Any tips - approaching 4 month sleep regression/progression....!

[Suzysuz]

Just looking for any tips on getting through this?!

At moment am incredibly lucky that we do bath, feed, bed routine (not feed to sleep, he goes down drowsy) down with white noise and Swaddle Up sleeping bag and he sleeps 8pm, usual bit of wriggling/wind in early hours, up for early feed between 3-4am and back down until 7-7.30am.

Day naps are a bit iffy but we're still working on them, now use a dummy to settle for day naps which usually (not always) helps him settle, gets put down in pram in lounge, back in Swaddle Up sleeping bag with white noise too. We don't have a clear nap pattern, although he's getting better at longer naps. During the day I focus on awake time of no more than 1-1.5hrs including any settling time.

So most of the good stuff is pure luck (!) and worried about it all falling apar during the regression/progression.... Any tips/pointers/experience would be much appreciated!!!!

I've got nothing to add as DS is only 3 months old so will be watching this thread as the routine you describe is identical to ours I could have written it myself

Hi, we are just going through it at the moment. I would say to work on independent sleep ( in cot settling) if possible before it kicks in, as that is what has kept it bearable for us. My lo wakes a few times a night at the moment, but 9 times out of 10 will go back to sleep independently within 2 mins. So although we get woken, we don't actually have to do anything.

I'd also suggest giving as much milk during the day as possible, as then you can be more confident at night that any extra wake ups are not hunger related.

For us it has coincided with him starting to sleep a 12 hour stretch - sometimes with a couple of brief wake ups when he self settles, and some nights without a squeak between 7 pm and 6/7 am. So it can be a positive thing!

Good luck. Some people don't notice any effects from it, so it's not a guaranteed nightmare!

Thanks both!! The dummy has definitely helped the settling, occasionally it doesn't work but generally has saved my back from copious amounts of rocking which we had been doing!

@saz467 what did you do that helped your LO learn to self settle in the cot?

Sorry, only just seen this, probs a bit late now. Since he was tiny, very clear sleep cues - dark room, sleeping bag, white noise, same lullaby every time, into cot when awake. If he doesn't settle, hand on chest and shhh. Took ages sometimes, but he got it eventually and now usually very easy to put down.