Lurker needs help w/ rocking to sleep

EllaSmella

Hi All, I'm mostly a lurker on this board. I'm having some trouble with bedtime and hoping for some help. Since we rock and nurse to sleep at 16 months, I have a hard time asking any questions about bedtime since the answer is always "stop rocking him" and "stop nursing him" neither of which I really care to do unless I have to, so I thought this board might be a good place to start :-)

We have a good bedtime routine (dinner, play, bath, books, brush teeth). Then we go into his room and sit in the rocking chair and he nurses and then falls asleep while I rock him.

It used to take about 15-20 minutes for him to nurse and fall asleep. No problem, and we both really enjoyed it.

Now it's taking upwards of 40-50 minutes for him to nurse and fall asleep. Nursing no longer seems to have any calming effect on him (he's all over the place even while nursing), and he spends 30 minutes fiddling around in my arms before he'll settle down. If I try to put him in the crib, he just stands and cries.

He is capable of putting himself to sleep (does it in the middle of the night and for naps at daycare), but he just won't do it at home. We've tried a later bedtime, which didn't help and just led to him getting up earlier in the morning.

Any suggestions for me?

pottermommy

Maybe rearrange play and bath.  Give him the bath and then run him silly.  Get him super super tired.

3003girl

It might be a stage. You could try different routines. ( my lo won't go to sleep if she's been too active before bedtime )

Lo went through a few weeks like that and I thought, ok, she wants to go to sleep on her own, without nursing. But she wanted to nurse, then rock. Now she wants to nurse and rock again. Who knows. And good luck! 

Annie984

Is he still taking two naps?  Is his nap later in the day?  Maybe he's just not as tired as he used to be.  Maybe you could try focusing on making sure he gets lots of hard/tiring play time during the day?

 

My little guy has always fought sleep.  At 16/17 months, I was spending 45 minutes getting him to sleep for his nap and at least that long at night.  What helped?  It wasn't fun, but he dropped his one and only nap at 18 months.  He just. wasn't. tired. before.  Now that he doesn't nap, he happily lays down and nurses to sleep in 5-10 minutes at night.

EllaSmella

Annie984:

Is he still taking two naps?  Is his nap later in the day?  Maybe he's just not as tired as he used to be.  Maybe you could try focusing on making sure he gets lots of hard/tiring play time during the day?

He's taking one nap. He goes down around 12-12:30pm. We definitely run him ragged during the day, and you can tell he's tired when you try to put him down, but he just fights it so hard.

My little guy has always fought sleep.  At 16/17 months, I was spending 45 minutes getting him to sleep for his nap and at least that long at night.  What helped?  It wasn't fun, but he dropped his one and only nap at 18 months.  He just. wasn't. tired. before.  Now that he doesn't nap, he happily lays down and nurses to sleep in 5-10 minutes at night.

We've tried a later bedtime, earlier bedtime, longer bedtime routine, you name it. I'm pretty in tune with him, and I don't think he's either over tired or not tired enough at bedtime. Part of the problem is he's just an earlier riser, so moving his bedtime later often just causes him to get up earlier and earlier, which means he's getting very little total sleep overall.

Annie984

I hear you on the early riser bit.  Since dropping his nap, my LO goes to bed between 6 and 6:30pm, and he wakes up anywhere from 5am to 7am.  I've had people ask me why I don't just push his bedtime later so that he'll sleep later, but that does.not.work. here.  If he goes to bed later, he doesn't sleep later, he just sleeps less and is cranky the next day.

 15 - 18 months was really hard for us sleep wise.  It got much better at about 19 months once he finished the transition to no nap.