How can I get my 1 year old to sleep in a cot!

[CultureAlienationBoredomandDespair]

When DS2 was born he slept wonderfully in a cot/ Moses basket, if he was swaddled but was in hospital a few times and decided on the third occasion (when he was 3 months) that he wasn’t going to sleep apart from me!

In order for anyone to get any sleep we now co-sleep but he's only just begun letting me leave him asleep on the bed (with guard rails) to come downstairs in the evening more more than 1/2hr. He feeds to sleep and if I try to put him down when he’s drowsy not tired then he instantly stands up and screams with big fat tears and does the same if I get him to sleep and try and transfer him. It’s like the second I move him away from my body he knows and will just scream. He’s the same if DH tries too.

DS1 was similar but was in his own cot in his own room at 8 months and definitely sleeping through the night by now. We did the Ferber method with our eldest and the longest we ever had of tears was 8 mins and then he slept through the night. We’ve tried twice with DS2 but he was so upset it was cruel and he wasn’t going to sleep at all.

I’ve tried sitting next to the cot soothing him and stroking him but it doesn’t help. He just screams and screams with big tears whilst stood up with his arms outstretched.

DH has taken to sleeping apart from me and DS2 but for lots of reasons it can’t continue and I need DS2 to sleep in his cot now.

Can you swap the cot for a bed with a guard on it and do the same as you're doing now with feeding him to sleep?

Have you tried sleeping with the sheets too so that the cot or bed has the same reassuring smell?

Put him in a bed, and one of you go to join him when he wakes?

But my experience with children like your second is that they don’t suddenly learn to sleep by themselves until they’re ready, and mine hated the cot. He does better in a bed, and we have some decent nights now - he slept 8pm - 12:30 last night, woke for 5 minutes for a drink, then slept until 5am and came in for a cuddle, and then fell asleep again until just now, but spent most of the night in his own bed. But he’s nearly 3 now, so it’s taken a lot of time to get here.