When did your DC self-settle?

[monkeymamma]

DS is 16 weeks and a fantastic night-time sleeper. We introduced a bedtime ritual pretty early - around the 5 week mark - and shortly afterwards he started sleeping from 'bedtime' (eg 8pm) through till morning with just one or two night time feeds. From 12 weeks he started sleeping the whole way through, although he still wakes for a feed at around 4am on a lot of nights.

Basically though we rock or breastfeed him to sleep (well, DH or I rock/sing to him and/or I BF him!), and my mum was a bit horrified we don't put him down in his cot and allow him to get himself to sleep. My friend whose baby is 5months puts hers down in this way too. I'm just not sure when we should have started doing this! My DH is convinced we need to start leaving him to settle when he's sleepy rather than putting him in his cot asleep, but the problem is that BFing makes him so sleepy that he's usually asleep when I put him in his cot anyway, IYSWIM.

Any tips or info on when your DC were able to do this would be great!

I would say that if you're happy with things as they are then don't change anything. It won't be too long until he may not fall asleep after being bf but will be drowsy but a bit awake.

The rocking will probably have to stop when he gets too heavy! You may be surprised and he may settle quite well anyway, my friends two ds's have never ever cried on being put to bed - some babies don't. Other people will set a 5 minute timer and then go in. There is a big difference between full on crying and moaning to get to sleep. But plenty of people don't want their baby to cry at all - horses for courses I suppose,

16 weeks is still very little and he's your baby - do things the way that feel right to you!

5yo

Between 2.5 and 5 yrs. (3DCs)

HTH

Suggested reading:

What mothers do
Kiss me!
Why love matters
The science of parenting

16 week olds are not designed to self settle. Babies and children learn to meet ehir own needs and soothe themselves by having those needs consistently met by caring adults until their brains mature enough for them to manage this themselves.

It sounds like you and DH are both doing a fantastic job

My LO is a year old now and I look back with such fondness on bfeeding him to sleep. It's a lovely time that is over waaay too fast. Make the most of it I say.
For what it's worth, he started self settling after nighttime wake ups at around 6 months iirc. Could you try patting and shushing as a half way house then withdrawing gradually if your DH is very keen on self settling? Otherwise just feed, cuddle, snuggle etc etc, soon you'll have to chase them for a hug! :o

Um, about four three. As in could say night night whilst he was awake, leave the room and he would drift off to sleep of his own accord.

That's years by the way.

I think, as we have a thumb-sucker, DD was about 12 weeks. We didn't force any sort of routine though just waited for the thumb to go in and put her down and it turned out to be pretty much the same time most nights. For us it was more about watching for the settling window than doing anything, but we might just have got lucky.

We lucked out and accidentally discovered that DD would self-settle when she was about 5wo. I was rocking her to sleep, she'd seemed to have dropped off, I'd try and put her down and then - bam, eyes open! One evening I was getting very frustrated with it (exhausted, starving, you know the drill at that age) and so even though she'd woken up again I had to walk out of the room as I knew I was too wound up to settle her. I left her in her cot in the dark with the monitor on, meaning to just take a few minutes to calm down before going back, but she didn't cry, and when I went back to check on her she had dropped off herself.

The same as you we had a bedtime routine from very early on and it means she is full and sleepy when she is put in her cot. We used to check on her every few minutes for the first week or so and it seems that sometimes it can take her up to half an hour to fall asleep, but she is quiet and content during that time. (I'm well aware that this might stop any day now!)

If you are happy rocking your DS to sleep then there really is no problem. But if you want to see if he can self-settle, the only way really is to put him down one evening when he is sleepy and wait outside the room to see what happens. As reel says, he may cry a little (DD does when she self-settles for a nap) but it might be a very sleepy, 'wind down' cry as opposed to an upset cry and he may be happy if you go in and reassure him. The only way to find out is to experiment. It really changes everything if they settle themselves so it could be worth a try just to see!

I've never rocked or fed mine to sleep (6 1/2 month old twins). I put the mobile on and lullabies and leave the room. Will usually drop off to sleep within a few minutes (and I will go back in if they cry for more than a minute or so, doesn't happen often though). Think they keep each other company though so probably different for twins!

DD1 - 6 years old after two weeks in hospital. She was just grateful to be allowed to sleep after all the poking an prodding I think. She got there in the end - they all do when they are ready.

DD2 - she just did it from birth.

My advice is go with the flow. He sleeps really well once he's down so what's the problem?

If it ain't broke.....

DS is starting to want to go to sleep on his own (with me there singing to him and occasionally with an arm on him) at 2.5 years. It takes him MUCH longer to get to sleep than it did, and I really wish he'd still bf to sleep.

FWIW, DS has napped much better & later than many of his peers because I've been able to get him to sleep by bf/rocking even if he doesn't want to nap. Others I know who have 'self-settled' have decided they don't want to nap, and there's nothing their parents can do about it, which has been immensely frustrating for them.

