Encourage baby to self-settle

[Newmama20232023]

My 10-week-old needs to be fed or rocked to sleep & cannot self settle. Everytime I try to put him down drowsy & leave the room he cries so I need to go back in. How do I encourage self-settling?

At this age, it's it's personality thing. Some babies drop of easily, some don't....

Can you manage to wait it out a bit? Very few recommend sleep training at this age.

I'll also remind you that under 6 months they are ideally supposed to sleep in whatever room you are in - it helps to regulate their breathing and reduces the risk of SIDS.

Of course going straight from feeding or rocking to sleep to putting down in cot and leaving won’t work! Even the most ardent of sleep trainers would say a 10 week old still needs lots of soothing to sleep. Very, very few recommend formal sleep training before 6 months. So maybe 1 nap a day try putting down with bum patting and shhing in dark room with white noise. Be prepared to pick up as soon as distressed and abandoning for feeding/rocking if inconsolable. Baby sleep really is a marathon.

10 weeks is still tiny, they just want to be with/near you which is FINE.

Honestly some babies just need that bit of help I don't think it's something you can "encourage" out of them. I rocked my first DD for every nap and bedtime until she was 19 months old, it killed my back, but she couldn't settle by herself. We eventually stopped having to rock her but even now at almost 4 she needs a hand hold until she falls asleep. My second DD is 4 mo and has settled herself off to sleep since day 1, sleeping bag, dummy, white noise and she's off. They are all so different.

Whatever has given you the idea that a 10 week old baby can self settle?

At 10 weeks old the world is still very scary and new to them. Of course they want to be near you. Of course they cry when left alone. It's all still unknown and terrifying.

I'm sorry OP, I'm usually not this blunt but you need to lower your expectations massively.

Did you try him with a soother?

This. It is a game changer for so many babies.

Wait it out for about 5 years and you’ll be grand.

Absolutely still rock and cuddle him at this age! I wouldn't leave the room until he's asleep.

Other options to consider are swaddling and also letting him sleep in a sling if you need to get on with other stuff at home x

Oh yes a dummy might help too x

Your baby is 10 weeks old!!! They're not designed to self soothe or settle or whatever nonsense they apparently can do. They are tiny, helpless mammals that seek out and need the warmth of their mothers. It's ... A... BABY!

He's ten weeks. Cuddle him. You don't get this time back.

I am not kidding when I say I spent hours of those first weeks nursing, cuddling, napping and just luxuriating in the opportunity to spend time with my newborn. They weren't trained to sleep etc until gone 6 months.

You can't-sorry. He's too young. Cuddle and/or feed to sleep.

When I had my first baby the nurse in hospital told me to wrap him up tight before putting him down. The reason being that he was confined inside you, so would feel more secure. It certainly worked for him and his three siblings.

I think everyone has covered it..

self sooth/self-settle is an invented western ideology of 'parent must dos'. Once upon a time, a man created a study/research, finding that a percentage of babies could settle themselves (older than 6m) without much input, but the majority of babies needed parental contact (predominantly mum) to assist them to sleep. For some reason, western society hooked onto the idea of 'self-settlers'.

Cuddle your baby to sleep, rock to sleep, breastfeed to sleep, gently pat and reassure that you're not going anywhere (he feels safest snuggled into you against your warmth and scent) and whisper sweet lullabies until he is sound asleep, then prepare for the gentle transition to his bed. Enjoy these sleepy moments, you won't regret it :)

Yes - self soothing is a construct, not reality. Please don't waste these weeks and months with your baby in the relentless pursuit of a magic baby who self soothes and sleeps alone in a dark room all night from the get go.

Cuddle. Your. Baby.

Lean in to this time of them being so little. I promise you won't regret it.

this

He can’t self settle yet, but it will come.

Swaddling definitely helps (because it’s tight like the womb)

Keep rocking him to sleep as you are - then you can gradually progress to holding him still before you put him down (he will protest at first so go back to rocking and introduce brief periods of still), then when he’s happy to be held still, put him down in the cot but with your hand on his back, then just your finger, then just you in the room… it’s a gradual process of him realising he is safe to go to sleep in his cot (because in the days of wild animals he had to be held to be safe.)

I wouldn’t use a dummy or feed just to get him sleep though, because then that becomes the only way the baby can get comfort, and that’s a PITA to break. Keep feeding and suckling for when he actually wants food.

SIDS guidance says he shouldn’t be left in the room
on his own.

@GCWorkNightmare with a baby monitor switched on only. She really might need to loo or something if there's no one about to watch baby I think that's ok if he's in a safe cot

The baby monitor doesn’t mitigate the risk. Your post could be interpreted as leaving the baby for a lot longer than popping to the loo.

You're not supposed to leaving a 10 week old in a room alone to try and make them sleep, they should always be with you for all sleep and naps until 6 months, so sleeping at night in your room and napping during the day wherever you are

Why would you want to leave your tiny new baby alone to self settle? I’m genuinely perplexed.