Experiences with pick up put down sleep training

[Lolarosemama]

Hello,

Can I hear your experience of the pick up put down method of sleep training? What age did you do it? Did it work?

Thanks, from one very tired mum whose baby won’t stay asleep.

DC1 was 8 months.
My problem was that she wouldn't be put down in the first place. As soon as I started leaning over the cot with her, she'd start howling so then I'd get back into an upright position, comfort her, move towards putting her down again and there'd be more howling!

Didn’t work for us, picking up just woke Dd up more and we had to start bedtime all over again.

I used the gradual moving away method (I think it’s the chair method on here??). Took a while as it is gradual, and you can’t give in or you have to start all over again. But a few difficult nights ended in Dd sleeping through. She’s 7 now and since doing it the only wake ups are when she’s ill. Dd was 18 months though, so I don’t know how well it works for littlies.

My little is 7 months, it feels maybe too young

This never did anything for me and I don’t really understand the principle behind it.

Controlled crying I get - you are reassuring them you are still there, you have heard them and they haven’t been abandoned/ignored, but at the same time they’re not going to get rocked/fed (whatever habit has been developed). You’re teaching them you expect them to stay in their cot and go back to sleep there. Pick up put down - what is that saying? They get picked up, think they’re about to get rocked/fed etc, so they settle down, but then they get put back in the cot which from the baby’s perspective is like WTF? back to square one.

Obviously I have no idea what goes on in a baby’s head but this is what I imagine it would feel like!!

Oh my gosh this is such a good point!!! Maybe I’ll look at other options.

It worked for both my boys. We picked up, they'd stop crying, put down. That's it - I'd say from around 8 months on. It didn't take long at all, but as with all things 'parenting' - it was perhaps only luck and due to their personalities.

We did a version of the gradual retreat method (can find for free on google) with my 6.5month old which worked well

Worked well for my DC. It does take some persevering though.

I went with pick up/put down over controlled crying because of his young age and because I wanted to encourage self soothing.

Thanks everyone ❤️