How can I help ds to self-soothe for daytime naps?.. we are doing lots of walking and rocking at the mo

[Spink]

He is 12 weeks old and is ok at getting off to sleep at nighttime, when we swaddle him. But he always really fights sleep during the day, gets horribly overtired and then cries and cries. We then usually walk around rocking and shushing until he finally falls asleep. Do we need to 'teach' him how to self soothe at this age, or is it ok to do the rocking? tbh the walking and rocking are knackering so it would be great if he could get off to sleep without it..

We've always used motion to get DS to sleep during the day. He's fine at bedtime and at night, but hasn't a notion of getting himself to sleep during the day. He's 22 mo. We've tried just putting him into the cot and he screams. I have now decided that daytime naps are, frankly, just not worth fighting over. If motion's what it takes, then we go with it. We're generally out somewhere in the morning anyway so it all works out pretty well. Then again, I haven't sent him to nursery/CM so I expect I'd be a lot more hassled about it if I knew somebody else was going to have to do the motion thing...

ds2 is 16 weeks and sleeps well day and night as long as he is swaddled. he won't sleep in his cot unless swaddled (will sleep in car or buggy without), so i swaddle him!

seems a bit odd i know, but it works for us.

Have yuo tried a dummy. I couldn't get dd off at all ever if I didn't use one.

Have you tried white noise? I found that worked with ds1 so well that I recorded the hoover and played the tape outside his bedroom door for about 10 mins. That was enough to send him off to sleep with no crying.

He is very young - I would go with the flow and do whatever it takes to get you through

can you sit and rock him without the walking??
x

I swaddled ds too lummox - worked for us as well. Could be worth a try Spink...

We do use a dummy which sometimes helps but often he gets so worked up that he just spits it out. Sitting down and rocking gets a bad response too. We'll try the white noise - when dh does very loud shushing it sometimes helps! We do swaddle at night but so far not during the day - I'll give it a try tomorrow and report back..

Corriedale and stressteddy - I know what you mean about going with what works, but he is getting so heavy that I think my arms may actually fall out of their sockets if things don't change!

hmm.. and what was that I said about nighttimes being ok?? dh is walking and rocking a screaming swaddled bundle this very minute...

Start hoovering

A long walk in pram, wrapped up warm with lots of air able to get to baby always worked for me.

I'm having trouble with my 9 mo needing to be rocked to sleep suddenly - now that is heavy!

One thing that used to help was giving him my little finger to suck - nail downwards to his tongue. He'd often take that when he wouldn't take a dummy. Maybe because it's part of mummy or daddy so it's more reassuring. He only used to need to suck on it for a few minutes and then you could gradually pull it out.

But it doesn't work any more! I think all these self soothing things are helpful but in my experience nothing lasts for ever. Sorry to be a downer!