AIBU to think self soothing is a myth?!

[nonamesareavailable]

Can babies actually self soothe? Mine won't go to sleep without a lot of help (pram, boob, rocking etc - often all of these!)...

Do babies ever learn to self soothe? How?! When?!

We gave DD a dummy at about 6 weeks in an aim to help her sleep. It would drop out while she was asleep so she would wake up crying. I stopped giving her the dummy so she would suck her hand, fingers or thumb and then dift off to sleep where ever she was. It also helped at 8 weeks we moved her to a cot over night.

Depends on the baby!

Some babies will do it early on by themselves.
Some babies will do it if encouraged to.
Some won't do it until they get older, regardless of encouragement.

Mine (all 4) have been type number three. They all slept well as babies, but only with a cuddle/milk. They all sleep beautifully now (well, the older three, the baby is six weeks old!) all by themselves. It does not last forever.

My GS settles himself really quickly and has done from about 3 months. He has a milk and sleep routine that works well. The first time he slept over, I lay awake all night waiting for him to wake, he never did apart from a 20 minute spell in the middle of the night when he just made a few noises, played with his hands for a bit then went back to sleep. Sooo funny to watch on the monitor 😂

Mine both did but it's hard work to get them to that point. It's a skill you have to teach them by being consistent. Withdraw slowly and give them the confidence you're there if they really need you.

My first baby always fed to sleep, up until she was over 1 I think. Didn't matter, she slept all night from an early age. My second hated cuddles or feeding or anything at bedtime, he just wanted to be put down and left and he'd drift off to sleep himself. And would then wake up 5/6 times a night wanting feeding.
So the ability to get thenselves to sleep doesn't necessarily correlate with them being better sleepers!

“Im talking about hours of jiggling when the baby wants to be put down.
The parents think they have to do something,it doesnt occur to them to just put the baby down and leave them to settle.”

Only if you have a baby that wants to be put down. Just as there are some that want that, there are some that want jiggling. Please stop implying that some parents are stupid for doing things differently to you

I can completely understand that there are babies that aren’t like mine. I don’t understand why some other posters can never understand the same. All this “we made sure we put them down to sleep” etc - I would have done that had he not woken up and cried (or just cried if he were awake) every time he was put down, because clearly he would have been happy with it. People don’t end up doing the more difficult thing because they choose to! It’s so insulting

My eldest was taught to self settle to sleep, and not by leaving her to scream or cry.

Some are ready, some need a little coaxing, some just aren't ready. DD1 needed coaxing, and there were no tears. She was probably around 4-5 months old.

DD2 could have been coaxed but I didn't bother. I cuddled her to sleep on the sofa until she was three . After that she was happy to go to bed like a big girl.

Maximum sleep for everyone, in the least stressful way!

My 4th is a great self soother/settler. He just naturally doesn’t mind rolling over and sleeping when tired. Some of the others were harder but it is a skill they can learn and one that lasts for years. All mine now go to sleep reliably when told it’s bed time. A bit of messing occasionally but they know they’re expected to lie there and relax quietly. I never had to do much controlled crying, just a little bit of mild crying and whinging when they were in bad habits of expecting milk or company or whatever they wanted when they were supposed to be/needed to be asleep. Usually around 8-9months was a good time to set some boundaries as that’s when they become more alert and clued in.

Self soothing isn’t something that you can teach, it’s a developmental leap. Some babies will do it earlier than others but the generally accepted age for them to really properly self soothe (which actually doesn’t just refer to getting themselves to sleep, it’s about emotional regulation in general) is between 4 and 7 years of age. Some babies might manage to get themselves to sleep before this (which isn’t actually true self soothing, it’s just what sleep trainers call it when they’re wanting you to each your child that crying is fruitless), but it’s not something you can teach any more than you can teach them to ride a bike before they’re ready. True self soothing is the ability to regulate and maintain their own emotional needs- which is far more complex than just the ability to go to sleep alone. True self soothing requires an element of self awareness which children don’t develop until much later.

I think self-soothing as applied to babies is a bit of a misnomer - the ability to calm yourself down when stressed is a sophisticated skill that my 4yo is still working on (as am I to some extent!). I'd say that no babies actively calm themselves, it's just that some don't get anything like as stressed in the first place - and obviously a baby that's happy when laid down will find it much easier to fall asleep. If you have the other sort of baby there's not much you can do except ride it out and gently nudge them towards more independence.

Ffs it’s not self soothing if they have a dummy! They are soothed and settled but with a prop

It's a thing in my house , I put both of mine to bed awake with a scout music bear and left them . They settled with the music then gradually phased the music out . Mine both slept through from 12 weeks . I think they key is to do it from day one but obvs that isn't for everyone .

They’re all just so different aren’t they. I go to baby groups and am amazed that some babies will just drop off to sleep, regardless of what’s going on around them. My MIL is amazed that my baby won’t, as all of hers apparently just fell asleep when they were tired...

