Introducing a Bedtime routine?

[ClareW85]

Hey All, I’m new to the board so just looking for some tips really.

We have a loose routine with our DD, she’s 4 months old next week. She’s just starting the sleep regression phase so might not be the best time to start a routine.

In the day she falls asleep on us, and at bed time we take her upstairs at 7:30, give her teething crystals, change her and get her dressed for bed, then a bottle and cuddles and we put her down asleep.

It’s working for us but it’s not ideal, we want her to be able to self soothe but whenever we’ve tried putting her down drowsy or just after she’s fallen asleep it always leads to her being inconsolable. Even if it’s just a few minutes before we reassure her, it makes us not want to try again especially as she’s very content with what we do at the moment.

Any tips on how we can start getting her to self soothe would be great and indeed how we can settle her if she doesn’t like it.

Thanks all

Have you tried pick up, put down? It gets frustrating but might be the best thing for this age. It'll be easier to focus on naps earlier in the day first so they're not overtired.

She’s still little, they’ll let you know when they’re ready to self settle, if she’s happy and sleeps well with your current routine I wouldn’t change it, and like you say with a up and coming regression it wouldn’t be an ideal time to change it.

I knew when my DS was ready to self settle when he started to resist my usual methods of getting him to sleep such as rocking etc. This was about 8 months, but I couldn’t leave the room until he was asleep but he’s just started to be happy to self settle alone at 10 months.

Thanks for that, there’s defo a feeling of thinking I SHOULD be doing something.

I’m pretty comfortable with what we’re doing I just didn’t want my love of the cuddles to hold her back from her being able to self settle!

The pick up put down was what we tried when she was upset for hours. Awful!

Thanks for your advice :)