How do you/did you get an older baby/younger toddler to sleep?

[mrsjuan]

DD is coming up for 14 months now and I am still rocking her to sleep (sitting in rocking chair or standing up) to sleep at night. She has a dummy which she can't fall asleep without.

It is beginning to take longer and longer to get her to sleep unless she is completely shattered (i.e. crying with tiredness), when she will fall asleep pretty much as soon as I give her he dummy.

I would like to get to the stage where I could put her in her cot and read or sing to her until she fell asleep but she either cries or thinks it's time to play - she won't lie down.

Once she is asleep she is not too bad and is finally sleeping through most some nights so I'm not bothered about all the self settling CC stuff - I'm just wondering how to get her to sleep in a slightly more 'grown up' way.

The only thing that has worked for us is to let her cry. It takes usually about 10 mins for her first nap, then 5, then about 2. If for some reason she is fed or rocked to sleep, I have to do it all over again but it really is worth it, as far as we are concerned. I think she (our baby, yours might be different) genuinely needs a little cry to wind down.

Maybe I am too soft . I sometimes leave her for about a minute if she wakes up crying in the night because then she can find her dummy herself and go back to sleep but I think that only works because she's so sleepy.

I can't imagine she would settle for the first time if I left her - she'd just be standing up on the cot bars and get more and more upset

with ds2 i feed to sleep, or push in buggy to sleep
ust starting to be able to fall asleep sometimes if i lie next to him
it does come as they get older - ds2 is almost 2
it's fine to carry on helping her to sleep if it doesn't bother you to do so
perhaps she needs slightly less sleep during the day if she is taking a long time to get to sleep? however this can disturb sleep even more if they end up over tired

I didn't do it for a long time but when I did it worked in quite a short time. They do say to go back in after a certain amount of time, but I have found that it gets her all worked up.
Have you tried music, or a musical lantern-projector-on-the-ceiling thing? Those have helped us.
The standing holding onto the cot bars have been a bit of a problem for us, but now that she knows how to get herself down again it usually doesn't take too long for her to do so.

Might try a projector thing and see if that helps her lie down.
I don't have a problem with 'helping' her - I figure I won't still be doing it when she goes to uni! It's just that she'd getting a bit reluctant to be held sometimes and it can turn into a bit of a wrestling match trying to get her 'into position'!

In the daytime I can often sit her in her pushchair (with the dreaded dummy) and she will drift off with no help so it's obviously the restraint (for want of a better word) that she needs.

I'd advise making sure all nap times are regular (ie around the same time each day) and making sure she doesnt sleep too much during the day. My daughter is 14 months. She sleeps no more than 2 hours during the day and goes to bed at 7pm, waking around 6am. I feed her just before I put her down but no rocking. I just put her in her cot with her dummy and let her go to sleep when she is ready. At first she would cry a bit, so I would go in, say ssshh and lie her down in her cot with her dummy and favourite toy. I dont believe in letting them 'cry it out' so would be in and out a fair bit initially. Now, she understands that when she is in her bed, its sleepy time. She might chat to herself but soon drifts off and sleeps all night (bar the occasional hiccup)
Be consistent with the bedtime routine and she'll get it. You could try putting on a CD for her to listen to has you leave as part of the routine. I used to do that with my son and it helped him.

At that age if not feeding DS to sleep I would put him in his buggy and go for a walk. After a while of this we progressed to in buggy, pushing it, in the house. After a while we progressed to putting him in the buggy and being quiet/going into another room for 10-15 minutes while he fell asleep. If he cried then we'd go bak one step - ie I'd push it until he was quiet then when he was quiet stop, if he cried again I'd start to push bak and forward again. If this didn't settle him then we went for a walk.

It seemed to be that when he was strapped in he KNEW he ouldn't just get up and go and play, so he didn't try (didn't get upset about the prospet either though) and allowed himself to relax enough to just fall asleep. It worked best when he was really tired but didn't want to go to bed. Admittedly it works best if you have a really snuggly footmuff - but not muh good when it's hot - a sheepskin insert helps when it's hot, I have found.

breastfeed to sleep. She's 20 months. For naps now I don't feed her but time it so I'm out walking in the ergo. She naps much better for my husband (we share her care) in the daytime but so far any attempt by him at bedtime has gone awry.

