baby won't sleep in anything but our arms!

myst33 · March 2011

Anyone else have this issue? I love cuddling him but we can not get him to sleep at night AT ALL! We have the co-sleeper and put him in it at night and within 30 seconds, he's crying. We tried the rock n play and also had no luck. Dh and I have taken turns holding him literally all night long. We may try the swing tonight but we can't swaddle him in it b/c of the harness so I don't know if it will work. Any ideas? Thanks!

kare81bear · March 2011

Yep same issue, except LO won't hardly sleep on DH. I slept in the living room chair or glider with her the entire first week. My parents came to visit and got us the rock n play sleeper and it works wonders...the key is LO needs to be asleep already when I put her in it, and it only seems to work longer than 30 minutes at night. I've at least been able to sleep a few hours in my bed at night for the last week which has been nice. Other than that I haven't found anything else that she'll sleep in (tried pnp and crib). I keep hearing they grow put of it but who knows how long it'll be. Good Luck!

seastar77 · March 2011

Have you tried a white noise machine? Esp one with a heartbeat? My DD slept in a Snugglenest in our bed the first month or so and it had a heartbeat or womb sound thingy and she would fall asleep immediately when you turned it on. Also, do you swaddle?

1Mrs.Jones · March 2011

same issue here, although it is slowly getting better at night ...

For us, we have to rock her until she is almost completely asleep, and then put her down in a snuzzler in her pack n play on the incline feature with the heartbeat/womb noises playing on her Mommies Melodies bear. It works sometimes... other times, we just have to hold her.

I have heard people say to let them cry it out, but LO doesn't cry for 15 or 20 minutes and then fall asleep- she just gets more and more frantic until she is picked up. Our pediatrician said that we shouldn't let her cry for more than 15 minutes, so cry it out is not an option for us ... not that I know I could do it if it were.

Artsywife07 · March 2011

I don't have an outside baby yet, so I don't have much to contribute, but have you checked out Happiest Baby on the Block? We got the DVD at Target and the methods look like they really work. It might be more for soothing than sleeping, but soothing has to help with sleeping, right?

MrsCarroll.6-10-07 · March 2011

Like PP said, swaddle, noise machine, and Happiest Baby on the Block (just a bunch of info that helps you understand the first couple months).

We slept for the first few weeks with DD on us...whatever works though. Sleep where and how you can when the baby is small...that is my motto.

ermimac · March 2011

Liam went through this too. As PP have said, white noise ( we do waves gently crashing with a heartbeat noise.) We also do let him sleep in his swing sometimes and he tries fighting it, but the rocking puts him to sleep. It will get better, after the first 2 weeks Liam almost stopped doing this or took a pacifier to calm himseld down in his crib and went to sleep.

ncbelle · March 2011

He's just spent 9 months inside of you having his every need met, never knowing being apart from you - so totally normal that he'd want to sleep in your arms ;-)

He will get to a point where you can put him down (make sure it's in a warm spot!) once he's really soundly asleep. In meantime, treasure the snuggles; they grow too fast!

MicahAnn2009 · March 2011

I could have written this in the first 36 hrs we were home. He would sleep after eating and on someone, it was so hard. We ended up pulling out a pacifier and that helped, he likes to suck. Our routine starts with changing his diaper, then nursing, then we swaddle(ideally id like swaddle before nursing but I would be so hot!), and lay him down in his pnp. He gets his pacifier during swaddle time and if after 10 minutes he isn't content, I grab him and we cosleep. He sleeps beautifully just being close and its so easy to put his pacifier back in or to pat him back to sleep. I didn't think we would cosleep but I needed some sleep and it works for us...hope somthing works, good luck!

MarchABC · March 2011

I think ncbelle's point explains why this happened to so many of us. For the first week + DS slept on either my chest or DH's and sometimes we fell asleep too. during the day, he would nap in his swing or the lamb chair so the pediatrician recommended we let him sleep in one of those things at night. She told us for the first several weks her son slept in his carseat. Anyway, we put the lamb in his pack and play and he sleeps in it on vibrate. We also play the heartbeat sound and have lately put the pacifier in if he's not already asleep. And like pps said, we swaddle him. So far, so good. Hopefully we can transition him soon. Sometimes I still fall asleep with him in my arms. I really miss the skin to skin at night so sometimes we do it during the day. Good luck!

DucatiLeah · March 2011

We had this problem our first night home. It turned out she was cold despite the fleece swaddler. We upped the thermostat a couple degrees and now she's sleeping fine if heavily swaddled. Our daytime temp is now 69 and night time is 67. We live in Alaska where it's still below zero outside, so any higher will make for some crazy gas bills!

kwitt22 · March 2011

we did a fake swaddle. we swaddle her upper body not her legs and put her in her bouncy seat. then got a blanket and tucked it tightly around her feet. it worked. alsoni know people who put a heating pad on low before they put lo down. then remove it when they put lo down for night so they arent sleeping in a cold bed.

alyssa44 · March 2011

The Miracle Blanket did the magic trick for our LO. I thought I was insane for spending $30 on it, but he sleeps until his feedings every single night.

He wasn't one for liking a swing or bouncy seat and yesterday we got him a mamaRoo. It is amazing and he slept for 6 hours in it in the afternoon.

hispenguin · March 2011

Ditto the suggestion about the white noise machine. We have a sleep sheep attached to our bassinet and a FP Aquarium attached to the crib. We play the ocean sounds whenever we put her down. It works like a charm.

lyzabeth · March 2011

Our first three nights back from the hospital, we couldn't get her to sleep in her pnp that we set up in our room, so we ended up with her in our beds or on our stomachs. Which is okay, but we weren't getting any sleep and I was crying over things like junk mail on the floor.

My friend told me about the Happiest Baby on the Block DVD and showed us how to swaddle. So, we swaddled and tried changing multiple variables to her sleeping. For example, we moved her to her room, which is warmer than our room, swaddled her, and made sure that she was feeding every 2 hours during the day (a suggestion from the nurse). We also, let her fuss for about 5-10 minutes before picking her up and if all else is good (she's well-fed, warm and has a clean diaper), she usually doesn't fuss too long.

Last night she gave us 4 hours of straight sleep. I hope that's a trend that continues.

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