Babies: 3 - 6 Months
sharyandel
member
Helping 4 mo. old fall asleep
sharyandel
member
I'm looking for advice on how to get my 4 month old to fall asleep on his own, and not be rocked to sleep. He is definitely ready, bc he can fall asleep on his own sometimes when he's really tired. He is already sleeping through the night, so not really worried about putting him back to sleep when he wakes up in the middle of the night. Really just wondering about when he initially falls asleep. I know there are let-him-cry and no-cry methods. Experiences with both would be helpful to hear, so I can decide for myself what is right for the little one.
Re: Helping 4 mo. old fall asleep
Then about 5-10mins before bedtime I hold her and just pat her bottom while singing a few lullabies. I make sure not to rock or swing and when her eyes are heaving, I place her in the cot. Probably 50% of the time she falls asleep herself.
The other half of the time if she lets out a cry I wait to see if it will continue beyond a couple of mins (sometimes she whines just as she's nodding off). If it's not going to stop, I go in and roll her to her side away from me and pat her bottom until she gets drowsy again and just repeat this until she falls asleep.
I try and leave her in the cot but if I can tell she's not going to resettle I take her out and hold her, pat and sing again. I will do this until slowly I'm not patting so much and can just hold her, sing songs and place her in awake.
I think it will take quite some time but I'm a stay at home mum for the meantime so have the time and once she is asleep she tends to sleep through the night.
Do you want to stop rocking at night? What happens if you put your LO down before he's all the way asleep?
I still rock my 16 month old every single night. She doesn't have to be all the way asleep now at this age but I've rocked her since she was born and I love it.
I've sleep trained 2 kids so to me it's not a big deal, but not as young as 4 months old and it was usually for middle of the night wake up's. I've always just rocked them both to sleep at night and eventually as they got older, they stopped needing to be all the way asleep. I just waited until they did that on their own.