Baby sleep frustration

[LittlemissMama67]

I'm writing this to vent but also to keep myself awake right now. I'm actually losing the will to live. My baby only wants to sleep in my arms. Full stop. The second I put her down she's fussing and whining. And the whole process starts again. I'm on the verge of tears right now this has been since birth she's 4 months old. I feel so exhausted I'm always close to crying. My eyes are so heavy, my body needs sleep. 😭

I cry most nights. Sending you a hug and solidarity

Sending you hugs mumma. 💞

Are you looking for advice on ways you can work on putting baby down when they are sleeping? I’m no expert but certainly happy to share my routines I have with my 3 month old.

I remember being in this situation with my daughter who is now 6, I swore I would do things differently with my second. His sleep is far from perfect (I’m sure you can tell that as I’m sat writing this at 3am 🤣) but I’ve done certain things I believe help his sleep!

@LittlemissMama67 sat here currently in the same position with my 3 month old! And this is my second! You’d think I knew what I was doing after already having one!

@SLACK124 please do tell us!

I find routine is key, even at these early stages. He is breastfed, and will always try to feed to sleep. I will wait until I can see he is getting drowsy and start to remove the breast. Sometimes he will wake straight up and want to continue feeding which is fine, others he’s too far past it and will snuggle in. I won’t let him use me to comfort suckle (first thing I done with my daughter and regretted it come 1 year old and she was still there comfort sucking every night!)

My son will fall asleep no problem during the day in the car seat or the pram - for that I feel extremely lucky! But much like others as soon as the motion stops 8/10 he will wake. If there’s things to be done he is popped in the carrier and we power on 👏🏼

For naps in the house as soon as I catch his sleepy cues I will put him into his star blanket. I’ve made that an association with his day naps and believe this is how he will settle to sleep and be put down during the day.

Nights are a little different. It can be gruelling on an evening to lift and put down baby 4-6 times in a 2 hour time space but I’m not one to leave a 3 month old inconsolable and also not going to give in to letting him sleep on me (another thing I done with my daughter that I wouldn’t do again) I do the same thing over and over until he is settled. It has decreased a lot with this routine in the number of times I need to do this each evening so I assume it’s working 🤷🏼‍♀️

Feed - cuddle and rock to sleep - hold for 10-20 mins and put down. White noise is a must for us, and keeping the hand on his chest for a good minute once he is down so he feels the pressure and not just suddenly that he is away from me. If he doesn’t stay sleeping I won’t pick up as soon as he starts to make his whingey noises, I’ll keep the pressure on and pat his bum for a good minute or two to see if he is going to escalate it into a cry.

As I say I am far from an expert! Hopefully people with more knowledge will comment in the morning and give advice, but these are the things that work for us.

My current issue is my son will go down for between 4-6 hours on first put down, wake for a feed but doesn’t want put down after his first nightfeed! For a while I was just co sleeping and we were fine with it but if I want to see my 30th birthday without being the shape of a quaver from back pain I need to stop this 🤣

Just posting to say I’m in the club and hello! I hope you find a way to get a break and feel better x

Hello 👋🏼 just posting to say I am in the same position and I'm on baby number 3!! You really think I would know what I'm doing by now but actually each of my babies has got progressively worse and baby number 1 was the best sleeper. Currently lying here at 3am with a 3 month old on my chest. She does not go in the cot AT ALL!

Just realised it's actually 4am!!! Arghhh

Fussing and whining is absolutely fine, pop her down. Give her a short period of time to cry (a minute, a few minutes). She might just fall asleep.

I'm going through it with my second, I started co sleeping around 2/3months as it was safer than falling asleep in bed holding her. She still woke lots but I could get her back to sleep easier.

It's just started bring unsafe to do this so the past week I've been putting her down in her next to me crib. She turns into her side and over the past week we've gone from screaming crying each time I lowered her or put her down to periods of actual sleep in the crib. And no I didn't think it was possible as I was in tears at the start of the week cos of how bad it was. And it may just be short lived but I'm taking the sleep I can get right now!

Maybe try with co sleeping and see if that helps until they're a bit older to try putting down again.

This is my 3rd baby too! And my last 😂

my first was a nightmare. My 2nd was a dream and now we're back to no sleep 🤪

I CANNOT do this again. It will actually break me. No it's the morning and it's all done for another night and I managed to squeeze in some sleep although I'm knackered. I'm ok

But running about after 3 kids all day, then getting minimal sleep every night is taking it's toll on me massively

amazing OP, you clearly do a good job if you’ve brought 2 up already 😆

sometimes it’s just good to vent and know others go through the same thing. It will all come into place soon enough, for now just try to enjoy all those extra snuggles 🥰

Yeah I barely even remember writing this tbh 😂 it was one of days, I'd had to wrestle my DD1 into a high chair In Wetherspoons earlier in the day while trying to have lunch with my friend, the house was a mess, it was just a long day and I needed to sleep and baby wasn't having it 😂