ohh,i think i've made a big mistake...

[motherbeyond]

...desprately wanted to bf,got help on here when i was struggling.
but now,my 4 month old baby will not sleep unless i feed him to sleep,i have always done this with him,but now he really needs to learn to sleep in his cot.

i've got into such a bad habit,feeding him to sleep on the sofa and holding him all night 'til i'm ready for bed,and then he sleeps with me.if he wakes up and starts to cry,i quickly lift my top and he latches on and goes back off.

i have tried over the past few days to sleep train him in his own cot,but he doesn't last longer than 45 mins and i cave about 1am and put him in with me.

i just cant stand the thought of no sleep, i have 2 other pre school children to care.

any suggestions?!

ps, my dh blames bf for this and reckons it's easier to get a routine with a ff baby

no advice as am barely conscious with 4 day old dd but didn't want your post to go unanswered.

is it a problem him sleeping with you?

this isnt bfing fault, its just a habit & habits can be broken.

hopefully someone with better advice soon.

I agree with bumperlicious that its not the bf as my ff baby was the same just without the breastfeeding part, we slowly moved him by using a dummy and when hed cried in his cot getting him to sleep but putting him back rather than holding him for ages while he slept

That's what I did, although after first couple of months I was able to put DD in her cot for a few hours before taking her with me to bed (I mean she would wake up by then).

I found it much easier than getting up 5 times a night to bf.

On the upside, although she co-slept for the first few months, then she started going through longer stretches and by the time she was just over a year she was sleeping beautifully on her own and at 20 months still does- I leave her in her cot, she looks at some books etc and falls asleep by herself at 9 and wakes up at 7.30-8.

The only thing I would do is to try to put him down in his cot in the evening after bf. Does he always wake up when you do this?

I just answered another thread in sleep about 4 month old ff baby who is waking a lot at night, so clearly nothing to do with the feeding method.

It's really, really tough when you are in the midst of it, but I do tend to think your ds is too young for anything else at the moment. We had dd in bed a lot at this age. She doesn't ask to come in bed with us now and hasn't for ages (she's 2), so I wouldn't worry about the cot thing.

Just do what you can to get some sleep and don't worry about it.

This is exactly the same as my dd. I don't have any advice, but here is a couple of links which I found reassuring,

www.kellymom.com/parenting/sleep/comfortnursing.html

www.thefoodoflove.org/breastfeed-in-your-sleep.htm

It may be easier to get ff into routines, maybe not. Who knows. If you had formula fed, you may have encountered different problems.

The benefits of bf will last your ds a lifetime, where as sleep problems won't last forever.

I did much the same as you with my DS. I started putting him in a cot in the evening from about 8 months, and he'd usually wake up at about 11 and come into our bed. I found that it didn't take too long before the spells in his cot got longer and longer, until he wasn't waking up at night at all.
You haven't made a mistake. Don't worry. He's only tiny. Routines will come.

I did exactly the same. It's not a 'habit' - it's just a development stage. They are such little babies for such a short time and they want to be near and hold their mummies and have a drink. Just do what makes life easier for you. It's a short term thing. My DS put himself to sleep fine from just over a year and he never had sleep training - it just came.

Think of it as an evolutionary thing - we wouldn't have evolved far as a species if we all naturally from birth went into a deep sleep on our own, for 12 hours in the pitch black. We'd have been eaten by sabre tooth tigers!

My DS was bf till about 13 months, and then bottle fed for ages in the night. I probably let it go on longer than it should have done, but eating properly finally solved the night waking for us (sorry this is probably a bit too early for you with your 4-month old).

I know it's not the done thing on Mumsnet to promote particular "methods", but I found the Baby Whisperer's pick up/put down and shush-pat worked when I was finally making a stand about naps and getting DS to bed. They take a long time on the first few occasions, but they pay dividends later if you are consistent. They also feel like humane methods - for both the child and the parent (after all, the parent is a person too, and needs sleep!). And your little one needs to coexist with your other children, too!

As for your DH, he is out of order blaming you for anything. Doesn't he realise how easy babies of bf fathers have it? You have spared him a lot; the least he could do now is spare you some sympathy and support!

