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Attachment Parenting
st.augbride
member
Baby only naps in carrier
st.augbride
member
I need some advice here. Dd is 4 months old (3 months adjusted) and she only ever wants to nap when I wear her in the carrier. She naps great and can even go for 3 hours. I love it too, however i know she is getting to an age where she needs to nap in her crib, especially because we just started daycare and she can't sleep well there. Any advice for how to transition over?
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Re: Baby only naps in carrier
DD napped only in the Ergo starting at about 4 months, until almost 13 months. There was a brief time where I could hold her and she'd fall asleep, but only about 10% of the time would she let me put her down. I could never lift her up and then put her in her crib without her waking.
At 13 months, we changed her crib to a toddler bed, and now I lay down with her until she falls asleep, and then I can get up. I honestly don't think she was ready to nap alone before 13 months, and I was not ready to force the issue. It was really hard, so I feel your pain. You may try putting the mattress on the floor and laying down with your LO until she falls asleep, then get up.
For the first 3 months, my guy had to be held for naps - carrier or in arms, he wasn't picky. This is how I transitioned him to the crib (where he was fine sleeping at night).
Week 1: I have a really deep couch, so this worked, but a bed might work if your couch isn't deep enough. I let him fall asleep on my while laying on the couch with my boppy directly beside me. Once he was asleep, I'd roll him onto the boppy.
Week 2: Once he got used to sleeping on the boppy, I started him out napping there. I still lay beside him on the couch, but for naps, put him in/on the boppy instead of me, and held his hand and sang to him.
Week 3: Okay, he can fall asleep when not on me, so we moved to his bedroom. I introduced the swaddle for naps at this point (we used it for night time only before, but he had a super strong morro reflex, which is part of the reason he would awake if I'd try to transfer him). So I'd swaddle him, turn on his white noise, and rock him while singing him a lullabye. Once he fell asleep, I moved him into the crib.
Weeks 4-6: This was the hardest transition, and took the longest. I skipped the middle step. Swaddle, white noise, and I put him in the crib with his FP Seahorse. Eventually, by the time the seahorse turned off, he was out like a light.
DS2 - Oct 2010 (my VBAC baby!)