Settling a 4 month old

[JudysDreamHorse]

My 4 month old DS just does not get sleepy. We tend to rock him until sleepy while sucking our finger and then put him in his cot (if he wakes we let him suck our finger to sleep in there). I've tried putting him in the cot awake and he just starts crying. So far we've been trying to get him to sleep without crying (I've tried leaving him for a couple of minutes in the past and he just gets more and more upset.

I'm worried about him not settling and the last couple of weeks he's been waking every hour or so (a good night for us is him waking 2 times between 11pm and 7am). I know this could be a sleep regression which may pass but I decided to ask my HV for advice.
She said I should put him in the cot after the normal bedtime routine and then not pick him up again no matter what. She said it'll be difficult to begin with but it should work. She said it was not controlled crying as you stayed with him to reassure him (we've never been able to calm him in the cot if he's really worked up). Has anyone tried this? Does it work? Is it really any different from controlled crying? I just think he's going to cry himself to exhaustion and then sleep but would really like to get to a point where he can self settle.

Perhaps you could try giving him some more sleep cues?

For example, firstly following a very consistent bedtime routine: Bath, bottle in nursery,dim lights read a book, cuddle/song, put in cot etc. If you follow the same thing every night, then he should start to learn that it is time to sleep.

I would also recommend removing anything from the room and cot (especially) that may distract him e.g. lots of toys/mobiles. He is becoming more aware of his surroundings and frm this age, anything that may catch his eye is enough to make him stir and waken fully.

Make his room really dark - light can waken them in a light sleep too.

Both my DS have white noise playing in their rooms to block the noise of aircraft and noisy neighbours!

Finally, I have always played our BT monitor music (which thankfully you can also control remotely!!) EVERY time my DS2 has gone to bed (both nap and bedtime) - it is his key cue that it is time to sleep. From the moment he hears it, he rolls over and goes to sleep. I have done this since the day he was born (now 7 mo).

Make sure when you try new things that you give them a week to work - NOTHING with a baby happens overnight!

Good Luck

I agree with all the above - and how about a dummy instead of your finger?

Watching with interest as am in the same boat - I could have written your post ...

Thanks for replies - know I should try a dummy instead of a finger but he's not taken it before and seems more effort to make him learn to take it than just using a finger (which is always available and I have to remove it eventually). We have a pretty consistent bedtime routine (which we've been doing for weeks now) but quite often it takes us hours to get him to sleep. Before we were trying quite hard not to let him sleep in our arms but I have been for the last week or so as I can't see how he's going to form sleep associations with bath/massage/little song if it's not until 2 hours later that he falls asleep.

I've actually just bought a mobile as I thought that might help!