What age should sleep training start?

[Cheery145]

My ds is a couple of days off 3 months old and won’t sleep until 12.30 - 1.30am and that takes loads of shushing, cuddling, rocking in my arms, white noise, etc. I started googling how to move sleep pattern earlier and only came across people talking about their babies who were off to sleep at 6/7/8pm from 2-3 months and I ended up feeling none the wiser and a total failure!

He had colicky issues at night when younger but now they appear in the morning so I don’t think that’s an issue at night anymore, but basically I thought 12.30am was great cause it used to be 4.30am after much screaming!!

Having read a recent post it seems a lot of you are saying 3 months is too early to sleep train. So now I’m completely confused. Any advice or experience would be v welcome, thanks.

What do you mean by sleep training? Crying it out I wouldn't do at any age. Controlled crying you could look at for an older baby if you are happy to leave your baby crying for short periods unattended. It's not something that I would want to do. Then there are things like shush-pat and pick-up-put-down, and gradual retreat.

At that age I mostly had them nap on me or DP, fed to sleep at night and co-slept.

My ds is a couple of days off 3 months old and won’t sleep until 12.30 - 1.30am and that takes loads of shushing, cuddling, rocking in my arms, white noise, etc

Google the fourth trimester and that will all make sense.

Babies aren’t meant to sleep as you want them to. Most “baby sleep problems” are due to unreasonable parental expectations. ;)

(Didn’t ever sleep train DD. DD co-slept and was sleeping midnight to midday by about 8 months old. When she started school at 3 she adjusted to somewhere around 9pm and at 8 we’re at 9:30pm-7:30am. She sleeps like a log.)

Thanks ladies I appreciate the prompt advice. I guess what I mean by sleep training is that I have read lots of people talking about starting a routine and gradually moving bedtime earlier. I’ve just read someone else’s really useful link to an article on the dangers of “cry it out” for some babies and will definitely never use that now! I thought there might be a way to get him into a sleep pattern that is less stressful for both of us.

Will look up the 4th trimester now.

Starting a routine isn't sleep training, assuming you're not using any sleep training techniques to try to make your baby stick to the schedule. There's no reason why you can't follow a routine if you like. Babies often are in a routine by themselves at that age, although of course just as you get used to one thing it changes.

Moving bedtime gradually earlier is not sleep training.

I agree with AssassinatedBeauty.

Ah ok great! I will try that then and see what happens. I’ve also got to try to get him to move from a Moses basket where he can touch the sides (and does whenever I put him down) into a snuzpod! Please wish me luck...!

Our little one liked to be held until he was 5mobths old.
How is your baby sleeping during the day? I assume he naps in the evening time?

He sleeps all night with a couple of feeds between until about 7 then has terrible tummy pain and so can only sleep when being held on his side which i do until 11am-ish. He then naps during the day and evening every 2-3 hours for 30 mins or so. Even with these naps he usually cries with tiredness (which I now recognise) and needs to be held and rocked/shushed to sleep. I’m assuming this is normal?

What are your thoughts?

Agree with everything @AssassinatedBeauty has said. He is too young for cry methods of sleep training but not too young to start to establish a routine and good sleep habits. I was in a similar position to you with my eldest - she slept late and woke late at the same age.

My second is almost 3 months and we are in a 8-8 routine with 3 established naps but this is partly because he has to fit in with the older ones routine, nursery drop offs etc as well as it is a bit easier second time round. The first step to a routine is waking baby at set time in morning then putting them to sleep at set nap and bed times. If they wake early from naps, they should be resettled back to sleep. Throughout all of this, cuddle and rock him to sleep. Once timings are established, you can slowly reduce the amount you rock and cuddle so he starts to call asleep in your arms with no movement, then start putting him down before he is fast asleep etc.

My 3 month olds routine is
8am wake and feed
9.45am sleep for 45 mins
12.30/12.45 sleep for 2-2.5 hours
5pm sleep for 20-30mins
8pm sleep
He feeds 4 hourly at night but still wakes multiple times in between to be resettled (especially towards the end of the night).

