How to get five month old to self settle?

[Cloudhoney]

How did you get your baby to self settle? My ds has had reflux and is used to being held or rocked to sleep. For day time naps he is used to being bounced on ball, and has frequent 30/40 min naps in the day. He is completely unable to settle himself to sleep and wakes every one to two hours at night. Most sleep books recommend feeding him up before bedtime but this is impossible as he never eats when we offer, only when he feels like it and rarely for more than five mins. Any tips on what worked for you would be great?

Honestly? We did controlled crying. but I wouldn't do it until you're sure he's no longer in pain, or hungry. and most recommendations are not to do it till 6 months.

Thanks mini.

sorry I realise that wasn't very helpful! I'll be honest and say we did CC at four months but I will probably get flamed on here for that.

there are also the "gradual retreat" or pick up put down methods, which involve some crying but are supposedly gentler than CC because you stay with the baby while they cry. personally though, I found that wound my dd up much more than if I left the room, but babies are all different... there is also the "no cry sleep solution" which is supposed to be a way to teach self settling without crying I believe, I have not read or tried that but there are plenty on MN who have, I don't know how successfully! it does take longer.

you have my sympathy - we ended up in a similar situation as DD had dreadful wind and a bit of reflux and would only sleep on my chest for the first three months, then once in her basket she woke every hour or two and had to be rocked or fed back to sleep. there was no way she would self settle and she had got completely into the rocking/feeding to sleep habit. After that I was so exhausted I was close to dropping her from tiredness so felt CC was the lesser of two evils. (the wind and reflux had gone by that point)

Firstly, dont worry about the 30-40 minute naps: that's quite common at 5mo and he will probably stretch them out a bit as he gets older, starts crawling, gets more tired during the day etc.

With regard to self settling at night, I would say, if you're sure that your LO is no longer in pain with reflux, then maybe start trying to leave him for 3-4 minutes when he wakes in the night. See if he will start to learn to go back to sleep himself. I am not talking about extended controlled crying for hours on end...just don't rush to him the minute he wakes him. Time 4 mins on your phone and see what happens.

If he does not go off on his own, maybe place your hand on his tummy and say shhhhh shhhhh a couple of times to reassure him and then leave the room? Try not to pick him up for a cuddle unless he is getting very upset. Persever for a few days, see if anything gets better.

Would he take a dummy? That might help.

Thanks everyone. He does take a dummy and relies on that to get to sleep along with rocking. Thanks for saying his nap time is normal. I keep reading he should be on two naps a day, o is good to know his sleep is normal. If I think he is really suffering from not being able to get to sleep may consider cc, but would like to try something else first as he has cried so much already in his short life!

Honestly, I have done whatever it takes to minimise their crying, because crying = distress and it's worth almost any amount of my own discomfort/inconvenience to get them through that and out the other side (which does come!)

I think anything that involves a baby crying, and not picked up or conforted, is really not good for them. You are doing great - it should ease off soon. My 7mo hated being on his back, he slept better propped up on me, or with my arm under him to ease his tummy issues.

Mine have done it on their own initiative at about 9mo and 15mo. I didn't do anything different, I just realised that they were indicating that they wanted to be put down and not rocked or sung to!

I found that the gradual approach worked for me when dd was little, so I started off trying to get dd used to settling with my assistance but without taking her out her cot...bit of a labour of love though... I would give her a dummy ( she's a very sucky baby) put her on her side (her favoured sleeping position) and pat her bottom and shush her until she fell asleep. It took some persistence though! Then after a few days or so I withdrew the shushing and then the bottom patting and then eventually ignored her and she settled after some short grumbling. To work though I had to go to her before it escalated, so as soon as I heard her starting to moan but before the full on crying. I have no problem with the CC in theory at all but I just couldn't do it when she was so little. She's almost 5 months now and has started being a bit more difficult again and so I give her 10 to 15 mins of yelling. If she doesn't settle after that then I go to her and do the above, but often she's sound asleep by the time I get back from making myself a cup of tea pouring myself a drink . I don't feel too bad about it because when I go to her when she's crying she stops the minute she hears the door opens and gives me her best "yey I've won" smile! So I'm pretty sure it's not as traumatic as she makes it sound.