He used to feed to sleep... stopped working at about 3 months. Rocking stopped working at about 4 months. Dummy stopped working at about 7 months. Now, at 8 months, we are just at the place where my son can be put down awake, grumble and wiggle around, then fall asleep by himself. He’s not a natural self soother or settler, but gradually step by step he seems to have got there (for now at least). I never left him to scream and cry, but it just took a lot of patience and consistency, and if I go in to him now it actually seems to upset him more rather than just being left to his own devices.

“I think they key is to do it from day one but obvs that isn't for everyone”

That isn’t for every baby

Mine wasn’t a true Velcro baby in that he would happily be put down when awake and alert and not needing to sleep. In order to sleep though he needed to be held or cosleeping from night one in the hospital - he wouldn’t even go down in the hospital crib and never had a sleepy 24-48 hours that others talk about. He slept in 45-min chunks on me that first night. If I put him down he woke up and cried for me within a couple of minutes. Swaddling etc made no difference. There wasn’t anything wrong with him, he just needed more closeness than some babies. Now at 9mo he will sleep for two-hour naps in the cot and will sleep for a chunk in the cot at the beginning of the night, but usually starts waking up every 1-2 hours after a certain point at which point I cosleep. Sometimes he will go down in the cot awake and fall asleep, sometimes he needs to feed or be cuddled to sleep or just lie next to me on our bed and then I transfer him. None of this makes any difference to how the rest of the night goes. He has never “slept through the night” and I don’t expect him to though obviously I would love him to sleep for longer chunks because it is hard going. However, I think this is amazing progress from how he was as a newborn. Babies are all so different.

Ffs it’s not self soothing if they have a dummy! They are soothed and settled but with a prop

So is thumb sucking self soothing in your humble opinion?

@HerSymphonyAndSong our babies should hang out! It sounds like they have the same approach.
My little one is relaxed, happy, and happy to be put down or be with other people during the day. But at night, he seems to want to be near us. He doesn’t need to be cuddled in bed - I think he just likes to hear our breaths and psychologically know that we are close.
Like most of the rest of the adult population he prefers to sleep near someone else. And I can’t blame him, as I’m the same.

I’ve tried my best with routines, white noise, drowsy-but-awake-putdowns, consistency, naps, etc etc but nothing impacts the wake ups.

“I go to baby groups and am amazed that some babies will just drop off to sleep, regardless of what’s going on around them.”

Me too! My friend sent me a picture of her baby who had conked out in the jumperoo, saying “babies will just sleep anywhere!” and I thought not my baby...! :D

Mine is two (and a quarter) and has just accepted that going to bed is an acceptable option at the end of the day.

I tried "teaching" him to seof soothe at various points, never worked. He was a velcro baby, that's just his personality, he likes the closeness.

I had all the "rod for your own back" bollocks and judgement for cuddling him to sleep, using dummies, using white noise etc. This is a child who has happily forced himself to stay awake till 1am if it meant waiting for me to get in. It's the baby, not the parent who decides.

My DS was a terrible sleeper, up all night, never slept in the day, I tried everything. He just never slept long periods until he was 7.

I was dreading DD and sleeping, thinking it would be the same, (never believed anyone who said their babies slept well ).

DD slept and slept and slept, she was barely awake for the first 6 months. She was a dream. So much so that I would put her in a pram wide awake walk 10 metres down the road and she would be asleep. SIL saw this and decided to have a baby because it looks easy, her DS was like my first.

I had all the "rod for your own back" bollocks and judgement for cuddling him to sleep, using dummies, using white noise etc. This is a child who has happily forced himself to stay awake till 1am if it meant waiting for me to get in. It's the baby, not the parent who decides.

EyUpOurKid

Same, I just did exactly the same things for DD as DS and she slept, he didn't, no rhyme or reason to it. Just different babies personalities.

Plenty of children self settle, there is no reason that a dummy or security blanket is any less comforting than a complex rocking, shushing and cuddling routine. The idea that self soothing only happens because a child has learnt not to cry, is what people say if their style of parenting is causing them to be miserable and defensive. It's how they justify not doing anything to fix the misery.

OP, it's okay to encourage them if you are exhausted, you matter too. Both of mine went naturally from me stroking them with a muslin while they fed, to fondling a muslin with their hands while they fed, to settling with a muslin, snuggling into it. There was no distress at any point, just consistency. It meant I could tuck a muslin into the buggy, or that they could have one tucked in a pocket when they started playgroup or bumped their heads, it was great for them having a comfort separate from me. Good luck.

So is thumb sucking self soothing in your humble opinion?

Yes, since they find it for themselves..

Some do-some don’t.

But an expectation that they will can be very demoralising for a parents. And I think some people expend an enormous amount of time and energy on trying to make things happen with babies that would happen by themselves anyway. I always went for the easiest option-and the option that got the most sleep for the most people. So I fed mine to sleep until they grew out of it. I’d rather spend 5 minutes feeding a baby to sleep than an hour doing any of the techniques intended to make them self soothe.