Talk to me about floor beds instead of bedsharing

istalkgeeks

I am assuming some of your LOs sleep in floor beds. I'm thinking about moving my DS to a floor bed this week. He will be 4 months in a few days. I don't think this is too young, but maybe it is? 

Basically, the issue is, we don't co-sleep. My DS sleeps best with white noise and I can't stand the white noise for hours a night. I moved him to his crib at about 2 months and for the most part, he does ok with it. The biggest issue is that he doesn't fall asleep by himself and really needs us to put him to sleep. So if I end up nursing him to sleep for naps or bedtime, which happens about 70% of the time, I still have to move him to his crib, which is such a pain.

 Last night he was being crazy and didn't go to sleep until 2.5 hours after his bedtime. He is really like clockwork and that hasn't happened for at least 2 months. I ended up laying down with him in my bed, nursing him to sleep eventually and co-sleeping. Like normal with us bedsharing, I was up more often and my back is killing me from all the side-lying nursing.

Then this morning he was crazy overtired and missed his first nap. Eventually I got him to sleep on the twin bed in his nursery, which I have gotten him to do a few times in the past week. I think I want to move the twin bed mattress to the floor and maybe implement some light "sleep training" as in laying with him/patting/nursing until he falls asleep. Is this a bad idea? 

MissyOlivePants

I think you could try this, but at his age, and for when he starts to roll over, you might want to consider laying him across the bed instead of lengthwise. My only concern is how firm or soft is the mattress that you'd be using. I might consider wrapping it so that it is pretty firm and then put a tight fitted sheet on it and nothing else.

FWIW, DD is 2-1/2yo and still requires us to be with her when she falls asleep. It's just one of those things. We've tried on occasion to have her fall asleep on her own, but the result is a meltdown that is not pleasant, so we have just accepted that she likes us there. I guess I'm the same way - I don't like going to bed without my husband.

And...at 4mos old...welcome to the 4mo wakeful period! It's a struggle.

istalkgeeks

MissyOlivePants:

I think you could try this, but at his age, and for when he starts to roll over, you might want to consider laying him across the bed instead of lengthwise. My only concern is how firm or soft is the mattress that you'd be using. I might consider wrapping it so that it is pretty firm and then put a tight fitted sheet on it and nothing else.

FWIW, DD is 2-1/2yo and still requires us to be with her when she falls asleep. It's just one of those things. We've tried on occasion to have her fall asleep on her own, but the result is a meltdown that is not pleasant, so we have just accepted that she likes us there. I guess I'm the same way - I don't like going to bed without my husband.

And...at 4mos old...welcome to the 4mo wakeful period! It's a struggle.

He actually does roll over, which is part of my hesitation to use anything but a crib or let him sleep with me.  He isn't an active sleeper though, so I don't find him rolling over in his sleep or squirming. 

I actually don't think he will put himself to sleep consistently, but I want to at least try. I'm with him all day long and put him down for the majority of his sleep, but I want to make sure other people (namely DH or grandparents) can do it on occasion (without using nursing, obviously). 

I guess my main question to all of this, was safety concerns I hadn't thought about. So thank you for mentioning the firmness. The mattress is actually super firm, but I hadn't intended on leaving anything on it other than the fitted sheet.  

I figured what has been going through has been the 4 month wakeful, but I'd still like a more comfortable way of dealing with it.  

gdemars

We used a floor bed almost from day one.  The first few nights home were hell as DS would wake up immediately after being laid down in the cosleeper portion of his PNP.

I gave up and we moved the spare bedrooms queen sized bed into our room on the floor next to our bed.  I slept down there with him for the first 2 months or so.  At first I'd bring him to bed late when I went to bed, then started nursing him to sleep in bed and leaving and coming back, but eventually, he got smart and didn't want me to leave so I had to nurse him elsewhere and carefully lay him down.

We too had many a night where I'd go in over and over to put him back to sleep.  Sometimes I could just lay down and give him a quick nurse and other times I had to bounce him back to sleep in a dark bathroom with the shower running (only thing that worked.) 

Eventually, around 3 months, I was able to nurse him, lay him down and he'd sleep on his own.  I would get down there when he woke up, feed him, and then get back into bed with DH.  I could also leave him alone and come back to bed when I was sleepy. 

We transitioned him to his crib for naps only around 3 months.  It was really hard at first and he'd wake up.  But after a few weeks, he finally did start napping in there and he DID sleep longer.

At 4 months we moved him into his room at night too.  He was allowing me to just nurse him and rock him to sleep instead of the bouncing.  But most of all, he was rolling and came VERY close a number of times to falling off the bed.  He'd move ALL over the bed, in his sleep.  And we were afraid he'd be on the floor one night.  He ALSO wasn't sleeping well anymore.  He'd wake up when we'd come to bed, when DH snored, when we got up to use the bathroom, etc.  It was miserable.

Again, it took a week or so, but he eventually started to sleep in the crib at night too.  It just took persistance and lots of coffee to combat the tiredness.   

I guess what I'm saying is, your DS is at the age where 1) he is going to move and falling can be an issue.  2) He's going to be more aware of his surroundings and not want to sleep due to not wanting to miss anything.  Sounds like that what may be happending now.  I think persistance is the key.  Maybe try the floor bed, but in his room and use those bed rails so he doesn't roll out.  Jam it into a corner so that 2 sides are protected.   This way you can lay there to nurse/soothe him but you can also get up and go back to your own bedroom.

Wow that got long. Sorry.  Hope our experience helps.

hollowstar

Linking to one of my favorite bloggers. She does a floor bed and I believe her 5 month old already sleeps in it. The bottom of the article also has several links to more resources on the topic. HTH!

https://www.joyfulabode.com/2010/07/09/baby-room-tour-hanford-ca-home/