How to get baby in own cot?

[mummyIztired]

For the past 2 weeks our 5mo has been in our bed so that he sleeps!

i know there’s phases and not to worry as he must just need me but ideally I’d like him in his snuz then cot when he goes to his own room

I love him unconditionally I’d do anything for him! Co sleeping just isn’t for me please don’t judge

any tips? I don’t want him distressed or to cry it out I always pick him up if he cries

I had to put mine in the cot - she was tiny when I did but I was having continual nightmares that I was loosing her in my bed. She went into her Moses basket then one night she was sick in it and I had no option other than the cot. Put it next to my bed and it just worked. Good luck

He is at an age when he is developing sleep associations, so be careful about letting him in your bed if you don't want to continue! We used a next-2-me cot for the first 6 months so I could cuddle him without getting up, but he was still separate.

Honestly I would look up some gentle sleep training and nip it in the bud. I started controlled crying when baby was just shy of 6 months. Yes there is some crying involved, but it's in short bursts and I would do it again.

4 months ago my son would never have dreamed about going to bed and falling asleep with me not in the room. It's been a long road and hard work for both of us, but this morning he did exactly that.

Good luck!

The thing with switching from co-sleeping to cot sleeping is that you can't do it gradually, there is no halfway, so it will be pretty much impossible to do without some tears. The sooner you do it the better though. How does baby get to sleep at the moment?

@MolliciousIntent so I rock him to sleep then he’ll go in his cot (when asleep) for like an hour

then needs settling and then keeps going down and settling until next bottle and around 12-2am I give up and get him in so I can get a full hours sleep or so

so he doesn’t start in the bed! Just ends up the most of the night

So basically the issue is that he doesn't know how to fall asleep by himself. If he didn't need to be rocked to sleep every time he wouldn't be ending up in your bed.

You can do it fast, with tears, or slowly, with probably still some but maybe less tears. Depends whether you want to spend days or months on this.

@MolliciousIntent my mum did say this could be the problem

how can I help him? I’m terrified of him crying for too long because I heard it can damage him emotionally and his brain development so even controlled crying scares me

This is why I give in and let him in I’m scared he’ll cry for too long if I don’t soothe instantly :(

It’s one or the other unfortunately

had this with my daughter who is now 15 months

i co slept from 4.5 months until 7 months

then I felt comfortable doing a bit of sleep training and she has slept in her own cot in her own room since then.

now she wouldn’t even lie beside me in the bed or sleep on me at all - needs to be in her own space to sleep (cot, car seat or buggy)

Does he have a dummy or comfortor? Agree with pp you need to break the association with being rocked to sleep, he needs to be able to go back to sleep himself which he can't do yet.

It's not going to damage him emotionally, that's bullshit. You won't be able to change it without crying, so either you suck it up and co-sleep til he's old enough to bribe (3 or 4) or you suck it up and deal with the crying. It's a bitch, but that's life with babies.

@Lazypuppy he falls asleep with a dummy but spits it out when he falls into a deeper sleep!

not always though only a few times I’d say

Lucy Wolfe the baby sleep solution book is a great read. We did a similar plan to hers at 6 months and got him settled in cot in own room after a rocky few months of co sleeping (which I also disliked).

I would start with getting baby used to naps in the cot during the day. It took our baby a few weeks to get into good nap routine in his cot then tackle the nighttime?

Thats normal, most babies do, then thry learn how to pop it back in if they wake up, or you put it back in their mouth anf they can go back to sleep

I don't think all the 'sleep associations' stuff is necessarily true. Every baby is different! I had my little boy in bed with me for a month or so around 5 months for majority of the night as he kept waking up upset (before that he was sleeping through the night!) Then around 6 months I moved him into his own room and cot and he slept fine after a couple of weeks of getting used to it slowly. I still feed him and hold him to sleep then put him down and usually goes all night now or wakes up for one feed around 3am. Yes there has been bad phases with teething etc but I don't think him waking up has ever been because I feed and hold him to sleep! He's 1 now.

I do think getting him used to napping in it during the day was most useful as he loves a nap in there now and all the space. A good routine helps too! Good luck!