Support thread for sleep training in lockdown

[Goostacean]

Hi all, I was on a similar thread for potty training (for my toddler) in lockdown and it was great to have some support and encouragement from those going through the same thing.

From tomorrow night we’re going to try sleep training our 5.5mo as he currently nurses/bounces to sleep and wakes multiple times a night.

Anyone else in a similar position, regardless of your child’s age?

@NC2605 that really sounds like things are progressing well!

@Goostacean I do just as @2018isanewyear does. We are also bottle feeding.

I change a nappy in order to rouse her a bit because when I wasn't doing that I struggled to wake her enough for the feed. Mostly she doesn't open her eyes fully and goes straight back down. With this I then do one night feed most nights. It's worth you trying it for a few nights to see how it changes things and if it works for you. It's basically bringing your 2am feed forward.

Last night we had 7.30-10.30pm - dream feed then - slept to 4.30am - fed - slept again until 6.30am. Bit better than 5.30am the previous day! But no idea why as dream feed was earlier. Nap at 8.30am to 10am and it feels like the next nap is coming up...

Thanks for letting me know! We had a bit of a backslide today; were out all day in the sunshine and I ended up feeding to sleep then holding him for an entire 40min nap... felt naughty but also it was lovely to feed to sleep again, and hold him, he’s still so young... I figured once won’t hurt 🙈

He went down without a peep at 7.30pm, so we’ll see how the night goes. He’s back in his sleeping bag which I think may help- I’d not been using it lately because of the heat. Fingers crossed for a good night for us all!!

Hi everyone! Is it OK if I join, but just for advice /tips for now? Our ds, first baby, is 5.5 months but was born a month early.

His sleep is pretty awful really! Can wake up to 5 times a night for short wakings or will have a decent 4-6 hour block but then be wide awake for up to 2 hours in the middle of the night 🤦‍♀️ He used to sleep quite well and be able to nod off on his own, but since the 4 month regression it's gone to pot and I mostly feed him to sleep.

We're moving him to his own room at 6 months, so in about 2 weeks. Our plan is to see if just being in the cot and having his sounds etc on all night help things at first and if no improvement, we'll look to do gentle sleep training towards the end of June, when dh has 2 weeks off work. Does that sound OK?

Questions... If they wake up but are just awake, do you leave it and only start going in if they actually cry? And if he cries, would we be OK to wait 2 mins then go in, pick him up/comfort him until he stops and then put him down and try again? We've never really left him to cry before now, save from unavoidable stuff like being on the loo /dh making a bottle if I'm out etc. I think we'll find it really hard!

I'm OK with a few short wake ups, it's the long wakes I'm really struggling with! We keep our room dark, quiet, boring etc, but I feel we must be doing as something wrong 🙁

@Fivebyfive2 it is really hard to hear them cry I had been cuddling to sleep for 8months as as much as I was fed up it didn't make it any easier.

Everyone has their own variation but from what I have read none of them involve picking them up to settle them. Obviously there are more gentle methods that do, this isn't the only way.

We have done 3mins return for 2mins (leave ds in cot but tell him we love him and that we're just downstairs give him a comforting stroke and then leave the room) 5mins return for 2mins and then 7mins each time. If he's not crying I leave him. the most we have ever had to do is 3/5/7/7. The idea isn't to settle them necessarily when you go back in just to reassure that you Haven't abandoned them and a couple of occasions it actually made him worse but I'm pleased to say a week in and we haven't had any tears for 4nights and he's gone to sleep within 5mins and he is a much happier baby for it.

As I said down thread I kept reminding myself if I give in now then we have just let him cry for no reason which then is just mean.

@Fivebyfive2 also you deff need the support of DP, the first night there were tears from all three of us!

We had a good night! Baby slept 7.30pm-7.20am with a single feed at 1am. Very pleased, hoping it becomes a trend.

He’s had two GIGANTIC naps today- morning was 2h15 and I woke him up, now it’s again over 2hs and I’m leaving him to it. He fell off the bed this morning so I’m quite worried tbh but keeping a close eye on him and hoping the long sleeps are coincidental... I called the GP and they weren’t worried but that was before the epic naps. Hmm. Settled without a peep both times, I think he’s getting a good association with the cot, dark room and his musical bear.