Good luck. Do keep posting. This is a really demoralising problem, and it does require support from other adults!

what Tondelay and whydobirdssuddenly said. Put another way.....how can meeting a tiny human's basic need for food, love and comfort be a 'bad habit'?

And please, please don't judge yourself by what other people say their babies do.....

(For the record, both DDs fairly, um, challenging sleepers). Tried 'methods' with the first. Didn't work. Am now happily resigned to my fate with DD2.

"Doesn't he realise how easy babies of bf fathers have it?"

I got that exactly the wrong way around! It should read: "Doesn't he realise how easy fathers of bf babies have it?"

sorry to post and run,been in a&e all eve with my 2 year old (he fell off a bunk bed,but is alright)
thanks so much for the reassuring replies.no one in rl says this to me.
all i get is "the baby should be sleeping through,in his own cot,wean him off the breast and get him on the bottle"

the problem is really,my dh likes a drink in the eve and i wont let him in the bed if he does,so he's been on the sofa for 4 months!
not great for the marriage really..i do miss the closeness.

also,i cant turn over with the baby in bed,and usually if i move he wakes up,mouth open and ready!so,i find im really starting to ache as im stuck in the same position all th time.

plus,how doi get him to have naps in the day if he's co sleeping? i cant leave him in th bed,and i can't hold him for hours either.he looks so lovely and comfy in his cot...i just wish he'd sleep in it.

even if i feed him to sleep,and he looks SOUND asleep..the minute he feels you lowering him in he'll start crying!!
you'd think he was my first baby reading tis post wouldn't you?!

I've got one of these,www.elc.co.uk/Blossom-Farm-Sit-Me-Up-Cosy/113377,default,pd.html and find if dd falls asleep on me in the day, I put her in here and she sleeps for ages (normally she doesn't sleep for long!). I think it's because she she feels like she's being held. You could arrange pillows to create a similar nest.

Don't worry, it's totally normal at this age - it's not a bad habit.

My DD was exactly like this at 4 months and now (at nearly 8 months) she sleeps in her cot every night.

We just made the change very very gradually - first putting her in a cot by the side of the bed with the side taken off, then putting the side onto the cot, then moving it further from bed and then into her own room. She started feeding less and less in the night as she got older.

I think we started putting her down to sleep on her own in the evenings at about 4 months - I definitely still fed her to sleep at this point.

I still have to feed her to sleep for naps, but I can put her down awake but sleepy at night and she will settle - again, we got to this point really gradually.

I knew I couldn't leave her to cry so doing it the slow way has worked really well for us.

Try getting him to sleep in his cot in the day happily before you try and settle him there at night? I did this with mine and it worked well.

I did a similar thing to pinkbasket. Stick to your guns, you are doing fantastically. :)

Sounds like you are doing well, not a bad habit. Could be teething, DS2 (who I always feed to sleep, as I did DS1 who sleeps very well btw) used to sleep only waking twice a night. But now after he goes to sleep I put him in his cot and he keeps waking every 45 mins too, I feed him he sleeps.
This goes on until I go to bed and then I get him in with me.
Dont worry about anything being a bad habit, sleep patterns change so much, the main thing is, you get yours :)

My mantra is 'they are babies for such a short time'. I enjoy every cuddle together. (Despite mum and sis telling me Im making a rod for my own back

I was completely obsessed with the not-feeding-to-sleep thing as I had read the Baby Whisperer and the 'accidental parenting' label had been assigned to it, making me feel like it was the worst thing ever. Anyway I spent the first six months shushing her to sleep and while it was OK it would take ages at naptimes and she always cried so quite a miserable experience all round. At sixth months, with the need to fit in solids and do BFs I found I had to BF her straight before bed. Unsurprisingly she fell asleep and you know what, it was fine. In fact she started to sleep a lot more soundly from then on.

In terms of where your ds sleeps, I think you do need to start putting him down in his cot once he's asleep. A bedside cot is an amazing thing which means he has his own space, but is within arm's reach if he needs feeding. Like someone else said, you can put up the side, move it away from your bed and eventually into his own room. I thought my dd would be in our room for about a year or so, but she went into her own room at 8 months as I was going back to work and knew I needed more sleep - we realised it would take a few sleepless nights until she settled and I didn't want that during a working week, so did it in the summer hols. We went through that whole process of moving the cot away from the bed and dd was fine with it. I think I was the only one still awake at night for a few weeks - stupidly listening to her breathing on the monitor for hours on end .

