How to get baby to fall asleep independently

[gds05]

My baby is almost 11 months old and he’s always fed to sleep even at bedtime. Now I feel like he’s starting to drop bottles, I struggle to get him to nap.

Like today, he had a filling lunch so refused his 3.30pm bottle for his nap, I resorted to having to drive around in the car to get him to sleep. I tried rocking and he just cries and tried to turn.

Any ideas on how I can start to get him to fall asleep with no bottle?

I think it's something they just gradually learn to do as they get older. My little one is nearly 3 and they can sometimes fall asleep independently. I very much recommend a group on Facebook called The Beyond Sleep Training Project where they talk a lot about building sleep pressure to try and get baby to sleep. If you post a normal routine on there you'll get lots of advice!

When does he usually nap? Because 3.30pm seems like a very late nap for his age... perhaps he just doesn't want a nap at that time if he's napped earlier in the day already? Or perhaps he's overtired if that's the first nap of the day? I think most his age probably have 1 main nap straight after lunch, possibly with a short morning nap too if needed, but that's usually being dropped around 12 months.

In terms of how to get him to settle without the bottle, it will take some perseverance and you'll probably have to temporarily move to an alternative settling method to help him fall asleep, such as patting to sleep, before gradually reducing that so he's settling alone.

in my experience, use a dummy
yeah I know they need weaning off it later but worked for my eldest who always fed to sleep!

When I was going through this process I made sure the “bedtime feed” wasnt the last thing he experienced before bedtime.

So I gave him his night time feed in a well lit bedroom, and then I put his pyjamas on, then I read his bedtime stories, and then I turned the lights off and then I put him in his cot.

It was all about breaking the association, which I did with daytime naps too.

As has been said though, thats a really late nap for an 11 month old!

I wouldn’t be letting mine sleep any later than 3pm never mind trying get them to nap at 3.30pm 😳

At that age you ideally want to brush teeth after their last bottle. We went to a floor bed at that age so we could lie with our daughter whilst she fell asleep, either with a cuddle or bum pats. 3.30 seems late for a nap, is it worth cutting morning nap shorter, assuming still need 2 naps?

He has his morning nap 3 hours after he wakes up, he’s usually awake at 7am. Then he’ll have his afternoon nap at 2/3.30 depending on how he fights it. then bedtime at 7.30.

He only naps for an hour each time.