It sounds like your DS is a fantastic sleeper for his age. IMO the emphasis on 'self-settling' is to prevent children subsequently waking at the end of every sleep cycle needing help to get back to sleep again - which your DS clearly isn't doing.

mine have all varied, but generally by 18mthts ish i could leave them dozy but awake, ds4 did it from 3mths but he was a thumb sucker and dd was about 10mhts but she has a dummy, the other 3 needed feeding, cuddling but i just used to lie next to them and they would go off easily, from about 10mhts i could sometimes just pat, shushh them rather than feed them and didnt always have to lie with them it varied tbh. but they all sleep fine now at 12, 9,7 4 and 17mths.

your baby is still very little and sounds like he is doing really well, i wouldnt worry about it at all :)

From 6 weeks onwards our LO began to sleep through the night (*7 hours at first then 8, 10 and even up to 12 hours for a few months). Of course we have had the odd unsettled night since then, due to teething or illness and we did have a week of what we thought was probably separation anxiety behaviour, but LO has always been pretty good at getting herself off to sleep again if she wakes in the night - even with a horrible cold, she just goes back to sleep after a good cough and has about 10 hours sleep most nights. She has always had cot toys to play with though, from 3 weeks old. At 8 months old she started having soft toys and a particular teddy in her cot and from about 9 months old, her teddy became her main comforter/settler and still is (LO is now 20 MO). I think use of cot toys helps, as it provides distraction and something quiet to do till they drift off again, and especially once they get attached to a particular comforter toy this helps a lot

thank you all for your lovely (and supportive) replies!
PestoPenguin, thanks for the reading list - sounds interesting and will be good to have some ammunition in case of any 'rod for your own back' comments :-) 16 weeks seems SO little to me, unfortunately DS is a whopper (nearly 20lbs last count) so people tend to see him as older than he is. He's the smallest (only) baby I've ever had so he'll always seem little to me :-)
And yes, BFing to sleep is lovely! Can't believe I used to grumble re night feeds when he was littler - now I really miss it when he doesn't wake/sleeps through, and love our cuddly mum and baby time together when he does...

DS1 was fed to sleep every single night and rocked to sleep for every nap until he was 13 months old when suddenly he got attached to a comfort blankie and was abl to settle himself. I never minded feeding him to sleep at all and he slept through 12 hours from 10 weeks so I really didn't see or feel a need to change it. they all get there in the end. DS2 is trickier as he's only 5 months but won't feed to sleep at all. He just won't feed when he's too tired so at the minute we have to pop him in his cot and hold his dummy in for him to chew until he dozes off :-/ not sure if anyone else has to go to such lengths but I don't care and I know he'll settle eventually :-)

If you're interested in reading about sleeping from a Health Visitor's POV, this book[[http://www.amazon.co.uk/Good-Sleep-Guide-Parenting-Health/dp/1907359001/ref=sr_1_1?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1338319736&sr=1-1 Angela Henderson]] is rather good.
It suggests starting from 6mo to teach your child to self settle. I guess it depends how quickly you want your child to learn. I'm a single mum and was pretty exhausted at the 6 month mark so I found it useful. Even if you don't agree with her methods, it's an insight into sleep psychology if you like that kind of thing.

I had a very similar experience to Lexiesgirl and accidently discovered DD could settle herself at about 16 weeks. I'd been feeding or holding her to sleep until then, but she'd started fighting it and was finding it more and more difficult to get to sleep for naps and at night. At the end of my tether one evening I left her awake in her bed while I went downstairs for a cry break and the little pickle only bloody drifted peacefully off to sleep! She's settled herself for every sleep since.
So it was a very different situation to yours as it sounds like your bedtime routine is working really well for you at the moment. Enjoy the sleepy feeds with your lovely boy :)

Ah, sloth, its so reassuring to hear of another mum hitting the end of their tether - I remember feeling like an awful mum for walking away from her before she was asleep!

I tried to put mine down while they were sleepy but still just awake and I was lucky to find both self settled from birth really.

Breastfed for a month then had to stop with both for medical reasons, but when I was I fed, then changed a nappy and popped them down. DD didn't like the moses basket so moved her to the cotbed at the end of our bed and she stretched out blissfully. DS was a big baby quite quickly and also liked having space around him for sleeping.

Only time we rocked or used pram was when they were ill - both had dummies til 5 months, DD then used her thumb and DS just didn't need anything. (Not twins, 19 months apart)

DD was the same as Lexie and sloth. DD was about 6 months old and I'd put her down for a nap, but all the crying and fussing got to me so I took the advice of "leave for 5 mins, have a breather and regroup". DD stopped crying as soon as I left and when I checked on her she was asleep. I guess I was keeping her too stimulated by being there?

DS is 7 weeks tomorrow and already manages on occasion to want to be left alone to sleep. Of course he still has that startle/jerk thing so wakes himself up.

Up until DD was about 5 months old I rocked her to sleep. I didn't care what people thought--it worked well for us and we both enjoyed it.