Reluctant to do it 20 months on, but also reluctant to give a good parenting tool up, if you see what I mean. They're so young though and I wouldn't fret about them learning all this stuff. It will come (I keep muttering to myself)

She'll do it when she's ready. DS breastfed at bedtime until he was two and a half, but now, at four, goes to sleep beautifully by himself after stories, hugs etc, with no fuss at all.

We just let her cry - 5 minutes felt like 10 minutes but so long as the crying was diminishing we didn't go in. It turned out she was a child who simply need to cry to let off steam and unwind. She rarelyt cries now; just drops off (never had a dummy though and has never been rocked to sleep).

we have two dd (2.5 and 13 months)- my 1st dd was able to self settle and has slept thro from 6 weeks no dummy. my second dd was a demon bless her. I refused to cuddle her to sleep. we have a very set routine, 5pm tea, 5.30pm go into playroom and get the books out. 6pm bath time 6.30pm biscuit and juice. at 7pm we go upstairs put dd1 to bed first, we check cupboards for monsters (this is new) she turns lights off gets into bed we all give her a kiss and a squeeze including dd2 and then go into dd2 room, put her sleepbag on (which we have tied her dummy to- short enough not to go round her throat) and then kiss cuddle tell her she is a good girl and put her down. the first week we did this from 4 months old, she'd cry. I'd go in after 5 mins put my hand on her chest and tell her she was a good girl, repeated this at 10 min, 20 min, 30 mins and 45 mins on and so on... first two nights took 2 hrs, then from night 3 it took 10 mins and now she just says ta... nigh nigh.. and that is it. i think it is about associating bed with happy times, i know some moms who get stresses and this rubs off on the child.. just put her down and tell her she is a good girl xx hope this helps x

and also i know some people don't agree with controlled crying because of research about negative hormones etc.. however by going in regularly I really believe your child doesn't feel unloved and abadoned, one of my friends who has a dd same age as dd2 still rocks her to sleep which takes 50 mins and then the child wakes every 1hr 15 mins all night. i really believe this is beacuse her little has never learnt to self soothe and mommy is too ready to take her into her bed. we all know what sleep deprevation does to us so I feel sorry for her little one as sleep is precious.

anyway hope this helps x

About 1 year started bedtime routine and lots of talking about what comes next. So now it's time for IgglePiggle and your milk. When IgglePiggle goes to bed then it's time for your nighttime napp, and then the CBeebies go to bed and it's time for you to brush your teeth and go to bed. Right, if you don't want to rinse your mouth any more toothbrush goes to bed and you go to bed. [lift into cot] Here's dummy and blanket. Night night. [wander off]

Most of the time he'd switch on his musical mobile or just conk out. But then for naps he used to just lie down on the floor and sleep suddenly - now I have to make sure he's in cot or pushchair with dummy before he gets overtired.

Around 14mo he started wanting more milk at night and once we gave it to him he then went back to sleep. Finally started sleeping through regularly at 20mo, after some time of both me and MrNC telling him that yes, it's sleep time, we're going to sleep too. Kids are all different but this worked with ds - as we left the room you'd hear WAH! WAH! WAH! Humph [sound of lying down]

I was rocking my DS to sleep at 7mo, sitting by cot holding his hand till around a year, sitting on a chair in his room till recently and can now say night, night and walk out most nights. If he's a little unwell he wants me to stay but I'm hoping that will become less often as he gets older. He is 18mos now.

When I first started on the road from rocking to laying him down I would rock him till he was very sleepy and put him down. Was a leap of faith as you know a little more rocking and you're done v putting down and risking him waking properly but you have to view it as for the longer term.

Move from rocking in your arms to comforting her in her own bed. Take it one step at a time. A sleep consultant once said, think about where you want to be and reduce your intervention by 20% until that works easily, then take the next step. Allow her to wriggle, it's part of the settling to sleep process.

Thanks for all the replies - glad I'm not the only one who is / was still helping at this age.

blackbear - I know exactly what you mean by the leap of faith! I think I will choose a good evening - i.e. not too tired or too over stimulated and go for it!

The annoying thing is that we did have a bit of a push on it in January and got to the stage where I could pat her in her cot and she'd go but we reverted to rocking when she was ill and never really got away from it - and now she can stand up! Aghhh!

Pretend you have paid me £125 as a sleep consultant to go back to putting her down in her cot. (if necessary, take £125 out of your bank account or buy some M&S vouchers!!)

If she stands up, tell her it's bed time and to lie down. Then if necessary, put her lying down and keep going.

Try for a week, make a note of how long this process takes each night and report back in a week!!