Baby suddently wanting to co sleep to settle

[SL80]

Hi all,

Our Baby girl is now just over 7 months old. To about six and a bit months she used to go to sleep around 8.30pm and usually only stir a few times in the night and just need a gentle comfort to drift back off. Now she is like clockwork waking between 10.30 and 1pm and will only go back to sleep by lying with us on the bed. We thought it might have been a small phase as around a month ago we started putting her in her own room in a larger cot. So we then went back to having her in the bedside cot with us but the waking still continued and needing to be next to us.

I know co sleeping is not safe and ultimately it ends up with me going into the spare room so its taking its toll on us both and we really want to nip it in the bud but we are struggling with ideas.

We have tried the whole 'cry it out' training but this just makes Baby more and more stressed to the point a few times its made her puke when we do pick her up to settle her.

Any advice much appreciated

Co sleeping is perfectly safe and IMO cry it out is abhorrent at that age.
How does your wife feel if she’s the one ultimately left with baby while you’re in the spare room? I’d stick with co sleeping, you in the spare room and reassess in another few months, as long as everyone is getting sleep, what’s the problem?

Thanks for the reply. The Wife ultimately will do what it takes to comfort the little one back to sleep. She says though that it's like she is sleeping with one eye open when the baby is co sleeping so her sleep feels very light so she is feeling v tired in the day.

Our concern is that the longer it goes on, the harder the habit will be to break. We have some friends who's little one still co sleeps and he is now three, they said it started with a similar pattern and they literally haven't been able to have a night away from the toddler for 3 years.

Defo won't be trying the cry it out again, so just seeing if there are some alternatives to try.

DS slept in his cot from 4 weeks (I shared his room) because I thought he’d struggle once he got a bit bigger to transition but I agree with PP that co sleeping can be great if done safely and we occasionally co sleep if he’s having a bad night. I don’t have a problem with cry it out but the baby does need to be old enough and that will be different for each child. 7 months is probably too young but you could try again at 9 months or try one of the more gentle fade techniques.

I used to make a bed up next to the cot so I could still comfort but not get them out of the cot. We couldn't get a proper sleep with them in the bed

For now I’d keep putting baby down as usual, after a good bath/feed/quiet time routine, assume you’ve tried things like white noise/ ensuring her room is not too hot/cold etc? Is she on solids and eating a bit but still having all her milk feeds?
I’d mainly focus on everyone getting some quality sleep so you comforting baby when they wake in the late evening (are you feeding at that point/is she maybe hungry?) while your wife has a decent stretch of sleep then if baby doesn’t settle pop her in with your wife then you have a good sleep through to morning. She can then hopefully doze with baby but she’ll have had a decent chunk by then if she does feel she has one eye open.
I’d role reverse at the weekends/your days off so wife has the later, longer stretch.
Honestly it’s hard going but doesn’t last forever, it’ll only become a longer term thing if you let it drag on for years but I wouldn’t worry at all about a 7 month old needing extra comfort.

I think if your wife reads up on safe co-sleeping she might feel more relaxed about it and get more sleep. It’s the way babies have slept for millennia (and still do in many parts of the world) and it’s the way they are programmed to feel safe. This website has good advice www.basisonline.org.uk/where-babies-sleep/

Thanks DC appreciate the advice. Makes sense