4 month old suddenly won’t sleep in arms - normal transition?

[Whyismycatanasshat]

My little one has severe acid reflux; and has always fallen asleep semi upright in mine or DP’s arms or laying across us.

She’s had an ear infection this last week which has made her sleep at night bad but she’s nearly done with the antibiotics and seems much better.

But... Yesterday we were away for the day at my parents and baby was so, so tired but would not fall asleep. I mean screaming the place down for hours. We managed 45 mins sleep in 11 hours. No one could take her without her screaming hysterically. I felt broken by then end.

Today after her breakfast she was desperate for sleep, that was evident, eye rubbing and snuggling her head into me. I cuddled her up as usual and the screaming began in earnest. I had to put her down after half an hour as I’m struggling with it today. Plonked her in her rocker bouncer thing and she wasn’t screaming hysterically but howling still.

And lo, suddenly she’s asleep with very little bouncing or rocking.

Is it normal for babies to suddenly want to sleep without being held?

My DD stopped sleeping on us at 4 months! We were really surprised (and relieved) when she fell asleep on us on an evening flight recently age 9 months! She would never do that at home. She much prefers her cot.

Yep, ours stopped napping on us at around 3 months. Still (at 6 months and TOUCH WOOD) goes down a treat by herself at bedtime.

Bloody nosey parker though, so daytime naps have to happen in pram (thankfully stationary) with Snoozeshade over. And we only get three or four half hour naps a day. I almost want her to nap on us again so she could actually have a proper length one for once.....!

Thanks, that’s good to know; we’ve had another day of screaming and refusing to nap at all.
Torture.
I can only assume this is yet another phase. A trying one!

Every sympathy OP, it was a horrific phase. Especially as all of my friends were photographing their babies of the same age nodding off on their playmats, bouncy chairs, sofas - even on a cushion during a wedding reception.

We finally found the nap switch on ours by walking her round and round the village in the buggy, letting her protest till she dropped off (made sure she was fed, changed, winded and comfy before ignoring protests!).

If it helps, we now get about 2-5 mins of protesting before each nap now and that’s it. Napping in her cot between 6.30am and 6.30pm is still akin to being lowered into boiling lava though, judging by her reaction.

I am frantically googling bike trailers tonight as that’s going to be the safest way to take mine out to lull her to sleep around here.

Part of me is terrified she’s ill and I’m missing it too.

Oh how I hope that regression doesn't hit our house again!
We had to do dark room in silence or with white noise and if anybody made a sound, and I mean the tiniest little thing like I breathed a little too heavy once or held in a sneeze we would have to start all over again. Usually took about an hour to 1.5hours to get her settled and till she dozed off (and the transition from arms to cot was dangerous too)
Have you tried putting her for a nap on her front? Or using pillows under her covers so that she is at more of an angle? My youngest sometimes just wants to be laid down and not held (3months) I think sometimes she just wants her alone time too

Oh! When my dd got so exhausted from lack of sleep and really struggled to go down I would just have to turn on the hoover and leave it outside her room for 15 minutes or so worked every single time it was like a magic stop screaming machine 🤣 (would move it to another room still turned on before I turned it off)

Alas, I have tried all of your suggestions; I thought I’d cracked it with putting her down on her front; but she started doing angry, screamy press ups!

The vacuum worked once, the twinkly lights on her monitor have worked once... it’s like she’s not impressed second time round so “balls to you mummy!”

Can you tell I’ve resorted to a wine this evening?

My mother is pressing that there something wrong with my baby. She doesn’t believe this regression stuff.
Husband frequently works 16+ hour days, 7 days a week at this time of year so I feel very alone with screamy-Mc screamy.

Hi, my baby was a screamer since being about 2 weeks old. At 11 month she's much less screamy but still cries a lot more than her peers and still naps less, generally! She was referred to the paed at 7 months and her appt is in a few weeks as the waiting list is so long. She's on a trial of ventolin now for suspected asthma unfortunately but other than that nobody has found owt wrong with her yet. I still have absolutely no idea what shes crying for about 50% of the time she is crying, especially when she has her weird phases of night time hysterics .

Anyway back to the sleeping - DD still falls asleep on us most nights and then transferred to bed asleep. But always fought sleep and hardly slept in the day and not enough at night and it was broken because she woke constantly for her dummy and needing resettling etc so cnan sympathise with that stuff. She's always been a bad napper but there is hope, she never napped longer than 30-45 minutes until she was about 7 months and then over the last few months she has gradually increased the times she naps for an hour or more. Not every day by any means but probably most days that she isn't in nursery for.

She was a bugger to get to sleep when she was smaller but the following sometimes worked:

• Being bounced in bouncy chair
• Being rocked in my arms or being walked around over DH's shoulder
• Being held and bouncing on exercise ball
• Being laid down in side-sleeper crib and being sort of rocked by my hand on her tummy, with a little teddy either side of her face to squish her face into, and playing this Lala from Telebbies that we have that plays lights and a tune that fades out.
• Being pushed in the pram - if the weather was awful I'd just push her back and forth in the hallway. Boring af and would often take 20mins+ but would often work.
• Being rocked in her carseat
• Being in the car - which always worked, but we don't have a car. So we couldn't take much advantage of this
• Being in the Baby Bjorn with DH going for a walk with her