4mo decided not to go in cot in evenings - advice needed

[reastie]

hello all, is anyone able to help me?

have a 3.5mo dd. in general, she has been pretty good at self settling up until now. about a month ago she had a cold and i got 'nice' about her falling asleep in my arms in bed in the evening as she was poorly. Every evening is now a struggle!

This is the general pattern: we have a very simlar bed time routine of naked time, bath, massage, feed, quiet time with dh and i and then bed as soon as she looks tired or between 7:30 - 8, whichever is first. she can sort herself out to sleep with a bit od moaning most of the time but WITHOUT FAIL she wakes about an hour later and will scream her head off until we pick her up when she usually will chirp up. Every time I try and put her down - she screams (unless she is in bed with me).

I've tried waiting until she's nealy asleep to put her down, classical music, white noise, mobile, light show, dummy, putting her to go to sleep earlier and nothing will stop her. Once she's awake and screaming she will then stay that way and want to be with me/dh. She's also started needing to be settled bythe boob which she's never done before - my niples are so sore from earlier this evening when it was the only thing to shut her up.

It's usually well gone 10 before I can finally get her to sleep and in her cot (when she first goes in her vot for the night at 7:30) and most nights this is done by rocking her to sleep and lowering her into the cot extremely slowly (and usualy takes at least 3 attempts). I've tried leaving her and she just gets herself in a state, I've tried patting her and soothing her while she's in her cot but it makes no difference. I know she can self settle as she does so in the morning for her nap. Any suggestions or help please as Im now starting to dread the evenings.

Hi reastie

I know that you have ruled out overtiredness, but how many naps does she have during the day? I only ask because DS does this sometimes (not every night thank god) and the only thing in common is that he does it on the days when his daytime sleep has been poor (e.g. if weve been out and about and hes napped in the pram for say 30 mins at a time). He seems to need 2 long naps (1.5 to 2 hours) and a 45 min catnap. And even then is in bed by 6.30pm. Could you try getting to nap more in the day? Or is that not the problem?

Or, could it be that she now has a "sleep association" of being held by you or DH? If thats the case then maybe use some of the techniques in the BW book (im sure you said you had been reading it) to try and break the association?

Sorry I am probably not much help!

thanks suzy (was starting to think no one would help

She has naps in the day but they vary greatly and it is unusual to go for 1.5 hrs + - she tends to more do 1/2 hr - 1hr ish. That might help but I'm not sure how to get her to sleep longer in the day - if she wakes up i leave her until she really crys sometimes she will self settle back but often she works herself up :(

I remember when my son had his first bad snotty cold, I took him to bed with me for a few nights and I took an age to get back to where we had been with him self settling afterwards. I would highly recommend the baby whisperer book in this aspect. If I recall she was pretty spot on with her suggested techniques. Basically, little ones pick up bad sleep habits very quickly, but it takes much longer to undo any bad sleep habit learned due to enforced change of routine or illness. HTH

reastie DS also wakes after 45 mins every nap, but i use BW techniques to lengthen them, e.g. shush pat or PU/PD. this usually gets him to go down for another 45mins at least. My new rule is that if he wakes up crying or twisty then he is not getting out of that cot!

From your naps and late bedtime I would say she prob is getting overtired, which unfortunately makes it harder fir them to settle. So you need to break the cycle.

Reastie, we have naked time with ds, then bath, and last thing is bottle and bed. He's usually very drowsy when we put him down but sometimes he's fast asleep. I wouldn't worry about dd getting used to feeding to sleep at night as she'll soon learn to self settle. Most important thing to me at the moment is that he goes to bed on an evening.
Ds has his bottle within two hours of his last nap.
I haven't been following the baby whisperer as she is quite strict with routine. I've got the sleep sense book and its fab. It says that the 45 min sleep cycle is normal for naps and to only try for a few minutes to get baby to go longer. After that get them up and put them down for their next nap a bit earlier.

well suzy she is sleeping now and has been for nearly an hour

I have tried the shushing and patting and ems we do exactly the same bedtime routine as you . She does usually go down ok initially it's just when she wakes up - i mean, how long should i leave her screaming (and I mean really screaming) even if i am shushing her and there for her?

Well done reastie at least she is now napping!

I am bit of a softy and cant leave DS screaming, but I would maybe try baby whisperers PU/PD, so pick her up if you cant settle her, but then put her down as soon as she stops crying. Repeat until she falls asleep in her cot. OR at this point I sometimes use a dummy to soothe DS, which is prob not very good advice, but it does soothe him to sleep if he is really inconsolable, and it doesnt seem to interfere with his sleep as we put him down without more often than with.