Advice needed please !!! My 8wo daughter can't self settle

[elsie1976]

Hi all, hope you can help please ? My eight week old daughter seems to have developed a sleep problem, she will happily sleep on my chest and if I then put her in her moses basket when she is asleep she is fine until she comes back into a light sleep and can't settle herself back and ends up crying hysterically.

If I put her down when she is half awake/half asleep she can settle herself but takes about an hour of her making noises (not crying) and me putting her dummy back in her mouth before she falls off.

My husband likes swaddling but I don't think she likes it much as she seems to get herself agitated by this.

She sleeps well through the night when she finally gets off to sleep, waking at about 2am and 6am, where I feed her and put her straight down, she makes noises to settle herself and goes back to sleep.

I suppose I'm asking am I wrong to let her go to sleep on my chest and if anyone has any tips for settling her when she awakes mid sleep, should I just let her cry ? I don't want her to feel abandoned ?

Hope someone can give advice, I appreciate this may sound like a very small problem, just don't know where else to go for advice ????? thanks

Wow this sounds like really good sleep to me! I dont think an 8 week old is expected to self settle, my 8 week DS certainly doesnt - he falls asleep while being rocked and even though we co-sleep he still often wakes when I carefully lie down with him in my arms! He also wakes every 1-2 hours to feed. I think you should just go with it and certainly dont worry that it is wrong to let her fall asleep on you - quite the opposite. She's still so tiny and needs that comfort from you so just enjoy the cuddles . Certainly dont let her cry, she's far too young.

And re the swaddling my DS is the same - he just gets worked up if he cant wave his hands around.

My 8 month old doesn't self settle well hardly ever). I didn't realise it was a problem! They are babies, they will get there in their own time, you are doing nothing wrong at all. Definitely do not let her cry, IMHO that is cruel at this age, all she knows is she wants to be warm and safe and near you!

She's so young so I wouldn't worry. She's doing well by the sounds of it. Most babies aren't ready to self settle until around 4-5 months. Before that it's luck really and even after that it doesn't become consistent for a while.

I'd do whatever works at the start of the night to get her sleeping for long stretches. Things like teething, growth spurts and developmental leaps will all cause havoc as she grows so you'll only hve to "reteach" if you do try sleep training (which I think is pointless until at least 6 months but even then it can all be undone!)

She's only 8wo, please don't worry about self settling, babies that young need the comfort of your touch.

Thanks all for your messages, really appreciate it.

I am no expert and can only talk from personal experience but what saved our sanity was using white noise eg hairdryer for a time when first settling to sleep at the start of the night, particularly helpful if ds is overtired. He used to take up to an hour to get to sleep despite showing classic tired signs, it was like he was keeping himself awake by making noises but wasn't actually crying the noise definately seemed to sooth him. At first it still took time with white noise but now takes 5 mins or so and doesn't always need it. Doesn't wake up again when it is switched off

That is not a sleep problem. She is an eight week old baby.

Wow - you don't have a baby with a sleep problem, you have a baby who is great at sleeping! Sounds pretty good to me - only waking twice a night, going back to sleep after her feeds, you can put her down sleepy but not sound asleep and she still goes off to sleep - well done!

Don't let her cry when she wakes up - 8 week old babies only cry because they need something.

I think babies who self-settle at only 8 weeks old are the exception rather than the rule.

8 wk olds aren't supposed to self settle. You shouldn't expect too much, sounds like you're doing pretty well to me :)

way too little to expect self settling. I say lucky you that she sleeps as well as she does at that age! they go through stages, don't worry too much about it at the moment and just do whatever works. She's only tiny and still needs lots of reassurance.

I think the reason I was concerned was that she naturally self settled so well before and I thought I had created the problem by hugging her too much, but reading the posts it sounds like I have nothing to worry about and will continue to hug her as I have been.

I put her down in her bed while I ran her bath last night and came back to find her asleep, so I think I'm going to go back to being relaxed about it and see what happens, we both enjoy the hugging so why not just carry on I guess :)

Good on you, elsie.

One thing I was surprised about babies (after having had DD, now almost 3) was that I'd expected her to change in a kind of linear way (so, with sleep: sleeping badly at first, then better, then sleeping through permanently), but actually she (and probably every other child) changed from month to month and not always in an obviously "straight line". So she started off sleeping really quite well, then started waking up loads for months, then eventually started sleeping a bit better, then slept through occasionally, and now generally sleeps through. But things like illness, house move etc can mean a baby starts waking up at night again.

So just as you think you've got your child figured, they go and do something different and you just have to adapt! . I think this was probably my single biggest lesson of motherhood to a baby!

That's good to know Wigeon as I had also thought sleep would change in a linear way, at least I know not to expect that now and we're moving in a couple of weeks so sounds like I'm in for some hard nights. Hope it's not too much for DD bless her.