If it helps, I've done a fair bit of reading on the matter and come to the conclusion that it's not about what you do so much as who your baby is. Some babies are just good sleepers. I have seen many women with an excellent sleeper dc1 who have presumed it was something they did and patted themselves on the back for it, then had dc2 be an awful sleeper! Don't stress yourself out. Your baby is still tiny, nature did not design them to sleep through and we need to stop foisting adult sleep expectations onto tiny babies imo. Just enjoy them.

For me, never.

Look up safe cosleeping.

Cosleeping is often talked about as some miracle cure to everything on here but its not for everyone. I ebf both my children and was open to co-sleeping but hasn't been an option both times. DC1 hated it and still does. She wants her own space and will still ask to sleep in her cot today after she's had comfort cuddles. I have co-slept with DC2 at times (particularly in first 4 weeks) and he does like the closeness but he has lots of wind and colic so falling asleep while feeding just results in him waking screaming an hour later to be winded, then if he falls asleep feeding again the whole cycle repeats itself. Made much more sense to feed him, wind him then put him in his crib so we could both get a 2+ hour stretch of sleep.

It works for some but isn't for everyone.

I agree @FestiveNut, one of my friends would often post links to Sarah Ockwell Smiths articles on dangers of sleep training to long term development etc when the rest of us were discussed sleep training in desperation with our firstborns. She had a good sleeper who would go sleep when he was tired so didn't understand the hell of an overtired baby who didn't want to settle. Her second turned out to be a non-sleeper and at that point her eldest also regressed in sleep at night and she was exhausted and desperate - those of us who sleep trained talked her out of CIO at that point and helped her with some more gentle methods.

Have you tried a sling? I wonder if he'd like to be upright. I'm not sure it does sound completely normal - I'm not saying there's anything terribly wrong (I'm sure there's not) but it might be worth thinking about issues like reflux if he's so unsettled and seems in pain so often. How is his feeding? Is he gaining weight well? Totally normal for a little baby to need help to sleep, but things like the needing to be on his side might point to an actual physical issue.

Thanks again to you ladies too, makes sense and is much appreciated.

@Cheery145 i moved my dd to her own room at 3 months and did controlled crying. She then started sleeping 7-7 with 1 wake up for a feed, which she stopped at around 4/5 months

^^none of which is recommended.

Day one!

@PoutySprout

^^none of which is recommended.

Recommendations are just that, not strict rules. It was needed for my own sanity, i could never have had dd in my room for 6 months, and it wasn't right for her either.

As a parent you need to weigh up all thr options and risks and make your own decision.

OP if you decide to do some form of slrep training wait until you are 100% sure as you need to commit or your baby will get confused. Its garder to start again if you've stopped.

Pick a werk and do it, and baby should have grasped it by then

Durham University has an infant sleep research centre which provides information for parents on normal sleep and related issues. This is a link to their info sheet on sleep training:

www.basisonline.org.uk/wp-content/uploads/sites/6/2018/11/Basis-Sleep-Training-201018.pdf

I am one of the lucky ones with a great night sleeper. Hellish day napper though and he used to be VERY overtired and cranky by evening until.we got him napping a bit better. We slowly got his bedtime earlier and earlier which is what you seem to want. We followed the exact same routine each night but pushed it back by half an hour, kept it for 3 days then moved it back another half an hour (or do I mean forwards? Earlier anyway). This worked really well. We were originally sleeping him downstairs until 10:30ish then taking him upstairs but he's so much better sleeping upstairs from 7pm. We now do playtime on the bed, bath, mini massage in dim room with star projector, bottle, finish with breast, then into crib in grobag and white noise on, lights off, I give him.a kiss and walk out.

Can I just say also that his excellent sleep is NOTHING to do with me. My husband and I have no.idea what we're doing and just plonked him in his crib hoping he'd sleep as we didn't realise you even could rock them to sleep... thankfully he just drifts off every time! So it's seriously just luck.of the draw. You'll be lucky in A different way. But please don't beat yourself up.over it!!! Hope it gets easier.