Weening the swaddle - need advice

mejialar

Ok, I know this is asked a lot, and I'm sorry for asking again... but, I think I'm going to try and not swaddle ds tonight for bed. During the day I put him down without a swaddle and he sleeps abut 1-2 hours. Here's my thing though... he's spoiled and I put him to sleep in my arms and put him in his crib or next to me on the couch within 5 minutes of him falling asleep.  I think he's ready, but I'm terrified because he always flails his arms and I'm afraid of him being up all night. What can I do to prepare myself? Should I not break him of the swaddle cold turkey and maybe just do one arm? Before I started using a swaddle blanket, he kept breaking out of regular blankets, but since he didn't sleep I bought a swaddle blanket, and he is STTN.

TayLynn

I would do one arm at a time.  And I don't think he's really spoiled at just 3 months. 

foodiequeen

just curious....if he is STTN the night swaddled why do you want to rock the boat and stop swaddling. I also thought I HAD to stop swaddling since he was getting older. Then he stopped STTN and I came the realization that all babies are different and that if it is working for now to just go with it. He is now 4 months and 3 weeks and I just started to swaddle again and he is sleeping so much better.

I also just do arms out sometimes.

emilyNYA

We tried cold turkey at about your DC age and failed.  I continued to swaddle until after the Holidays and tried at a little after 4 months, cold turkey.  He now wakes up once a night about half the time, he had been STTN consistantly since 6 weeks swaddled.  If it dosn't work out after a few nights, wait a few weeks and try again. 

mejialar

I wanted to stop because last night after I put him to bed I was watching him on the monitor and he was so squirmy - like he was trying to break out of it. He was practically bending himself in half arching his back. I just feel like he might be ready for it.

You're right, if its working and he's STTN now, why bother him... but I felt bad for keeping him swaddled after I saw him last night. Besides, he sleeps fine when he takes his naps during the day without being swaddled.  I know all babies are different. So we'll see, I guess!

Thanks for your advice ladies!  

micheleNYC

We just did this last weekend.  We started Thursday night cold turkey -

1st Night - horrible.  Got NO sleep (sorry - it might happen, start on a weekend night!).  He was awake every 15-30 minutes, it was insane.  T

2nd Night - we decided to use the swaddle blanket just around his midsection with his arms out - better. Slept for 2-3 hours at a time (he had been STTN for like 8-11 hours for weeks).

3rd night - again swaddled around midsection but with arms out.  Even better - got like a 5-6 hour stretch out of him.

4th night - pretty good - goes down easy, might wake an hour or two later, but then is out for the night!

Now, after just about a week - he's back to his normal pattern of bed around 8pm and sleeping until somewhere between 5-7am. 

Good luck - we decided to go cold turkey after we realized that even with one arm out he'd still be waking up a lot, so we might as well get it over with for us!