Will DH ever be able to put DS (8 months) to bed? Your top tips please!

[frankietwospots]

So...DS is now 8 months and exclusively BF. I haven't had an evening out yet, but I'm not desperate to either. But I do have a night out planned on 31st October and am terrified of the thought of leaving DH to put DS to bed. Here's some background...

We've got a good bedtime routine - DH has a bath with him, then I take DS upstairs to his bedroom and feed him to sleep. I put him down for naps when he's awake in the day, but he usually dozes off during his bedtime feed to I put him in his cot asleep. More often than not, he sleeps through to about 4 or 5am when I give him another feed. So that's all fine...but I seriously cannot conceive of a time when DH will be able to put DS to bed, based around the bedtime feed. DS hasn't had a bottle since he was about 8 weeks old (my milk supply wasn't great due to having a C section so he had a bit of formula for his bedtime feed). DS loves his sippy cup for water but surely he wouldn't take that at bedtime when what he really likes is the comfort of my boob? I'm reluctant to switch to a bottle (of expressed milk) as that seems like a backward step, but maybe it's the only way for DH to feed him? Have any other EBF mummies got any tips for how to deal with this? BTW, DH has put DS down for a daytime nap a couple of times without too much trouble so that's a start at least...

As we have quite a while to plan for my night out, how should we go about starting to involve DH more in putting DS to bed? I guess the cuddles/comfort side of things is just as important as the feed, but DS sees DH as 'PLAYTIME!' and therefore I'm worried that him seeing DH at night will stimulate him too much, plus DH is a bit rubbish at avoiding eye contact, not speaking etc.. at night.

I suspect I am overthinking all of this and that DH will just have to muddle through but the control freak in me wants to have a plan of action in place so that I don't spend my first night out constantly checking my phone and worrying...

I had an evening out proper when DD was 6m old. I was BF her most of the time, but did used to 'top up' with formula if she was particularly hungry. I started to express milk quite early on as I had a good supply going, so whilst I fed on one side, I'd express on the other.

We spent a few days before my night out reintroducing a bottle as the last feed/middle of the night feed, and I made sure we had expressed milk and formula on standby for the big night out.

All went swimmingly (except I had to take a breast pump on the night out - a hen night - to deal with my 'spare' milk!)

You'll be fine. :)

I've not cracked this yet and DD is older than your DS, but I have had a handful of evenings out. Either I get DD to sleep before going out, or DH muddles through, often involving lots of rocking or a walk in the pram! Not ideal, but he finds a way :)

I've not been away from my 6mo yet butt we sometimes practice me doing last feed downstairs then dh taking her up and getting her changed for bed and putting her down. I guess the crucial difference is dd always goes down awake, me taking her off the boob always wakes her. Maybe start with putting your ds down a little bit awake and go from there? Otherwise maybe just don't think about it too much and trust that they will do it and get on fine.

Also, my dh is playtime and different, and they just do it their way. Maybe if you think about it like that, then the thing to do is give them as much time together as possible. My two are noticeably closer after holidays and weekends.

Hope that's some help

Hmmm...I won't be able to get him to sleep before I go out as I need to leave around 5pm which is when he is a right little livewire ready for his dinner, followed by a dance with Iggle Piggle on the telly! How did your DH feed your DD?

NotGeoffVader - I will definitely have some formula cartons on standby but am concerned about re-introducing a bottle after all this time when he is so good with his sippy cup. But that's no substitute for a nice juicy nipple is it?!

frankie - no a sippy cup is nowhere near 'right' - I found that if DD was tired enough, the bottle was fine.

(Still trying to get rid of the bottle actually - it comes out for night-time feeds)

I think I timed it so I did the bedtime feed and then went out. But I think one night with a bottle/cup will be fine as it'll be different anyway with you not being there. And it's still 6 weeks away, they change a lot in that time!

Should point out that I meant a sippy cup was no substitute for a nipple from a baby's point of view. I have nothing against sippy cups. I am tired and unable to write coherently though! :)

We only recently managed this at around 13 months. I spent a month ish gradually putting DS down awake myself, ie waking him after a feed. It was really annoying having to go through this because I knew feeding him to sleep was always an easy option, and often he's take up to an hour to settle with me beside him in his cot. One night we bit the bullet and I went out saying goodbye to him at about 530. DH managed to get him to sleep in 10 minutes! Of course I had all the ' don't know what all the fuss is about' comments...

