How to transfer baby to crib without waking?

[TiredMummy321]

My LO is 4 months old and we’ve always struggled to transfer him to any surface once asleep since he was born. As soon as belly-to-belly contact is broken, his eyes open, even before he touches the mattress. This resulted in us cosleeping and feeding to sleep lying down as it was the only way to get any sleep. I’m now SO done with cosleeping and want to break the feeding to sleep association and being an hourly buffet every night. Or some nights he will only sleep with my nipple in his mouth AND wakes every hour for a small sip. I’m beyond exhausted.

The trouble is, it’s hard to get him to sleep in any other way at night. We can get him to sleep by rocking for ages but as soon as we lay him down, he wakes and I end up having to feed to sleep anyway (after a few attempts). We’ve experimented with waiting for 5-20 mins before transferring and we have the same problem every time. I don’t know if I’m getting the hold all wrong and perhaps it’s too jolty or if he’s just really sensitive? Or both?

I know we may end up having to sleep train to allow independent sleep but I hate the idea of him crying so if I could at least get him sleeping in his crib and doing slightly longer stretches, I think I could live with it. I’d kill for a 4 hour stretch of sleep.

Does anyone have any tips of how best to hold baby to easily release them, general transfer tips or alternative methods of breaking the feeding to sleep association?

Honestly, transferring a sleeping baby is such a PITA if I were you I'd be supporting the baby to sleep in the cot. Put it up to the level of your bed, take the side off, and get baby cuddly and cosy in there, lie next to him, stroke his face, pat, shhh, sing, whatever works, give it a good proper long try (like, 30min plus) and keep trying it.

Your baby doesn't need to learn to go to sleep independently, but he does need to learn to sleep in his cot. He'll cry, but you'll be right there with him, and he'll know it, so he'll be OK.

Yeah it’s not easy. I presume you’ve tried warming the cot with a hot water bottle?

I’ve occasionally used the Snugglebundl with success to rock LO to sleep and put her in Moses basket - it’s designed to avoid then waking up when you transfer them.

You could also try getting baby wrapped up slowly while on you so they fall asleep in blanket. If using a Moses basket you could even try taking out the mattress and using that to cuddle them up against your body, then transferring them on the mattress into the basket.

Sounds like you need a dummy.

It can take at least 20 mins for a baby to enter a deep sleep. I would use the floppy arm test. Lift the arm and if it drops and is floppy, baby is most likely in a deep sleep.

It also helps to put baby on his side when you put him down and then roll on to back, rather than straight on to back.

@Nintendonasalspray Unfortunately he doesn’t accept a dummy 😞 tried hundreds of times now!

@Glitteratitar I do have more success when transferring on side but still mess it up often! How do your hold baby/get your hands out? I normally try to slowly get his head in one hand and butt/back in the other for a minute or so before transferring (rather than cradled in nook of arm which how he lies when falling asleep). Sometimes this makes him stir though. I then attempt to put feet down first but he often wakes before I get to this point. Also in the day his sleep cycles seem to be 30 minutes so I worry about holding him for 20 mins and then him waking after 10 mins!

How did you get on @TiredMummy321? I could have written your post!