5 month old only sleeps in my arms and feeds to sleep

[Anotheronesoon]

Help! My ds2 is following in his brothers footsteps and is a really bad sleeper. I know this is all my fault. He is ebf on demand and now will only go to sleep whilst being fed. He is now waking when I put him down and will only sleep for 40 min before waking! My husband thinks I am too. Soft and do controlled crying - any help or tips on breaking these bad habits would've really appreciated - I feel like such a failure x

Maybe a bit young for this at 5 months but could think about it for the future. My DD was terrible mummy and milk addict and would wake 8 x a night. we could never just leave her to cry - too soft also. In the end my husband had to do night duty and she was sleeping 9 hours straight by the 5th night. Here's how we did it if you're interested - mydaughterwontsleep.com/2014/02/06/is-breast-best-when-it-comes-to-sleep-apparently-not/
At the end of the day I guess it's whatever you're happy to put up with.

Aah you're not a failure, of course you're not! You have my every sympathy as my dd was exactly the same. Do you co-sleep? I found this was the only way for me to get any rest really at that age. We did end up doing sleep training (Andrea Grace) but not until she was a bit older.

Thanks I'll have a read x just given in after an hour of him screwing and fed him- asleep in two minutes. Now I have to transfer him to his cot. Feel like I've let everyone down - him , my husband and myself for giving in. He just gets so distressed and even me holding and rocking hi doesn't calm him. I don't know what to do? How do other mums do it? Have I left it too late? My other son didn't sleep through until 18 months- I know I know it's my fault but I hate hearing them sob their hearts out

That sounds very much like my baby - the feeding to sleep seemed to get worse around 5 months and he would repeatedly wake up when I put him in the cot, then I would reattach him until he was asleep, and it would take forever until he was properly asleep in the cot. I got really sick of it so I started rocking him to sleep instead, thinking that we could perhaps gradually adapt that to patting in the cot or similar, but just as you describe the rocking didn't calm him down at all and he just cried until he fell asleep. We did that for 3 weeks and it wasn't any better so I decided since he was more or less crying himself to sleep in my arms anyway I would start CC (at 5.5 months) and a week later I have just put him in the cot awake and he talked to himself for a bit and then fell asleep. However he did cry for 70 minutes the first night we did it - I think it helped that a) before we started it he was crying a lot anyway and b) I went into the garden for the first half an hour where I couldn't hear him and husband went in. It's early days still but so far it seems to have really helped -he's also sleeping longer once asleep.
In relation to the waking after 40 mins I read somewhere that if they're overtired they're more likely to wake up again - could this be relevant?

Thanks imeg - I think he is overtired as I run around after two year old in day and little one doesn't get the attention he needs to sleep and is so good natured about it that he sleeps very little in the day- we have just come back from ten days holiday were any semblance of routine went out window so think he is chronically tired. Will try tomorrow to get him to sleep more in the day ( ironically am out an about without toddler so he will sleep more in the sling or pushchair) that might help tomorrow evening.
I actually feel like I should cc him- it worked well with other son at six months because as you said, he cried less than when we were patting and bothering him!!
Baby has only just turned five months though so feel he might be too little still? This is the only thing that me and ( my pretty amazing) husband argue about! Thanks for advice!

I was trying to hold out until 6 months but the rocking to sleep wasn't sustainable as he was just too heavy, and the pick up/put down type approach just caused us all a lot of distress, so this was the right approach for us. When I posted about it before several people said they'd done it at 4 months, although I know the official advice is not before 6 months. We have only done it at bedtime as once he was asleep he was already a pretty good sleeper so we didn't have an issue with repeated waking at night. My plan though was to still feed him when he woke in the night before putting him back in the cot and if necessary repeating the CC process after the feed - we didn't need to do this though as he went back to sleep fine after night feeds, and he has tended to sleep even longer since we started it. I know people disagree with this approach but I think his feed to sleep association was so strong that if I was in the room with him or especially if I was holding him it was just winding him up rather than comforting him, so leaving him was the best option.

Just a thought - we had great results with acupressure (the sleep inducing pressure point) to help our wired DD drop off without boob in mouth. May be worth a go - mydaughterwontsleep.com/2013/12/27/the-sleep-inducing-power-of-acupressure/

Plus I use to drink a huge mug of extra stong (like 3 bags) of chamomile tea an hour or 2 before bedtime to help chill me and DD out intime for bed.

Thank you! Will be trying the acupressure and then biting the bullet for cc when husband has a good run of shifts to support me! Thanks for all your advice xx