If you don't fancy that option have you tried playing certain music at bedtime or when you rock her and so try using music to soothe her rather than picking her up? It doesn't work for my little one but I know others who swear by it.

Also, can you try to keep him awake for longer periods so that he will nap better? My dd now has 30 mins at 9am, two hrs between 12 and 2pm (ish) and a short 20min nap around 4pm. I got to this outcome by trial and error - if she has longer than 30mins in the morning she wakes up 45 mins into her lunch nap and is difficult to resettle. If I don't give her a 20 min nap at 4pmish she is a nightmare at bedtime and won't feed properly. babies are all different but from the reading I did they do really benefit from a two HR nap at some point during the day.

Sorry this is getting long - I'm not being very eloquent today! Re the feeding, babies love naturally to snack and in my experience the only way to get some to take a decent feed is to grit your teeth and not feed them on demand but every three to four hrs. Nightmare the first time because he will have only snacked and will be hungry but if you can hold out and distract him with dancing, tv, anything, then the next time he feeds he will be so hungry he'll feed for longer and then in turn will not need feeding again for longer. My SIL had this exatct problem, minus the reflux) and ended up paying a fortune for a very experienced sleep trainer who managed to sort out her dd in a week by using this approach, although I warn you my poor SIL had to leave the house. Her dd is now a smiling happy baby on a good feeding and sleeping routine. caveat all this though because I have no experience with reflux so I don't know what the implications are for feeding so prob best to check with your gp.

Rambling, but I feel your pain and wanted to try and help. Good luck! X

Thanks so much everyone, and bumpity I really appreciate the detailed response. Lots to think about. I think I'm quite wimpy so not sure I have the stomach for the crying it out approach but then again he cries a lot now as he can't get to sleep! Have tried the no cry sleep solution (book) past couple of days but it just made him cry!

Totally agree with bumpity about the naps - don't stress yourself out, i wish I hadn't and I also had a 45 minuter! One day she just dropped from 445 to 21.5, just like that.

we did gradual withdrawal at that age, sat beside her quietly til she went back to sleep. Still fed her twice, but that was way better than the 1.5 hour mess we had too. It took a couple of weeks to get nights reliably better, but the first night i put her down (very) awake she only cried for 7mins while I sat there, the second night it was 2!

by the way if you post on sleep you will find a lot of people is the same situation as you, as well as lots of people with advice!

Hi just wanted to throw in what helped me when I was helping dd to self settle. I read The No Cry Sleep Solution too and adapted approaches taken from it. I'm afraid Ms Pantley would be disappointed in me though as there was a fair bit of crying involved! However, dd was never really left on her own to do this.

The main thing that I took was introducing what Pantley calls a "lovie" which we call a blankie. We use one of those little teddies holding a blankie. I wore it down my top for a bit then basically laid it next to her face or flapped it gently for her to hold onto when she crying. To begin with she would just suck it a bit before tossing it away. I thought this idea was quite stupid and was very sceptical but I persisted (because I was desperate!) and now, amazingly, giving her a blankie is her number one sleep cue. All I have to do is hand one to her (any one - she's not fussy!) and she squeezes it, flaps it in front of her face and starts sucking her fingers and she goes to sleep! It has been so handy to have this cue up my sleeve. After more strong encouragement she will find her blankie and self settle back to sleep in the middle of the night and now sleeps through.

Other things that helped soothe her and made me feel like I was doing something were a gliding crib, singing, trying to give her time in her room alone to self settle even if she was a little upset and wine. I was careful to not do too much rocking in the glider and quickly phased this out but I do think the motion helped soothe her to a certain extent as I was putting her awake in the crib for the first time and she was a bit mad about this! Ditto singing as I used that from when she was tiny and only napped in the sling, so sang two familiar 'sleep songs' over and over. I would stop if she was drifting off and try to leave before she was totally asleep so she didn't expect me to be there if she woke. The wine was waiting for me on the stairs outside the bedroom to steady my nerves!

This website helped me keep the No Cry Stuff in perspective, and acknowledges no one wants to do ccing whilst also stating it may be necessary to have some crying. She has a nice straightforward style.

Good luck! It is totally worth it.

Thanks everyone! That is really helpful! Will try out some of these suggestions.