@Fivebyfive2 Good luck! Tbh I’d recommend trying it sooner rather than later, although I don’t know about premies, because it’s been 1000000x easier than I expected. Baby has cried between 0 and 30mins each time, and I’ve got in after 5, 5, 8, 10mins. I was planning to do shorter intervals - for my own sanity and guilt - and did the first time or two, but quickly realised my presence was actually causing more stress and disruption, so leave him grizzling and he falls asleep quickly. These days I’m managing to get the timings right, so he’s tired, I feed him in his bedroom in dim lighting, musical bear plays, white noise on, blinds down, kiss and I leave. He doesn’t even peep! Before this I fed to sleep for over 5 months. I’ve regained literally hours daily which I’ve been using to either run my business or spend real, quality curled-up-in-bed-reading-books time with my toddler and it’s glorious. In the night I go to him and feed him, no lights on or chatting or changing, and he goes right back to sleep. We used to have those long chunks awake at 2am, but he’s grown out of them largely and they’ve not happened at all since the sleep training started a week ago. I found he was being woken by my presence in the room; things improved as soon as I moved back to the master bedroom and left him alone, and have continued to improve further. But only do what you’re comfortable with! Hope it goes well.

And as soon as I posted that, he woke up! In great spirits. Hopeful for a good night again... how’s everyone doing?

Hey @Fivebyfive2 I've nothing much else to add as @Goostacean and @2018isanewyear have explained it brilliantly - only just to say that we did move from Snuzpod to big cot, move to own room and sleep training all at once. When I was considering doing all this I seriously doubted myself but everything I read said do it all in one Big Bang... so we did and it feels like the right decision now. I was so exhausted I just jumped straight in as I was at the end of my tether. If you are too I'd encourage just starting sooner rather than later.

@Goostacean that's an amazing trend!! We are still having earlier starts here, though it was 6am this morning rather than any earlier. DD went to bed a bit later than usual tonight as we were out and got delayed coming back... so will see if she sleeps any later tomorrow. Either way I have asked DH to do the morning and I am going to sleep in until after her first nap... sooooo can't wait 😂

Sorry for the random bold!!

@agteacht we are also suddenly on early starts too. Are you doing anything about it or just going with it?
When he was feeding at half 3 ish he was going back to sleep. Yesterday and today he woke at 4 something and after he's fed its so light he's awake and he wont go back down so I've been awake for ages already now. What's worse is he is waking my daughter up too so she has been awake since 5.15 now. Going to be hideous later on!

Oh no @NC2605 😬😬😬
Well we had 6.30 this morning so it's seemingly completely random. I think I need to start a proper log of the times she's napping and going to bed so I can find a trend and see what I can do to tackle it!!

If it's before half 5 I'm resettling her but from 5.30 I just give in. That's basically what I read you should do but it's a b*tch and much easier to say than to do 😭

Sorry to hear about the early starts! We have a blackout background for our toddler’s room. It’s a portable one with suckers you stick on the glass, was about £20 off Amazon, but we use it permanently and it’s a life saver. Highly recommend! Our bedroom is very light though.

The blackout blind didn’t stop the toddler screaming his head off at 4am because he’d lost his pillow (it was at the foot of his bed), and that woke baby so I fed him. He was therefore up at 12 and 4, and up for the day at 7.15. Not terrible...

This one www.amazon.co.uk/Company-Anywhere-Portable-Blackout-Suction/dp/B00BKZLWBU?tag=mumsnetforu03-21

Hi everyone! I need some words of encouragement or some advice. Been doing sleep training with DD (6.5mo) for 8 days now and she's doing really well - she's gone from waking every hour during the night to sleeping through the past 2 nights! Her naps are really good too with 2x 35-40 minute and a 1 hour 20 min nap 3each day. I can not tell you how amazing it feels to be human again! She is much better for it too and is feeding better and all round in a much happier mood. It is however still taking her around 20 minutes to fall asleep and she is always crying still. Over time do they fall asleep more quickly? We've been doing the ferber method and I feel this has been the right choice for DD as she has always taught sleep and we have tried every form of gentle sleep training which she didnt respond to at all. Has anyone else had experience of the crying continuing for so long? Even without sleep training she would always always cry before sleep. I don't know what to do and I always feel so guilty about her being upset but even before the training I would feel guilty about not being able to comfort her...

