How did you get your baby to fall asleep in their cot without leaving them to cry?

[fhdl34]

Just that really, DD is 6.5 months old, feeds to sleep and at night goes into her cot about 7.30/8pm and doesn't wake up until she's ready for a night feed. But her naps she will sometimes stay in there for a decent length of time 1/1.5hrs but mostly wakes up either straightaway, 15, 30 or 45 mins later. What is the best method for helping her learn to go back to sleep in her cot without it involving crying? At the moment I feed back to sleep and either persevere with putting her back in (can take up to 3 goes) or give up and let her sleep on me and go to sleep myself

My answer to this was not to watch the clock at all, and just go with the flow. As long as DS seemed happy, I was happy.

In the daytime if he wanted to be awake, we'd let him be awake, and if he wanted to sleep we'd let him sleep. It was only at night time that we encouraged him back to sleep if he woke up. Eventually he fell into his own routine - I forget when - and used to nap for 1-2 hours, once a the day. At that point, I'd wake him if he slept for more than 2 hours as it'd affect his sleep at night.

Sorry probably not the answer you were looking for! But it worked for us :)

Yes, what pp said. Also, I never managed it with ds, dd did it from the day she was born. Ds just didn't know how to do it, he just couldn't work out how to.

The thing is I've never done a routine but since starting solids she fell into a sort of pattern of when she's tired, usually mid-morning and mid-afternoon. Sometimes she wants a 3rd nap depending how much sleep she's had during the first two. As an example, this morning she fed to sleep, I put her in the cot when she'd come off the boob herself and she woke 15mins later. After 5mins she started to get agitated so I picked her up, fed her again but this time let her sleep on my lap, because I was going to sleep anyway after an unsettled night and she slept for over 2hrs. So it's not that she isn't tired. I'm happy to feed her to sleep, especially until she's 1 so she's getting her milk, I would just like a return to the self settling she'd do when she was younger and woke up shortly after going down. I don't know quite where that disappeared to.

DS is 8 months now. I usually feed him to sleep and lie with him on the bed which can take ages. Lately I've been trying to get him better at sleeping and I've found that he will get himself to sleep sometimes if I put him in his cot and remain in the room or en-suite. If I sort washing out or do ironing in the bedroom I can concentrate on that and I ignore his fussing sounds and they are quiet activities that won't really disturb him. If he yells I'll see him but otherwise a bit of tired crying to sleep I leave him. He's reassured I'm around. Sometimes I have a shower and he can hear the water and knows I'm nearby.