should know better - 2nd child, 4mo sleep help required

[KSal]

now... i have multiple issues at the moment. One of them is the 4 mo sleep regression, which means DS is waking up every 2 hours. But putting that aside for a moment, i need some advice on the act of getting him to sleep.

During the day i am determinedly putting him down in his cot to sleep, but he is generally asleep when he gets there, usually by me rocking him in my arms or having fed him (although this is unusual for naps)

in the evening i seem to go for ages trying to feed him to sleep after my DD (2.4) has gone to bed. He will generally finally go off at around 9, which is slowly improving (I think).

The question is, should i be putting him donw in his cot awake and if i crack this during the day, will it mean i can do it at night? I feed him to sleep because the other option is just too noisy, frankly... and the cluster feeding involves a certain amount of crying. How can i bring his bedtime forward - it seems if i get him in his cot any earlier, he will just wake up after half an hour or so crying and i just latch him on again.

any tips on how to soothe him whilst he is in his cot are also most welcome as he just seems to get more and more upset.

... or alternatively should i just leave it and hope he sorts himself out?!

[Simic]

At 4 months my dd was still going to bed at 10pm. At that age, they sleep in the day and are not yet onto a normal older child routine. With us, the bedtime just came forward by itself as she got older (ds was different - he was an 8pm boy from birth).
I'd plump for the leave it and hope he sorts himself out option personally (well, I did!).
My mum also said she got fed up of standing by my cot until 10pm and switched to just keeping me downstairs to play quietly until I was finally tired! - now I'd die to go to bed at 8pm! :)
I think all babies have "sleep regression" or their sleeping patterns change... sometimes better sometimes worse. I hope it gets better soon for you!

[KSal]

thanks Simic... half the trouble is i can't remember how it happened with my DD and even if i could they are so different anyway, not least because he is EBF and she was... well EFF by this age...

i wonder if leaving it may be the easiest all round! would dearly love my evenings back though.

[Iggly]

I think 4 months is a bit young to self settle tbh. What time does DC1 go to bed?

You might get some ideas on combining two routines in the sleep topic?

I remember around 4 months DS started to go to bed earlier. We later realised he was tired by 5/6pm but we were putting him to bed too late -8ish. Once we shifted his day a bit, we could get him down by 8 then earlie and earlier. He'd do what yours did - sleep for half an hour then wake up because he was so overtired. Can you put him down even earlier?

[KSal]

DC1 goes up at 7.30, but she could go later tbh.
will have a look in the sleep topic... didn't realise it was there

I just don't seem to be able to read him... .e.g. is he tired/hungry especially in the evenings

[Iggly]

Yes I used to have the sane trouble. I think DS wanted feeding because he was tired and couldn't relax.

[Roo83]

Dd (4mnths) goes to bed at the same time as ds (2.7) usually somewhere between 7/7.30pm. They have a bath together at 6ish,into pjs and then dd sits on my lap while we read bedtime stories in ds' bed. When I leave him to go to sleep I give dd a last feed-sometimes she goes to sleep while feeding other times I put her into her crib awake. We have a mobile with a heartbeat sound that seems to help her settle. If she does grizzle a bit (not very often) I pat her chest/back if she's on her side and say shh,shh until she drops to sleep. I think a lot of it is luck-she's always been a gd sleeper....but putting her down at the same time each night means she feels sleepy at that time. Not all perfect though....this last week she's started waking 4 x a night to feed! Wasn't even that bad as a newborn!

[putthekettleon]

DD2 is 7 months and only just starting to go to bed at a decent time - around 8ish if I'm lucky. At 4 months I didn't mind her going to bed at 10 as I'd rather her have a decent chunk of sleep while I could sleep too than go to bed at 7 and wake at 12.

Also, she used to take a long time to feed to sleep, cluster feeding a lot and I would rather spend the evenings feeding her on the sofa and watching telly than spending ages in her room trying to get her to sleep (which is what happened whenever I tried to get her down earlier!)

As she's getting more active during the day she's gradually falling asleep more quickly and earlier in the evening. I've also been trying to cut back on the daytime sleeps, now I don't let her sleep past 4pm.

I'm a bit clueless too as DD2 is BF whereas DD1 was FF by this age. It's a whole different ball game! I still feed to sleep, it seems to be the only way for now.

[KSal]

gah... i think i may work on trying to help him settle himself during the day and start up a bedtime routine just before i know he'll curently go down... that should give me best of both worlds - still try to make associations with certain activities and sleep without going up early and spending my evenings on my own with DS...

i could start to move the times earlier if it seems to be working

Roo83 I would love to know how you got to that stage of being able to self settle...

[Roo83]

Like I say a lot of luck...she was a chilled baby from day 1. Also she has had to grab her sleep when she can due to a rather active older brother-consequently she can sleep through drums, guitar playing, dinosaur roars anything if she's tired! Goodluck though