How to put LO down awake?

CoreymaeW

DD is almost 10mo and all her life I bf her to sleep and then lay her down in her crib asleep, if I'm not super careful she wakes up and won't go back to sleep until I feed her to sleep again, sometimes I can simply rock her back to sleep though.

I know that I should be putting her down awake by now right. (correct me if I'm wrong) or at least trying to in the near future. I tried for the first time last night until I couldn't stand her crying anymore and just fed her to sleep.

I know that I'm screwing myself over by spoiling her so long, anyone have any tips for transitioning to laying baby down for bed while still awake. Also for getting baby to go to bed earlier? DD doesn't seem to be ready for bed til around 11pm:( 

candylies

I recommend researching some sleep training methods before just putting her down to cry. I like the book Good Night, Sleep Tight. 

Is there a late nap she is taking - 6/7ish? If so might want to try doing the bedtime routine at the late nap and see if she stays asleep....

k2west

I was in a similar situation with my LO....our dr recommended the Sleep Easy Solution.  We bought the dvd and it worked really well for us! It taught me how to put her to bed sleepy, but awake so that she would learn to self-soothe (I had always previously nursed her to sleep like you do and she went to bed late too). It was a pretty easy transition for us.  Now we have our bedtime routine: bath (usually), jammies/diaper change, nurse, story, bed. She sleeps through the night almost every night, from about 7pm-7am.  Hope that helps! Good luck!

iverske9

I agree with Previous poster. Go get a book and they will help you with a plan. If you just wing it you will cave everytime. I got The Sleep Easy Solution and loved it. I too was BF to sleep and had to switch up his schedule and break the habit that food was sleep time. I give LO his last bottle at 6 pm but then put him down to bed at 7pm after a bath. Good luck!

mpstochlinski8

I do this with my twins and I tried once to put them to bed awake and they cried so bad I went in the room within a min! I just can't do CIO to this day almost 10mths and they still need me to get to sleep and when they wake at night they wont go to bed unless I nurse to sleep. nothing wrong with spoiling our LOs but it does make it really hard on us mamas it seems., good luck!