She's 9 months now and in her own room, being fed to sleep every night and generally doing a straight 12 hours - I don't find the feeding to sleep an issue, in fact you may be onto a good thing

Op, hope your two year old is ok. Not a fun way to spend Friday.

Won't give you advice as have had loads of it. . we operate similarly all over the place sleeping arrangements. Like most families.

Oh, I hate the baby whisperer's accidental parenting label. We did all the things she warns about and you know what? DD has grown out of them on her own, no problems at all. Babies are designed to be fed to sleep.

And do you know what? feeding her to sleep, isn't going to make her arms and legs fall off or make much difference in 10 years time, other than giving you are warm fuzzy feeling that you had that level of closeness once when she's a cheeky 10 year old!

My 1st went into a cot, my 2nd and 3rd 50% co-slept to 6 months my 4th finally went into a cot around 10 months.They all slept on the sofa next to me while I mn'd in the evening.

There is no right / wrong. There is no "mistake" enjoy you baby.

Do follow the links on co-sleeping tho, I found a way of co-sleeping very comfortably, it can work. Good luck.

Sorry him not her! durr!

I've done this with all my babies and kicked myself over it about this age. My 12 mo is still bf (only been eating solids for a few weeks) but we've managed to get her to go to sleep without being fed, and to give up nighttime bfing fairly easily. I think we've done the same with all the children. We waited until we are sure they're eating a sensible diet in the daytime, then I basically just stop feeding them in the night. If and when they wake up, it's easier if daddy gets up to them. In our case, because she's in with us and we have no spare room, I slept downstairs for a week so that I wouldn't be in the room when she woke up. She went from waking 6-7 times a night (every hour basically) and refusing to go back to sleep unless fed, to sleeping through 8:30 to 5am, maybe with one minor stirring in the night, in that week.

I know that not all babies are the same (and our son was very difficult to get to sleep through the night- very stubborn and could and did scream for 3 hours at a time), but I just wanted to share what we did with you in case it gave you hope that all is not lost, and that you can safely carry on nurturing your baby the way you want to until you want to do something different. Fwiw, I think you are doing the right thing. Lots of people parent differently, but I feel that little babies need the reassurance of their mother near at night, until they understand that mummy is not far even if you can't instantly see her.

I hope that helps. Hang in there- it's not for ever, I promise.

Can you take the fourth side off his cot and attach it to your bed at all? You might need to drill extra holes/raise the mattress somehow. Bring the cot mattress across to plug the gap and squash rolled up towels into the opposite side to hold it there. Firstly it acts as a bed guard, and then after a while you should be able to progress to scooting him over into the cot when he has finished feeding, which means you can lie on your back or front or face DH or anything really.

(Also, I don't want to push in, but I really don't think you are being unreasonable asking your DH to sleep on the sofa when he's had a drink and TBH would suggest that if he isn't happy about that then perhaps he could consider not drinking until the baby is a bit older, rather than expecting the baby to change his behaviour)

FWIW I think the way you are dealing with bedtime makes absolute sense! I did this from when DS was first born, kept him with me and then took him up when I went to bed. Actually cot death recommendations are to have the baby in the same room that you are in for all sleeps, not just the main night time sleep until 6 months, so it's actually recommended advice as well.

I used to say to XP - are you looking after DS all day? No? Right, I'll feed him how I like then. And - Are you getting up to do any night feeds? No? Okay, I'll do it this way then thanks, it's much easier.

I do think that BF is much easier at night if you can manage to co-sleep comfortably. You can't doze and FF at the same time, can you? And you have to either buy the expensive ready made cartons, get up to make it up at ridiculous times, or make it up in a less safe way than the guidelines state, meaning you run the risk of exposing bacteria to your baby.

My FF baby was the same and he was in my bed until he was 11 months old - at which point he went into his brother's room.

I think he got lonely.