11 month old won’t settle for sleep with his dad

[doireallyneedaname]

He loves his dad at all other times but when it comes to naps, bedtime or settling in the night, he screams bloody murder unless I come in and take him. He then immediately calms down and goes back to sleep, like an off switch!

Whilst I secretly love that he wants me to comfort him, it also makes me really scared. I keep on thinking about what will happen if something was to happen to me, and I find the idea of it very distressing. I want baby to be happy with his dad settling him too.

Today his dad went upstairs to put him down for his morning nap, and I stayed downstairs. He screamed for 20 mins before I finally went up. I’d stayed downstairs on purpose and googled the problem itself, but when I went upstairs my partner was upset I’d left them to it and said that I should have just come up as it’s me he wants. I explained I wanted them to figure it out because I’m scared of what would happen if I wasn’t around and my partners response was “nothing is going to happen to you.”

I understand my anxiety is an issue with this but nonetheless I’d still like baby to settle for his dad.

Any ideas? Do we just have to keep doing it this way? Should we both put him down for his naps so he gets used to dad there too? I just think if we are both there he’ll think it’s play time.

Is your baby breastfed? If so, in my experience (of 3 babies!) this is normal! Mine became less dependent on me for sleep around 18 months

Nope, he’s formula fed!

Have you tried doing bedtime together a few times so he gets used to his dad doing it but with the reassurance of you there? Even if it doesn’t work then these things change quite quickly and I found that even though my DD preferred me to do bedtime she’d settle fine when I was out of the house

Dos the baby go down to bed awake? So you are just doing the physical putting down/tucking in? Or do you rock them to sleep?

Give dh a tshirt or something of yours that smells of you for baby and leave him to get on with settling dc. It wont take dc long to work out if he screams loud enough and long enough youll turn up eventually. As long as dh is willing to put the work in and a few sleepness nights while they work it out together, id step back a bit x

You just have to let them get on with it. They both need to learn! Do a couple of naps/bedtimes together, and then start going for a nice calm walk at naptime/bedtime and leaving them to figure it out.

FWIW, it isn't that your DH needs to be able to settle the baby in case you tragically die, he needs to be able to do it because it is his child too and you being the only person who can get the baby to sleep is not at all fair on you!

Have you thought about teaching him to fall asleep by himself, so you cut out the middle man?

We have the same problem with our 12 month old.
I agree with the person who suggested bed time together with dad doing all the things and you just being there. Then slowly moving away so one night dad does bath and pjs but you come in for actually bed time. A couple nights later dad does everything and you just sit on the floor in the room.

Another thing I find works is if the baby knows I'm not there so 15 min or so before bed time I go out for a walk ( say goodbye at the door and let baby see you leave) and then he settles for dad because he knows I'm not there. This works for us because I had to go back to work when he was 9 months and he stayed with dad so was used to the idea of me leaving so not sure if it will work if baby hasnt spent much time away from you. If that's the case you might want to build up daddy time while you go out for a walk or go do the shopping during the day.

DS goes back and forth on which of us he prefers to put him to bed. For a week or two DH is absolutely the only one he wants, then it switches to me for a few weeks.

Personally I wouldn't necessarily worry about it and go with the flow.