can't put baby down anywhere!!! HELP!!!

[fatnhap]

Hi, gosh it's been a while since
i've been here ... really missed it but no chance since I had my daughter 3 months ago. she came 6 weeks early and as she was in hospital for 3 weeks i tried to make up for our lost time together by holding her a lot and then letting her sleep in a papoose on me most of the time. of course she is no longer 4 pounds and my back is breaking + i now need my space .... 3 months of baby on me has taken its toll!! my hubby and i have been trying to put her down in her crib but no chance, she wakes up in 5 minutes and then we have to start all over again. Any tips on tackling this? do we wait till she nods off and put her down, pick her up whe she cries and put her down again etc. or is it better to go for the crying out method ... let her cry a bit more everyday and eventually she'll settle herself. Heard of both these methods but can anyone who has gone through this weaning give me a bit more detail on how to go about it. good to be back on mumsnet and pls don't think i'm rude if i don't reply immediately as baby is most likely the reason any help would be much appreciated.

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but pinkdiamond, having a routine doesn't preclude cuddling to sleep or co-sleeping, they're just different kinds of routines!

rickman, I co-sleep as well. I often could not have told you how often my dd woke up to feed, as I didn't even wake up properly.

I carried dd2 around in the sling all the time, just to get things done. Of course it would be much easier if baby would just lie somewhere, and I often wished it was so, but after a while you get sort of used to doing things with baby in a sling. And then they grow and things change and they are suddenly happy to be off playing! Well, at least some of the time...
I still cook mainly one-handed, with dd2 sitting on my hip. She's 17 months now.

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I co-sleep. With DS1, we co-slept until 3 months, and then he went in his own cot. It wasn't a fun transition, but it was survivable. DS2 is 4 months now, and we're still co-sleeping. He's easier to share a bed with (heavier sleeper), and this time around I'd rather avoid getting out of bed to feed. So we'll move him at 6 months or something.

And like many others, I now feed while asleep. I'll wake and find my bra open, when it was closed. I honestly don't know when/if he feeds in the night - I think he's started going from 11 to 6 or 7, but I'm not sure.

Co sleeper here. DS1 slept in moses basket till 4 months, then outgrew it and has been in bed with us ever since. Ok, we have about 3 inches each to sleep but he's happy and dont want to fix it if it "aint broke". I love waking up with his arms round my neck. Wont last for long and i enjoy every minute of it. When it comes time for him to get his own bed, I will make a big deal out of it, how the bed is "only" for him and him alone, i.e. its special.

Fatnhap - I do understand how frustrating this feels - when you can't even have a shower or make eat a sandwich without having to listen to crying. It can make you feel extremely claustrophobic. However, as others have said, it really won't last forever. I don't know how she sleeps at night - I certainy didn't find co-sleeping the magical panacea that it obviously is for others - ds slept worse, if that was possible (!), with either or both of us. And he refused to latch on if I was lying down so it was hideous. However, during the day I did have to clear the decks to hold him - I got a cleaner because my house was such a tip and I was helpless to do anything about it! I got my first break when I started putting him down in his cot almost exactly two hours after he woke in the morning and it was just right - tired enough to go to sleep but not overtired. He was a bit older than your dd is now, but that might be worth a try. Some people swear by the pick up put down method in the Babywhisperer book, and my ds did seem to need to cry (sometimes quite hard) for literally a minute or two before he could go to sleep - to sort of use up the last scrap of energy or something, so you might want to try that (ie put down, go downstairs, put on kettle and make tea and see if she has stopped crying by then) but I agree with those who think it is too early to leave her to cry for any serious length of time. And of course, your daughter had quite a fragile start to life, so she may need a bit more holding that some other babies. My ds has turned out to have a few sensory issues probably connected with dyspraxia (it's not serious and he's bright and wonderful and lovely) but I think this may have been why he was such a rubbish sleeper and such a cuddle monster in his early months. At eight months he slept through, got a great daytime routine and he's now three and sleeps incredibly well, so there is light at the end of the tunnel! Just because she doesn't like to be alone now does NOT mean you are 'making a rod for your own back' or 'getting her into bad habits" - babies change a lot in the first year and the baby you have right now is not the baby you will have in even a month or two's time.

fatnhap

I can sympathise with you I felt like this too with DD that she would only sleep on or beside me. We are still doing co-sleeping and we all get a good nights sleep doing it, if she wakes in the night 5 mins of breastfeeding gets her back off to sleep again.

Daytime naps were hard but I just let her sleep on me if necessary. In the last few weeks (shes 6 months now) if I see her rubbing her eyes I put her to bed she moans for about 5 minutes then goes off to sleep on her own by herself!! Also she plays happily under the playgym now which is great for getting things done. Maybe when your DD is a bit more interested in toys etc you'll be able to put her down.

Fatnhap, you sound just like me and Ds. He is now just 10 weeks short of 4 yrs old and still won't sleep anywhere without me. He has a bedroom but doesn't sleep in it. He sleeps with me. The only thing I would suggest is, if you can't physically put her down, please, try a cranial osteopath. My friends swore by one with similar difficulties. I waited 7 months before I took DS and it made a huge difference. Good luck! And.... I got sick of hearing the "light at the end of the tunnel" phrase.... it does come though!

Playgym is a great idea - mine liked that from about 6 weeks.

Also she liked listening to music and OCCASIONALLY would lie in her pram and listen to Punk Rock Baby or 80s Baby.

Oooh just been looking through pics of my dd at three months! She was in a door bouncer then - is your dd strong enough for one of those?

She also liked sitting up in her pram in the kitchen (propped up) surrounded by toys that she could hold and shake (small rattles).

Hehe in most of the other pics she's being lugged around though!

rickman, I'm co-sleeping with DS3

morning paper - same as mine as baba is now 4 months old and i bought her a walker last week as she could hold her head up from literally birth and she hates lying down as she likes to know whats going on around her - she is ssooo nosey!!

at soon baba falls asleep i give her 5 mins and then straight into the cot and doesnt wake up.

Ooh biglips that's right I remember mine was always very interested in what was going on around her - I think that's why she liked being held a lot, so she could see what I was doing! She was strong too and in a forward-facing sling at six weeks - would struggle if I put her facing me - too boring for her I think!