Ladies, I need your wisdom.

kerrbear72 · November 2011

Since D is on average a month younger than most of your LO's (he will be 5 months on the 12th) maybe you can shed some light on my situation.

For the last week D has been going to bed at his normal bed time of 7pm. Then he's up at 7:45, back down by 8, up again at 8:30 and usually back to sleep by 9pm. For the most part he just wants me to shove a boob in his mouth for a few minutes and he falls back to sleep.

He's not STTN which doesn't bother me but this bed time crap is getting old.

I've tried just letting him fuss for a few minutes but he wont put himself back to sleep.

Help please

Lisa Frank · November 2011

If you don't own Ferber's book, it's worth picking up. (I say that a lot lol)

Anyway, if you can tap into Iris, I know she worked on getting Gus to go down without needing the boob. Does he go down drowsy, but awake, or is he full blown sleeping when you lay him down at 7?

kerrbear72 · November 2011

Lisa Frank:
If you don't own Ferber's book, it's worth picking up. (I say that a lot lol)
Anyway, if you can tap into Iris, I know she worked on getting Gus to go down without needing the boob. Does he go down drowsy, but awake, or is he full blown sleeping when you lay him down at 7?

You just flicked the switch in my brain.

Normally when he goes down at 7 he's so tired that he just passes out mid-boob. That was making me think he wasn't eating enough before bed but it used to not be an issue when he was younger.

Perhaps its the being put down while asleep that is screwing things up.

Lisa Frank · November 2011

kerrbear72:
Lisa Frank:
If you don't own Ferber's book, it's worth picking up. (I say that a lot lol)
Anyway, if you can tap into Iris, I know she worked on getting Gus to go down without needing the boob. Does he go down drowsy, but awake, or is he full blown sleeping when you lay him down at 7?
You just flicked the switch in my brain.
Normally when he goes down at 7 he's so tired that he just passes out mid-boob. That was making me think he wasn't eating enough before bed but it used to not be an issue when he was younger.
Perhaps its the being put down while asleep that is screwing things up.

Yeah, that would be my guess. The drowsy-but-awake thing helps with their self-soothing capability. If he can get himself there to start, then you know he can do it on his own, kwim? And I'd really try and keep him awake for a full feeding before laying him down. My DD goes in and out of sleep while eating (she's bottlefed) so I have to keep tugging at the bottle and really take the time to get her to finish it on some nights (last night being one because she was already way past her bedtime and zonked out!)

kerrbear72 · November 2011

Lisa Frank:
kerrbear72:
Lisa Frank:
If you don't own Ferber's book, it's worth picking up. (I say that a lot lol)
Anyway, if you can tap into Iris, I know she worked on getting Gus to go down without needing the boob. Does he go down drowsy, but awake, or is he full blown sleeping when you lay him down at 7?
You just flicked the switch in my brain.
Normally when he goes down at 7 he's so tired that he just passes out mid-boob. That was making me think he wasn't eating enough before bed but it used to not be an issue when he was younger.
Perhaps its the being put down while asleep that is screwing things up.
Yeah, that would be my guess. The drowsy-but-awake thing helps with their self-soothing capability. If he can get himself there to start, then you know he can do it on his own, kwim? And I'd really try and keep him awake for a full feeding before laying him down. My DD goes in and out of sleep while eating (she's bottlefed) so I have to keep tugging at the bottle and really take the time to get her to finish it on some nights (last night being one because she was already way past her bedtime and zonked out!)

Makes sense. Maybe I need to start feeding him earlier so he's not so tired for that last feeding.

If he'd nap, he wouldn't be so exhausted but that's another story.

This whole baby thing is such a crap shoot lol Once you get one thing down, they go and switch everything around and its back to the drawing board.

dahansen85 · November 2011

kerrbear72:
Since D is on average a month younger than most of your LO's (he will be 5 months on the 12th) maybe you can shed some light on my situation.
For the last week D has been going to bed at his normal bed time of 7pm. Then he's up at 7:45, back down by 8, up again at 8:30 and usually back to sleep by 9pm. For the most part he just wants me to shove a boob in his mouth for a few minutes and he falls back to sleep.
He's not STTN which doesn't bother me but this bed time crap is getting old.
I've tried just letting him fuss for a few minutes but he wont put himself back to sleep.
Help please

I've heard that babies go through all four sleep cycles in 45 minutes. So your LO is for some reason having trouble getting through that lighter sleep phase without fully waking up in the early part of the night. We had some trouble with this too. For me just making sure the house was really quiet, her white noise was on, and it was dark in the room during that critical transition time seemed to do the trick. If not, I just shove a boob in her mouth, LOL. Maybe I should pick up Ferber's book too.

