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To keep swaddling, or not to keep swaddling..that is the question!

jamielyse1jamielyse1 member
in Babies: 3 - 6 Months

My sweet LO sleeps so well at night, anywhere from 8-12 hours, and we swaddle her. She is 3.5 months old. She has recently started wiggling her way out of the swaddle-me, so we decided to try and keep one arm out at an attempt to wean her from it. Well, 3 nights in a row she has woken up in the middle of the night crying. 

Should I stick it out and keep trying to wean her, or should I just keep giving her a full swaddle since it works well for her?

I worry she is so attached to being swaddled that we are going to have a hell of a time getting her out of it eventually. 

What are your thoughts/experiences?

Thank you!!! 

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Re: To keep swaddling, or not to keep swaddling..that is the question!

  • paxilchykpaxilchyk member
    I was not ready to stop swaddling, but when we started putting him down drowsy instead of asleep we needed to. He would just squirm and fight the swaddle until he was completely awake and frustrated. Now we put him down drowsy and in a sleep sack and he had been sleeping pretty well(now his sleep is messed up from getting his shots/4 month wakeful-GRRR!).
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  • abb08abb08 member
    Personally, I would stick with what's working for you.  You know that if you start unswaddling her now she will not sleep well, but you don't know that she will have difficulty later.  A lot of babies outgrow the swaddle and give it up easily on their own down the road.  I'd rather sleep well now and take the risk.

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  • synchrosallysynchrosally member

    imageabb08:
    Personally, I would stick with what's working for you.  You know that if you start unswaddling her now she will not sleep well, but you don't know that she will have difficulty later.  A lot of babies outgrow the swaddle and give it up easily on their own down the road.  I'd rather sleep well now and take the risk.

    This.  I stopped swaddling DS when he would break completely out of his double swaddle every night and ended up waking up cold.  He was ready and told me so.  Stick with what works for now. 

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  • livelovelaugh2010livelovelaugh2010

    I just started the process of stopping swaddling my 5 mos old son. I swaddle him at bedtime in a large muslin blanket and let him break out of it during the night. He still sleeps from 8pm - 7am like he did before. This is totally different than how I did things with my first born. He was a much fussier baby and I ended up swaddling him until he was 8 mos old or else he wouldn't go and stay asleep. I think it really depends on the baby or maybe I'm just more confident that it'll work itself out this time around. 

    I think it's fine to keep swaddling since it works so well. I think I weaned my first born by rocking him in the rocking chair and then putting him down fast asleep. That was hard because he would often wake up once we put him down in the crib and then we'd have to start the process all over again. I'm wondering if it is easier to wean earlier on?

    HTH 

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  • sarahlouise11sarahlouise11
    So I thought we would be swaddling forever, then he started to get his arms out, so we moved to one arm out, well that did not go so well, so we went back to swaddling, a week later he was getting 100% out of his swaddle- arms and legs, so we took this as him being done with swaddling, and decided to go straight to the sleep sack- no "one arm out" business, and since night one of the sleep sack he has done AWESOME!  I would wait a week until she is always getting way out of the swaddle, then go straight to the sleep sack and skip the transistion, but i know what works for one baby does not always work for all, that was just our experience.
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  • jamielyse1jamielyse1 member
    Thanks for all of your input!!!
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  • eitaknna9eitaknna9 member
    LO started wiggling out, so I would just swaddle her lightly until she had wiggled both arms completely out many nights in a row. At that point I just stopped swaddling. She woke up a bit more frequently at first, but got the hang of sleeping without it and sleeps just fine without it.
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  • smitt2619smitt2619
    Breaking loose is a sign to stop swaddling.  She's going to need some time to adjust, try sticking it out.  Are you weaning her gradually?  I  found that to work well.  And his Halo sleepsacks really helped with the transition. 
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