12 MO bedtime

[mude]

Hello everyone,
I would really like some advice on my 12 MO's bedtime routine.
It seems the only way I can successfully get her to go down fuss free is to rock her to sleep (but she is too heavy for me now)
Any attempts at shush pat, Pick up put down etc result in a manic baby.
How do you all put your 12MOs down?
Thank you!

DS has also been too heavy to rock since the early months. I'm afraid what worked for us was persistance (pick up put down) and in recent months we've done lots of patting and back stroking. He still grumbles sometimes but it's obvious he recognises that it's bedtime and so eventually dozes off. Think he needs to be tired enough as well (but not overtired), otherwise he'll put up a fight. Hth!

Rocking to sleep is a challenging habit to break past the newborn phase.

At 12 months I just put DD in the cot with a dummy and she did the going to sleep on her own. But that didn't just happen, it took many months of gradual withdrawal to get to that stage.

mude - does your baby have a comforter of any kind? Like a dummy, teddy, blankie etc?

I would establish an independant comforter, if you don't already have one and just stop rockibg to sleep. I would stay with baby, doing lots and lots of comforting and eye contact while in the cot - but not pick baby up and just wait it out. There will be crying but at least you'll be there offering care and compassion.

We went cold turkey on rocking and just put him in the cot. Dummy, muslin and initially a very firm hand on his back, patting and rubbing until he went to sleep. Once in the cot he didn't come out again, no matter how much he whinged. Once we'd cracked this we started putting him in the cot and leaving, but going back in and lying him down every few minutes. Now we just put him in the cot and leave. He walks around the cot a bit and chats but then lies down and goes to sleep, usually within 15 minutes.