swaddling/moro

[bagsundereyes]

dd1 is 3 months old and a crap sleeper. she is also obsessed with her hands, and still has a really strong moro reflex. waving/jolting her hands always snatches her from the brink of sleep back into wakefulness, and she then ends up overtired. as such, I'm still swaddling her in a cotton sheet to sleep. I know that most people stop swaddling around this age - are there safety reasons why I should do so? Also, when does the moro reflex subside? thanks all

I cant offer any advice, but my 17 week old is obsessed with his hands also - it is a developmental stage they go through = he stares at them and plays with them as if they were the most fascinating thing ever. He can manage to get his hands in his mouth and dribbles everywhere.

I think that if she is happy being swaddled then continue, as I am sure that she will soon let you know if she doesnt like it.

Dont know anything about the moro reflex - maybe someone will come along with more advice.

I still swaddle ds (four months) on occasion, because he likes it, but he always wriggles his hand free because he sucks his thumb. He's got used to just being put down now. I think the comfort of the swaddle has switched to the thumb. I'm not aware of any safety reasons why I shouldn't swaddle him, though.
I was told when he was out of the hospital by community MW that swaddling was considered bad now, but he wouldn't sleep any other way, and that's how he'd been wrapped in the SCBU, so i just carried on.

I think the Moro reflex disappears between 3-6 months. Don't worry about swaddling. I tightly swaddled all my children for as long as I could , which was usually not less than 6months. I have swaddled up to a year and with a couple of them I've even wrapped them for bed after that age. It hasn't caused any developmental problems at all and it did a lot of good in settling them to sleep. My eldest is now 20y and my youngest 3y.

Swaddling is now considered bad? I wonder why?

juule, not a scooby. I think it might be a SIDS over-heating thing, perhaps? We just ignored the advice because a)we'd swaddled all the others and b) he'd been swaddled in the SCBU which was much warmer than our house anyway.

I agree with the SIDS thing - people do tend to dress their babes as if it's below freezing sometimes. Maybe if your swaddling just have them in a vest and then add blankets if you think they need it?