*fought not taught

Hi! I’ve found the crying has got shorter as I’ve got better at reading baby’s cues (not to say you’re doing it wrong! Just that I was mistiming things a bit initially). What’s your pre-sleep routine? Do you know what happens if you put her down a bit later, is she maybe just not tired enough at nap time?

We now do a big feed before each sleep, with his musical bear playing, then I leave him in the cot with the bear which switches off after 30mins automatically. On one hand I worry I’m building a sleep association, but then again so what? We don’t use it at night, only for daytime naps and bedtime, and I prefer it to white noise as it stops and I’m more relaxed that I’ll hear him cry in the night. I’ve managed to get him down to no crying and usually just a bit of grumbling, sometimes none. But then all children are different?

@Mamabear04 it's so nice having your life back isn't it!! We still have some crying here too, been doing this for a couple of weeks now. DD is not hysterical by any means, more like frustrated tired crying. Maybe I'm slightly behind on the cues.

Ohh or @Goostacean do you reckon maybe she's crying cos she's going down slightly too early? Either way I must look into this a bit and see what I can tweak...

Please don’t assume I know what I’m talking about!! 😱 All I know is that (minus the first day when I think he was just shocked that I’d put him down and had the audacity to LEAVE HIM) the longest crying we’ve had (30mins, I went in at intervals) was when I knew I’d misjudged the nap and he wasn’t tired enough. Just a thought.

@agteacht how long have you been sleep training for?

@Goostacean we have a bedtime routine - bath, boob and story and also a naptime routine - put in sleeping bag, boob and story. Today I tried singing her a song once I put her down instead of running out the door and that seemed to help with the crying- infact she didnt really cry at all today! I'll try it again tomorrow and see if that helps again. It's so tricky to read her cues at the moment because there have been times I've thought she's been tired and then taken 45 mins to go to sleep! I've been using the huckleberry app to predict sweet spots for sleep and that seems to be pretty accurate but I also watch out for her signals too. She goes from wide awake to sleepy sooo quickly sometimes!!!

Hi all! Have just read this post and was looking for some help/advice!
I've got a near 5 month old, every nap time she refuses and cries for ages while I'm holding her trying to get her to sleep, when she eventually goes off, she'll sleep for no longer than an hour. Today her midday nap was 15 minutes!
She's EBF and I feed her to sleep at 7pm and normally sleeps until 2/3, but has been wide awake from then on for a few hours!
Was looking to do sleep training, as would love to get some of my evening back!
Do you make the room dark in the daytime for them? Do you feed and then put them into cot straight away once finished feeding? Also with the intervals, when you go into settle them, what has worked for you? Is it a case of putting dummy in and going out the room again?
Sorry if the questions are stupid! Have never done this before!

Hi Donut! So, to answer from my own experience - we have blackout blinds and I use them at all sleep times, day and night. I feed him with a musical bear propped up for him to watch (otherwise he gets distracted) and then once he’s done I put him and the bear in the cot. I then close the blinds fully (have usually kept the room dim for the feed), kiss and leave. Before I left him in silence, now I leave him with the bear. (Maybe it’ll turn out to be a mistake, but he doesn’t wake when it stops playing after 30mins so I’m happy to keep using it for now.)

I used to go in every 3-5-5-10mins and just shush him, kiss him, usually wipe his head with a muslin as he’d get sweaty, nuzzle his neck/put my head on his chest, and then kiss and leave. No more than 1min, and I didn’t pick him up. The longest he ever cried/fussed was 30mins, although I’d read that 40-150mins is average on the first night you try it.

I’ve found the naps have gotten a lot longer with the training- we also had 20min naps, now they’re consistently over an hour. One day recently he only had two naps, because they were both 2.5hs long!! We have a white noise machine which I often leave on during the day as well as the bear to drown out the toddler, but prefer not to use at night. Hope that helps! I’m no expert but I’m a total convert, it’s been so much easier and more rewarding than I expected.

@honeybee9871 Do you have a blackout blind, by any chance?