JKHope · November 2011

My dear son was recently doing the same thing from about 4 months till a couple weeks ago. You know what? I didn't anything. I dealt with it. My husband and I would take turns resetting him. Sometimes I would nurse if I felt he was hungry but not always. He worked his own way through it. Some times I think people are too quick to jump on the sleep training bandwagon.

I guess what I'm saying is to take heart because no matter what you do, even if you don't do anything, it will get better

SC1977 · November 2011

My son has recently started doing this too. Usually once we pick him up, he falls right back to sleep. Other times I have to nurse him back to sleep. It doesn't really bother me. Maybe it's lazy parenting on my part, but I hope that it fixes itself. I don't want to sleep train

kerrbear72 · November 2011

SC1977:
My son has recently started doing this too. Usually once we pick him up, he falls right back to sleep. Other times I have to nurse him back to sleep. It doesn't really bother me. Maybe it's lazy parenting on my part, but I hope that it fixes itself. I don't want to sleep train

Well I somewhat share your mind frame. I'm really not interested in sleep training per se, more of just understaning why its happening and trying to avoid or correct my/our habits.

candicemmann · November 2011

Have you tried a binky? maybe he just wants to suck on something, the binky deffinately helps with the self-soothing

SC1977 · November 2011

kerrbear72:
SC1977:
My son has recently started doing this too. Usually once we pick him up, he falls right back to sleep. Other times I have to nurse him back to sleep. It doesn't really bother me. Maybe it's lazy parenting on my part, but I hope that it fixes itself. I don't want to sleep train

Well I somewhat share your mind frame. I'm really not interested in sleep training per se, more of just understaning why its happening and trying to avoid or correct my/our habits.

Yeah, sorry. My post wasn't very helpful. I was trying to commiserate. I was sincere when I said that it doesn't bother me when he wakes up after 45 minutes, but I share your concern that I'm somehow screwing up his sleep habits for life. When I start to question my night parenting skills, I read everything I can that says it's normal for them to wake up (due to their short sleep cycles) and that eventually they'll learn to self soothe and will sleep for longer stretches again. I like articles that push my agenda.

Side note, I'm starting to wonder if my baby is cold and that's contributing to this. I may put an extra layer on him tonight and see how that goes. Good luck.

kristennd · November 2011

SC1977:
Side note, I'm starting to wonder if my baby is cold and that's contributing to this. I may put an extra layer on him tonight and see how that goes. Good luck.

It is possible. The one night last week that we put DS to bed with just a onesie under his sleepsack, he was up four times. Went back to the footie pj's and he went back to STTN. Hopefully that's all it takes!

iris427 · November 2011

Yeah, IMO he needs to be put down awake. Do you do a bedtime routine? When Gus turned 4 months, I started doing a basic bedtime routine with him (change, story, song) and then putting him down awake. He did cry at first but now he goes down with just a few minutes of fussing. The bedtime routine replaces nursing as the sleep association.

He is still not STTN but he is generally sleeping longer chunks than he was before. I still need to work out some of our sleep/nap issues, but I think we are making slow progress.

kerrbear72 · November 2011

iris427:
Yeah, IMO he needs to be put down awake. Do you do a bedtime routine? When Gus turned 4 months, I started doing a basic bedtime routine with him (change, story, song) and then putting him down awake. He did cry at first but now he goes down with just a few minutes of fussing. The bedtime routine replaces nursing as the sleep association.
He is still not STTN but he is generally sleeping longer chunks than he was before. I still need to work out some of our sleep/nap issues, but I think we are making slow progress.

We do a bed time routine but I think as both you and Lisa said, he needs to go down awake. I also maybe need to extend the routine in order to make it register especially if I drop the boob out.

Like I said, the not STTN doesn't bother me but the constant waking makes me concerned that I am doing something wrong.. Because the fall back is that it has to be my fault

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