Basically he just did a slightly different routine, ie stories on the floor in his room rather than on our bed which is where I feed him, and he put him down about half an hour later than usual to make sure he was tired. He shush patted for 10 mins and he was off! Since then he's done one more night and grandparents have done a couple too. But generally I have carried on doing bedtime as it's just quicker and easier!

Think PPL has it right - does your DS really need to be fed to sleep? Could you change that part of the routine somehow?

If you could start changing the bed time routine to:

Dinner
Iggle piggle dance ()
Bath - daddy
Milk (bf you)
Dressed - daddy
Story time - daddy
Milk to sleep - you

And then phase out the milk to sleep so that he has milk as soon as he is out of the bath.

The story time should be 2 or 3 good books for your son to enjoy but wind down. Perhaps get DH to do this on your bed, all snuggled up and basically lie with him until asleep.

We did this, I used to feed to sleep but we had a good pattern in place that we tweaked (ie bringing the milk forward and stories after) At first dd wouldn't settle on DP straight away but I'd go in, feed until sleepy and then put her down or back with DP. Over time, she was far more relaxed with DP knowing she would get her milk and a cuddle and wouldn't be left alone.

Now at 13 months, I literally can feed her before bath or straight after and she looks for DP to get her to bed (coincidently she wouldn't go down for me the other night when he wasn't here, I had to feed to sleep!)

At the same time, at 8 months, make sure during the day that you go out, offer more boob and solids and by 5pm he'll probably be ok with a bit of water.

Dd is a bottle refuser AND also will not take any milk out of a cup, beaker or bottle. She likes boob and that's that (little madam) therefore she'll wait for it. I go out for my sport and most the time she'll rarely wake up but on the occasions she did, DP
will lie with her on our bed (or the bed in her room as we part-co sleep) and she waits patiently. She used to get more upset/agitated by offering her milk, so DP
would offer water instead and take her down stairs until I come in.

I suppose I'm saying (perhaps not very well) is just see how it goes and explain to DH that it doesn't matter what he needs to do to keep you DS happy- if it means coming down stairs or distracting him then so be it. It's only one night that you are out.

And, as long as you are paralytic you can still feed when you get in.

Hi everyone, thanks so much for all these suggestions. Plenty for me to think about and try out, especially as we have six weeks to plan for this momentous event! I agree that the feeding to sleep thing probably has to change and I know DS can do it as he does it fine in the daytime. I also think that DH will find his way no matter what I suggest. I've been out on my own quite a lot this weekend and he has muddled through just fine. I just need to stop being such a bloody control freak!

You can still feed to sleep. Ds won't expect your DH to get a boob out!! Give him some milk so he can feed baby and it will be fine.

Simple answer: Yes.

More complicated answer: One day!

DS is now 13mo and DH is better than me at putting him down now. I give DS a feed downstairs at 5/6ish, DH then takes him up for a bath. After bath, he has a shouty ten minute wrestle over nappy/sleepsuit etc, but then they settle down in bed together, DH reads a book while DS fiddles with his taggy blanket, I usually go up and join them for a feed and then one of us puts him in his cot, sleepy but awake, for him to drop off. DS usually cries if I put him down, but settles quite quickly if DH does. It's taken a hell of a long time to get here though, and doesn't quite fit your bill as I'm still involved.

We're having a trial this weekend of leaving DS with DH's mum while we go out (nearby so we can rush home if needed) as we also want to be able to leave him for the whole settling period on 31st Oct. I wonder if we're doing the that night?

Some things that have worked for us - a bottle with a handle so DS is in control, a taggy blanket, a regular routine, his dad being uber calm and talking in v low voice, but equally dad being quite strict ('lie down now', 'go to sleep') which I am crap at! HTH.

ATruthUniversallyAcknowledged - ha ha, no I'm not seeing the Killers! You would never know to look at me (think Gap striped top, skinny jeans, Boden leopard print pumps) but I'm going to see Fields of the Nephilim in London , my fave goth band from when I was 18! Still in love with Carl McCoy, the singer (or 'growler' more accurately) even though his leather trousers could stand up by themselves. Anyhow I digress...

A bottle with a handle sounds good. Off to Google a 'taggy blanket' (that's a new one on me).

Love it. Enjoy the gig

I'd never heard of taggies either, but now we have a collection! To be honest, I think any toy/blanket that they can cuddle up to would work - It's a similar theory to 'loveys' in No Cry Sleep Solution - but fingering the different textures of the ribbons on has taggy really help DS calm down. We only give it to him at bed time so its also a sleep trigger. Good luck!