up hungry

cali1710

Try putting a heated blanket or hot water bottle down and remove it before putting her in. Maybe its the cold bed waking her up. It helped with us with the bassinet. Also we elevated one side by about an inch using books. Sometimes they like a little incline. Good luck!

nackie

I second the heating pad suggestion.  That worked wonders for us when ours wouldn't sleep at night

charliesmommy6

Just wanted to say you are not alone. My 6 week old has the same problem. Occasionally he will sleep in his crib or rock n play for 45 minutes or so, but most of the time when you put him down he's awake within minutes. Im going to try implementing a bedtime routine this week and see if that is at all helpful. The lack of sleep is not fun 

fishee333

Same thing was happening to us, so we gave up for now and she's sleeping in bed with us. Now we all are at least getting a little more sleep, and we will try her crib again at another point in the future. 

MssyMmmy

Same! My baby has to be really tired in order to sleep in his bed by himself. Lately I can get him alone on the couch if I build him a nest out of blankets but I can't let him sleep like that overnight. I think he doesn't like being in an open space. He likes warm and snuggly, but swaddling isn't his thing. I figure there is a really short time in his life where I can cuddle him to sleep, so I am going to treasure every second of it. ( although it's hard to remember when I get punched or kicked in a tingly full boob at night...)

jblake320

I did everything possible like PP suggested and nothing would work for us. Eventually I got something for her to sleep in our bed (see below) we put it in the crib one night, put her in it and she fell right asleep. Sleeps like that every night. It tricks her into thinking she's in more of a cuddly place.

carlyhammond

My son is 10wks - he does this. 
We have mostly co-slept since the first week home. 
We try to put him in his bassinet but he immediately wakes up- when he's in our bed we put him on a flat pillow so I know the bassinet isn't fluffy... 
But I'm starting to get worried for when he starts to roll over and we can't swaddle.. 
I woke up last night to him cuddling against me, he had scooted to the edge of his pillow perch and rolled to his side and cuddled up to my chest... I woke up scared because I didn't know where he was and I thought he couldn't breathe. I ended up poking him in the eye because I didn't know if he was ok ( when I touched him he woke up) 
We woke up and swaddled his legs so he couldn't kick/scoot around. 
I need to get him out of my bed and sleeping alone, but we always sleep facing each other and touching somehow, that'll be an adjustment for us both :-/

m6tonner

The heating pad worked for us, thankfully. But the best advice I got was "sleep leads to more sleep." I would try to keep her awake in the evening so she would sleep at night. Terrible idea for us, she would get over tired and over stimulated, by the time it was bed time, she was a beast. She doesn't nap well alone, so we either snuggle and nap, or I take her for a drive and let her sleep in the car seat. Then bed time for us is swaddle, feed, story, and into her crib. We do pitch black room, white noise, swaddle, and heating pad to pre-heat the sheets. good luck!

jordans_wife

carlyhammond said:

My son is 10wks - he does this. 
We have mostly co-slept since the first week home. 
We try to put him in his bassinet but he immediately wakes up- when he's in our bed we put him on a flat pillow so I know the bassinet isn't fluffy... 
But I'm starting to get worried for when he starts to roll over and we can't swaddle.. 
I woke up last night to him cuddling against me, he had scooted to the edge of his pillow perch and rolled to his side and cuddled up to my chest... I woke up scared because I didn't know where he was and I thought he couldn't breathe. I ended up poking him in the eye because I didn't know if he was ok ( when I touched him he woke up) 
We woke up and swaddled his legs so he couldn't kick/scoot around. 
I need to get him out of my bed and sleeping alone, but we always sleep facing each other and touching somehow, that'll be an adjustment for us both :-/

For what it's worth I think it might be time to move him to a cosleeper or crib. We did the exact same thing. I did with all 3 of my babys. Put them up on a fairly firm pillow in the middle of the bed so we couldn't roll over on them and they all 3 loved it. However, I have woken up a couple times where he's toward the edge of the pillow. Just the thought of him rolling off and somehow getting his face stuck against something and smothering was enough to move him to his cosleeper permanently. The pillow trick is awesome for when they can't roll or move much but just a thought. I'm sure you've got it covered anyway. My little guy is only 4 weeks but I just can't take the chance anymore.

Rach8672

Do you own the boppy newborn lounger ? It's awesome , it is pretty tough for a LO to roll off from and you certainly won't roll over on to it. We used it in our bed for awhile but now she sleeps in a bassinet. We use the lounger a lot in the living room for naps.  If you don't have one , it's definitely worth the purchase !  Pic attached 

Monilee1017

We have the same nighttime routine for all our kids. We feed, change and lotion, put on pajamas, put her in the halo, swaddled our boys, and then would lay them down when they are still awake. If they cry we let them for a few minutes then go in and don't take them out. We put our hand on their chest and rock them back and forth until they quite down but leave before they fall asleep. This work for all our kids. 

Ju111310

@carlyhammond Check out the arms reach co-sleeper. I'm not a bed sharer (I sleep with wayyy too many pillows and blankets) & we are loving the co-sleeper. I used a bassinet with DS1 but hated having to sit all the way up in bed and lean over the bassinet side every time I wanted to check on him, pick him up for a feeding or replace a paci. Plus I knew DS2 was gonna be in our bedroom for longer (bc he will eventually be sharing a room with 18 mo DS1) so I needed something larger than a bassinet & is more convenient. He's in his own safe space, just inches away but we can look right at each other and I can still lay my hand on his chest to comfort him while I sleep. I got the one that converts to a mini playpen too so it's multi-purpose for vacationing. 

A&Lmommy

@jblake320, we got the snuggle nest, like yours, right from the start. The first week, we kept it in the bed with us and then moved it into the crib. It's great because it has an incline to keep him just a bit elevated. I nurse him in my glider chair with a blanket thrown over us, burp, change his diaper, nurse on other side, burp, and when he's asleep on my chest, I lay him close to the side of the nest, then swaddle him in his warm blanket we just used for nursing. Same process at nap time except just nurse from one side. The noise machine works great, been using it for every nap and night for the last 2 1/2 yrs with my daughter and now him. There's apps on your phone if you wanna try it out before you buy a machine. He's 4 weeks old with a big appetite so he still wakes up every 2 to 2 1/2 hrs to eat.

Now my daughter on the other hand, not the best sleeper. She WOULD NOT sleep in a bassinet, swing, crib, nothing. Only slept in arms, but she also has food allergies so she had a hard time relaxing and as a FTM with PPD, we did what we could to make it easier at the moment, which meant bedsharing. We all got more sleep and as she got older, she would start in the crib, then move to our bed after her first comfort nursing session at night. Now she sleeps in our bed every night but she is such a lovable lil cuddlebug now who always wants her hugs and kisses.