Transitioning from co-sleeping to bedside cot

[Jurassiclover]

Hey guys,

Just looking for advice on transitioning away from Co sleeping.

So LO is 6mo he's EBF (we are about to start weaning but awaiting highchair delivery). He currently wakes around anywhere between 3 and 6 times a night looking for the boob. He currently Co sleeps with me as partner works nightshift. However DP is switching over to days and will be back in bed and I absolutely cannot manage to Co sleep comfortably with DP in there too (have tried and it's not worth it haha). So we have a travel cot by the bed.

I'm quite lucky that DS will sleep pretty much anywhere and we've been doing naps in the travel cot well, but I'm just not sure how to tackle the night time sleep.

I was thinking of putting him down in the travel cot at the start of the night and maybe for the first week, when he wakes for his first feed I'll bring him into bed with me. Then the second week I'll work on putting him back into the travel cot after the first feed, then when he wakes the 2nd time bring him into bed, then the week after put him back in the travel cot after 2nd wake too etc. Until he's being put back into the travel cot after every feed. Does this sound like a good plan? Has anyone else done similar or transitioned a 6mo out of Co sleeping? Any tips or any other ideas are extremely welcome!

Thanks guys!

Does he have his own room?

If he sleeps peacefully in the cot just leave him to it. 6 months is a tough time for sleep but once they're through it things return to 'normal'

When we transitioned to their own room we started with daytime naps in their room, then 7-10pm in their bed then 10pm to morning in the next to me. When they were settling well in their room we just left them in there all night and didn't bring in with us.

@Jurassiclover
Just go for it, say it lightly but if you keep bringing him back in to your bed you will confuse him. Get him use to his own bed will take a while but you will get there.

Do you have room to create a sidecar cot (basically a full size next to me)? That’s what we did at that age and then managed to transition to own room by 9 months xx

Yes, I did this with both DC.

DC1 was in a cot by the bed. It didn't work, he ended up in bed with me anyway! Getting him in an out of it, and settling him again in it was a pain and meant I got less sleep.

We got a 3 sided cot for DC2 and this worked brilliantly. It meant I could feed her to sleep in bed, and the gently move her over. Or leave her where she was, next to me - if she rolled over it meant she'd be rolling into her cot, not risking rolling out of bed. I got more sleep, bottom line! I'd definitely recommend this.

Incidentally a travel cot is fine for naps but he needs a proper bed/ cot to sleep in. A travel cot 100% of the time is not ideal.

Probably should have mentioned in OP the travel cot is temporary! We've recently moved so he does have his own room we just haven't finished decorating it so don't have his cot bed yet!

@Twizbe yeah he has his own room just still busy sorting it! That's a good idea to use times actually!

@poppy709 we do actually! That's a good idea!

@runningoutofnewnames I'm starting to think that may be better because I do think I'll loose sleep with the getting him up etc!

At the time we bought one, 3 sided cost were pretty expensive, but we found out (from mumsnet!) that there were reasonably priced ones in Germany as they were more popular there, and so we bought one on German Amazon, using my UK Amazon account and including delivery costs it was a third of the price of buying here! (If you look at foreign language websites using Chrome, it can translate it for you).

However I think there may well be more reasonably priced options here now; that was some time ago.

@runningoutofnewnames I'm starting to think that may be better because I do think I'll loose sleep with the getting him up etc!

Yes, I did. It was the settling him back again that was the kicker. He'd be seemingly fast asleep, but the moment his back touched the cot, he'd wake up!! Soooo frustrating. With DD, if she wanted to be close to me that was fine, she could fall asleep on the edge of the bed, next to me but by her cot. I still had plenty of space and she couldn't fall out anywhere as her cot was just there.

Ahhh thats interesting to know about the German amazon, thank you! @runningoutofnewnames so for one of his naps today he fell asleep on boob (rare during the day now) and I was able to transfer him from the sofa where we were lay to his cot without waking, but I feel like this may have been a fluke haha! I think I might try one night of popping him back in the cot and see if he needs resettled or not and that'll influence whether I buy a 3 sided cot!