One year old won’t settle with dad

[TheWalkingEyebag]

Hoping to get some help, advice or even just solidarity at this point!

12-month-old DS will categorically not settle for DH for naps, bedtime or any night wakings. He screams bloody murder until he sees me. DH is an amazing dad and DS adores him during his waking hours. Always wants to play with him or be held by him.

We are currently in the depths of molar/canine teething and sleep has been a disaster - think wake ups every 20 mins… I desperately need help and DH really wants to help but DS just won’t have it. It’s got to a point where DH is in tears after every attempt because he feels so rejected. He just wants to comfort his baby and support his wife.

In an attempt to not drip feed, DS is breastfed, but slowly weaning, we rock to sleep mostly, and he only contact naps or naps in his pushchair (another issue for another day). This problem started when he was around 8 months old. Before then, he loved naps with dad and would happily be settled by him at night.

Help?

Are you totally leaving him to it op or hovering / back and forth? How long is DH trying before he gives in and gives you the baby?

You need to go out and leave his dad with him, just go for a coffee, or to the 24 hours supermarket and buy chocolate.

Completely leaving him to it! I take myself off to have a shower or something so I can’t hear what’s happening/not tempted to intervene too quickly. DH normally tries for 10 mins, which feels like a long time when your child is screaming bloody murder

Jumping on as we’re in a similar boat.

I'm afraid you need to go out of the house entirely, and then your Dh needs to keep trying for as long as it takes - 10 minutes is nothing. Or if he naps in his pushchair, wave them off out the door and then dh gets to keep walking till the nap is over no matter what. Actually the second sounds better as you can go to sleep then too!

Thank you! That’s actually the one nap DS will take with anyone. His grandparents and dad can all take him for a walks and he naps equally well with them as with me! It’s more the at-home naps

Sounds like your DH is going to get a lot of steps in then! Joking apart, the more he drives the association for ds that he can go to sleep with dh, the easier other naps will be. A transitional object like a muslin or blanket that goes in the pushchair with him, and then that dh uses for in house naps might be worth a try too

Sod the at home naps, get him out in the pram for now! The phase will pass. You'll be back with at home naps soon, but why stress in the meantime?

Have to agree than 10 minutes is too short. I know it's hard, but honestly it's not enough to do it. He needs to keep going until he's asleep.

Go away for a long weekend and leave them to it. More than once if necessary.

@TheWalkingEyebag I know this is an old thread but I was wondering if things improved and if you did anything in particular? We're in a similar situation here with my 11mo.. Thanks

Sorry to hear you’re in the same position! When he dropped to one nap, he let his dad put him down for it. I would leave the house about an hour before and my husband would do lunch and the little nap time routine, and one day it just clicked. DS still screams bloody murder if it’s not me at bedtime or night wakings though. We did just have a set back too as DS started nursery a few weeks ago and now he is back to refusing dad at nap times too. We’ll get there. Hopefully!

@TiredAndSleepDeprived
My daughter wouldn't settle for dad but at 10 months I went into hospital and they had to figure it out
Lots of walking with her in a sling and they got there. At the time she wouldn't nap for me in the pram if he was walking next to me!
Sometimes you have to step away and let them figure it out. It might not be pretty the first few times to make sure it's not when they are struggling with illness or teething.
I stopped breastfeeding and for a while she settled better for dad than me.
Then at 2 she only settled for me again. She accepted dad as part of bed time routine if I was in the room so we did that for a while. When she was 3 we gave her a nudge and I made myself completely unavailable for bedtimes and now she accepts both of us again

The problem we have always had is mum is preference if she's not feeling well and with reflux and allergies this happens a lot and then she gets reliant on me again. Finding the right time to encourage her to be less reliant on me for sleep has been key. Once you get them willing to sleep for dad it's important to keep the consistency that dad is there for comfort too. This is where we have fallen down a few times we got stuck in a yes she will go down for me but it will be quicker for you and then we have more of the evening and then it gets harder again for my partner to settle her. The gulf grows we get more exhausted so whatever method gets her to sleep quickest wins and it's back that one parent is responsible for sleep and the other for chores. We both tired and crabby! We made a commitment in January to alternate bed times and it's been good for both of us.

Thank you both for the replies! Good to hear you had some progress @TheWalkingEyebag, fingers crossed nursery is a temporary setback and it will improve again. Sorry @Superscientist sounds like you've had some tough ups and downs.

We have a 5yo too, Dad was very hands on with him as a baby, we did different bits of the bedtime routine, and Dad had opportunities to feed him etc from early on as I had to express.. and so we never had this issue (in fact dad's been his favourite for a long time!). With baby, we divided and conquered (so we thought..) Dad did all 5yo bedtimes/any wakings etc, I dealt with baby's, it seemed easier as I ebf. Now I wish we'd switched it up more! That makes a lot of sense that various things would unsettle them and set things back - and to pick the timing sensibly to make any changes/try more with Dad. He just started nursery last week (with a nursery bug thrown in already, and teething too I think..) so he's very unsettled at the moment. We'll definitely wait a bit until he's more settled. Dad feels so frustrated (more so than me I think) that he can't comfort him and help me out 😞

I went back to work a week and a half ago, and last week had some awful nights.. on Friday night around 4am after countless wakeups I was so exhausted I just had to leave dad to go to him. He had to take him downstairs to distract him from crying, then was able to bring him back up and got him to sleep. Then again at 6:30.

The following night we decided we'd swap kids for bedtime, dad did the whole bedtime routine, which was quite an upheaval as usually I'd feed him to sleep! There was probably 5-10mins of tears as he was rocking him to sleep, then he went to sleep. He was then fine with dad going to him at first wakeup. At the next he tried for a while before I went and fed him, then he slept until the morning. We've done the same tonight, we're going to persevere like this for a bit. I feel so much more rested already and it's such a relief that he's not solely dependent on me now!(fingers crossed..)

I'd think it was relating to weaning him off the breast.

Mine screamed bloody murder when I tried to get him off the tit at 9 months of breast feeding. Grabbed him back on until he was done with it at around a year.

His dad was long gone.

Yea, life is hard with a baby.

Every stage is hard. Toddler, teenager, and one day you can breathe a sign of relief that they have come out as a fabulous human being.