Ds refusing to sleep in his cot

[WhatTheHeckShrek]

Ds (10 months) has started refusing to sleep in his cot. We finally also lowered it yesterday (I know way too late) and now he hates it even more. The moment I put him in he starts screaming.

I think I need a proper routine where I put him in his cot awake as so far he usually falls asleep while bf. I thought it would be ok as he usually wakes up when I put him down in the cot and then quickly settled with a bit of patting and goes back to sleep.

Anyway so fhst doesn't work anymore. I don't want to let him cry it out bit yesterday I kept picking him up every time he cried, gave him a cuddle and tjrn put him down in the cot again. It involved a lot of crying and finally he fell asleep from pure exhaustion. I'm not sure what else to do but I'm so sleep deprived I'm really struggling. He won't sleep in my bed either. He wants to be carried and walked around with. Also I'm worried he'll crawl or roll out of my bed.

What do I do? I don't need a super quick fix and I want to keep crying and distress to a minimum

We had all of the settling to sleep in the cot rigmarole with dc1. Ended up having to just let DH get on with it because if boobs were available, he lost his shit. We skipped straight from next to me/co-sleeping to a mattress on the floor with dc2. Meant I could feed to sleep or nearly asleep and then roll away. When she was just over a year, DH started putting her down to sleep. He still lays with her at 19 mo (after a quick breastfeed, and then her pushing me away and demanding daddy) but she goes down in about 10 minutes now so it’s actually quite a nice part of the day. (Meanwhile I have to lie next to the 3yo who just wants to talk about maths for hours in end)

Is there an issue with holding him until he falls to sleep and then laying in his cot?

Explain to a 10 month old 🤣

Haha love the 3 year old wanting to talk about maths well into the wee hours of the night!!!

It's not just holding him but I need to walk around as well. I can't stand or just sit down and hold him. That's not good enough for him. He needs movement. He wants movement. And he weighs a ton (I've posted another thread about this whole other issue...).

Also, I fully buy into the theory now that babies expect to wake up how they fall asleep so if he suddenly wakes up in the cot rather having fallen asleep in my arms he gets mad. I suspect the reason why he still wakes up so often in the night to feed is because of this.

But basically that's what I've been doing. I've been breastfeeding him to sleep and then putting him more or less asleep into the cot on most days. On the days that he wasn't asleep I could put him in the cot and then pat him to sleep (which I'm happy with). Now the moment I put him in he screams and it's even worse now that I've lowered the mattress. I don't think I can bf for much longer. The flow has already become very slow and I doubt he's getting much milk out at all so I think I need to start working on putting him to sleep in a different way.

Well I don't buy into that theory as it's not been true for my children. To be honest I feel the same as you about sleep training, but I never really worried that I needed to make them fall asleep alone. They will get there by themselves. Generally around 2-3yo in my experience. Follow some gentle sleep advocates on social media? I like Lyndsey Hookway.

IME if they aren't going to sleep by feeding, then they simply aren't tired. Try a later bedtime, and beware of late naps! If DS3 naps after 3 then he won't go to bed until about 9/10. If he has his last nap before this then he'll reliably fall asleep at about 7. He needs some help to get there, but he is only little. They don't need help for ever and ever. And he's my best sleeper ever and often sleeps through (at 10 months!). I do need to move him out of cosleeping though, because he is very stealthy and explorey and rolls all over the place in sleep. When he's in a cot he just goes back to sleep again.

I lie on the floor next to the cot and hold her hand through the bars, I find if I sit next to the cot she will sit up or stand to get face to face with me but if I lie down she lies down too. I take my ear phones and listen to an audio book and don’t engage, eventually she falls asleep.

This is a good idea!!

After lowering the cot it was no longer possible to put my DS down without waking him. We have been sleeeping on a matress on the floor ever since then.

I can say this worked for me like a dream. I took a week off work because I knew it would ruin me emotionally but it worked! The first two nights.. horrendous. Crying (me and the baby) but third night was noticeably better, 4th night was great and we never looked back. I did the same thing from the start with our second and they both go to sleep like a dream now. Brush teeth, story and then I kiss them goodnight and leave and don't hear a peep. Sometimes my 18 month old has turned over to sleep before I've even left the room. Honestly I thought it was awful at first but it's brilliant and the kids get a great nights sleep which means they wake up happy.

I will add that I did go in and lay him down but I never said a word. I would go in and lay him down stroke his head and leave again. The more I spoke the worse it got so I kept quiet. Eventually he stopped getting up and was so much happier for it.