Advice please. Desperately tired mum 'self settling' hell

[Nobhobs]

Health visitor said we need to stop feeding to sleep / playing white noise to sleep so DS learns to self settle. I stopped both two days ago and we've barely slept since. DS is screaming blue murder all day and night. Even I'm in tears. He only falls asleep if he gets so hysterical for so long that he passes out from sheer exhaustion. Or he falls asleep nicely on the boob or with white noise playing. Not sure why this hell is preferable. Please someone help

WTF? Your health visitor is talking actual shit!!!!! Just carry on doing as you were before and stop your baby screaming!

I'm not just leaving him scream. Lots of cuddles and shushing but nothing works like white noise or breastfeeding does. She says he's dependent on me to sleep and needs to learn to sleep without his 'associations' do I not need to do this? I feel evil when I see how bloody tired he is

How old is DS?

You only need to teach him to self-settle if you want him to. Most babies will have a sleep prop of some kind, whether that's one that involves a parent (breastfeeding, rocking, shushing) or not (dummy, white noise, cuddly toy).

Personally I'd be keen to get away from breastfeeding to sleep simply because I wouldn't want to get up and do it every time he woke in the night but I see no need to stop the white noise if you can keep it playing all night without having to intervene.

Did you tell you HV you wanted him to be able to sleep independently?

Thank you peach. He's 5 months. Will try and persevere with just white noise

Of course she's talking rubbish. Get the baby to sleep in whatever way works best. If that means white noise and bf, what's wrong with that?

No he usually only wakes once or twice a night, I said I think he's having a growth spurt as he's been feeding four or five times a night the last few weeks and is needing white noise on all night and she said he doesn't need nightfeeds at this age and white noise can't be used continuously as they become dependent

Just keep doing what you are doing and ignore the HV. I fed mine to sleep for a lot longer than 5 months! They are now 3 and 6 and definitely dont feed to sleep now.

Currently under 10 month old who breastfed to sleep and does so throughout the night too. You do what works for you OP. Jeez... how dare a mother actually provide some comfort to her child 🙄

No you absolutely dont have to do this!! Hes a baby! He needs you! He doesnt understand. Carry on as long as you want. He wont be little for ever, and he wont still need you to help him sleep at 18! He will self settle when he is developmentally ready.

My DD is 2.5 and still sleeps with white noise (all night, every night!). She isn’t woken by fireworks or our noisy terrier - I’d say this is down to white noise as she is a very light sleeper!

She sleeps brilliantly, and has done since pretty young. She has a dummy for sleep too. As PP said, most babies will have some sleep associations.

My baby is 6 months and when I saw the health visitor last month she very clearly said it was developmentally normal for her to still be being fed or rocked to sleep. If you want to get rid of these sleep associations then fine, you can use sleep training (we actually used controlled crying a couple of weeks ago so she self-settles at night but I still feed her to sleep for naps/she is rocked in pram/sling) but don't feel you have to at all! It sounds as if your baby isn't ready yet. Do what feels right for you.

I don't think you can teach a five month baby to self settle - I was spectacularly unsuccessful twice... Some babies do, if yours doesn't just do what it takes to get some sleep, and try the gentle sleeping books for more ideas (some might even work!). It's just time, in my view - just do what you have to survive for now and they'll learn to self settle eventually. The waiting sucks mightily though

Jesus christ 5 months!!! Your health visitor needs reporting!!!

9 month old here BF to sleep every time!!

Another vote for this HV talking shit.

Most babies have night feeds well post 5 months. 🙄

Health visitors will peddle shite but you don't have to buy it

Okay. So around 4-5 months there's a developmental stage in sleep where sleep patterns become more fragmented. This usually means that whatever your baby needs to get to sleep when they go to bed, they'll need every time they wake up. So most likely your DS is feeding to go back to sleep rather than through hunger (although I suspect he'd still need at least one feed a night regardless - my DD was bottle-fed and still had a bottle at 3am when she was 5 months). Your HV is right to say that if you don't want to be breastfeeding four or five times a night you do need to train him out of it. But that's YOUR decision to make, not hers. If you're happy doing it, keep doing it!

I can see what your health visitor was trying to say but there’s two things, firstly if what you were doing before was working for you all then don’t change it. Secondly if you do want to make changes you don’t need to go cold turkey on what was helping your DS before. It’s normal for babies to still feed at night at 5 months and they say not to do any sleep training until 6 months plus.

I should add that I did teach my DD to self-settle (with the aid of two sleep props - a dummy and a muslin) before she hit 5 months and I'm so glad I did as I very rarely had to get up to her more than once and once she dropped her night time bottle (around 6.5 months) I can count on one hand the number of times I've had to get up in the night. So I'm absolutely not against sleep training at all and I do think it leads to better mental health for mum and baby.

Also I was very lucky in that I managed to sleep train DD without much crying at all. If she'd been hysterical like your DS I would have stopped.

If feeding to sleep and white noise works for you then stick with it, and ignore your HV..

Trust your instincts and do what makes DC feel happy and loved. You're not going to be feeding him to sleep when he goes off to uni, and he's very little still!

5 months is still tiny!!!! My DD was still sleeping in bed with me at that point and I fed her to sleep every single time AND had white noise on all night.
Now she's in a cot in her own room (17 months) and has been since she was about 8 months. She doesn't feed to sleep anymore but still has white noise every night.
Your HV sounds AWFUL ignore them entirely and do what works for you. Sounds like you were doing a great job without the HV advice!

Every baby is different, so do what suits you and your family.
My son is 18months and has white noise at night, no dummy or anything else and he sleeps really well.
When he goes to nursery and has naps he doesn't have white noise. So, he can sleep without it too :)

They adjust!

I also didn't do any controlled crying with both of mine until they hit 6 months, as I had more success then.

Ignore. She’s talking rubbish. Go back to the white noise and the feeding to sleep. It won’t last forever!

My dcs are 23 and 18, and still sometimes play the music they had to fall asleep to as babies if they’re having a bad night. It doesn’t seem to have held them back. They did stop bf to sleep some years ago though.....

If the white noise and feeding to sleep works don’t change it!

I still feed my 2.5 year old to sleep at bedtime, why have a stressful exhausting bedtime routine when a five minute feed does the trick!
Strange advice comes from HCP