Ferber method

[E899]

No judgements please!

I have a 18 week old who has always been a bit of a rubbish sleeper. Will soothe himself for naps but they only last about 30 minutes and will cry inconsolably at bedtime every single night. He will get about 3 hours sleep a day as we tend to take him out in the pram once a day and he will sleep for a while in that.

Once asleep at night, he will wake after 40 minutes and can’t put himself back to sleep. After that it’s every 2 hours.

I’ve been looking into the Ferber method and just wanted peoples experiences.

Does it work?
He currently has a dummy but I’m guessing we will have to remove this as he won’t be able to connect the sleep cycles if it falls out?
He is EBF, do I give him a feed every two hours when he wakes up like I have been doing?
Or have people done the PUPD method and has that worked?

Thanks in advance!

He is very very young and the sleep you describe is completely normal.

But he is inconsolable when putting him down to bed, he will literally cry for over an hour and that’s with us cuddling, rocking, singing to him. Surely that’s not okay to happen every single night?

Yes I have read the book and I did a version of it but not till Dd was fourteen months. 18 weeks is to young for it, I'm fairly sure even the book itself says six months as an absolute minimum.

I left the soother and by the time I did it night feeds were no longer an issue.

Dd was like that and I saw a cranial osteopath eventually. That did assist with the crying and she was a little sore from delivery, section.

It did not help with the terrible sleep in the sense she still woke every hour to two hours but she was not crying just wide awake.

Sleep was horrific for us and it was not until fourteen months we really got an improvement.

By about eight months we did first part of night in cot then next part in with me although she woke frequently even cosleeping.

It's tough. For the screaming though I would want to alleviate any pain issues, be it sore tummy or something else.

Hello, am fairly new on Mumsnet, but just wanted to say I really feel for you and I bet you are exhausted. My son would hardly sleep for the first few months, exactly as you say would go off for half a hour or 40 mins and that was it. (I couldn't believe other people's baby's were sleeping so well). He suffered from reflux and when we finally got him on meds he was a different baby. He did have stereotypical symptoms but this was many years ago and I think people/ docs are quicker to pick up reflux now so you would probably know if it was that. My son did really benefit from swaddling and white noise in the background among other things. There was a book I found really helpful by Harvey Karp, happiest baby on the block which talks about seven 's' of sleeping. Wishing you the best of luck, you will get that sleep soon :-)

I think at least 6 months for the method, I did it at 8 months.
I know waking all night is rough, but I would try everything else before going to sleep training that young. I know mums with similar situations who EBF, but started adding a formula feed before bed, helped with the waking up a lot.
Good luck OP and hope you get some sleep.

I'm a fan of it, but we did it at 7 months and I wouldn't consider much younger than that. I would reiterate what others have said - exhausting but normal. It does get better.

Far too young. Even the book says not to start until at least six months.

Way way too young!!!!

Originally the creators said start it at 6 months and now they not before a year.

Approximately half of my daughter’s school nursery class started the year needing someone next to them to go to sleep.

Have a look at happiest baby on the block

Babies can have 'silent reflux' where they're not vomiting with it, maybe check that out and see if anything seems familiar. Also if you check out the 'babies with reflux' chat rooms you will find many people in the same sleep deprived state, which really helped me knowing I wasn't alone. The rest of my NCT group's babies were all sleeping !!

Far too young. Ignore Gina Ford and the other "my baby sleeps through at 4 days" people; they're either lying or incredibly lucky. This is the time to cuddle baby to sleep. The time for methods is in 10 months or so. You'll get through it!

I know it's so rough, trust me - I know. We gave in and did the Ferber Method at 11 months. I tried at 8 months, but couldn't actually go through with it then. It just felt too mean when he was so little. It's not recommended until 6months, so definitely wouldn't do it at 18 weeks.

Something I found helpful when DS was younger was the Lucy Wolfe Sleep Solution. It's basically the gradual retreat, and still isn't recommended until 6 months - but the first half of the book she talks about routines for younger babies.

What's your bedtime routine?

Ignore Gina Ford and the other "my baby sleeps through at 4 days" people; they're either lying or incredibly lucky.

Also, this ^

He could be overtired at bedtime, how often is he napping in the day? I would try shortening his awake window to 90 minutes and see how you get on, help him to sleep for naps if needs be. You could try the Huckleberry app to help with nap spacing.

Both of mine have been totally shit sleepers so I do get it. It does pass and somehow you adapt, honest!

Is baby inconsolable even when you offer to feed? Evenings are constant cluster feeds with my EBF baby.

Really really too young for Ferber

That is far, far too young for that method as others have pointed out.
He sounds pretty normal sleep wise for his age, albeit a difficult sleeper :( sounds just like my first.
If he sleeps in the buggy could you put him to sleep for bedtime in his buggy in the hall to something?

What I have found really effective with second is following nearly exactly recommended awake times for baby, swaddle, white noise for nap (though not at night).

Good luck OP, it does pass quickly x

Thanks for all the replies!

I can deal with the get ups in the night, it’s the putting him down to sleep as it’s so draining and will only settle with me!

@RedFoz he won’t take a bottle, I keep trying but he’s not a fan!

@Livingoffcoffee so when he wakes from his last nap, we don’t have the telly or anything on, but we take his clothes off so just in nappy and will have a play on his mat or have him on our legs playing peekaboo, singing to him, etc. I’ll then give him a feed, baby massage, into pjs and sleeping bag (although he screams when being put in these), sing a couple of lullabies to him to calm him and rock him. We then put in bed drowsy but awake. However he often cries as soon as he’s put down, we will calm and try again and same thing will happen! So in the end we sometimes rock him to sleep. We have blackout blinds and white noise playing.

@Sunshinegirl82 he tends to go about 1.5-2 hours in between naps. I downloaded that app yday so have started following its suggestions.

@tbtf yes so when he starts crying I will try to offer him a feed and he won’t take it.

@farmertom he will sleep in oram but only if pushed on it and I want to get away from him being rocked to sleep

As mentioned the night wakings are fine, even though he’s not hungry as sometimes it’s an hour after his last feed - maybe I cuddle to sleep at this point instead of offering a feed? But it’s the putting him to sleep - I’m so tired from the day and i want to spend time with husband before having to go to bed!

18 weeks is far too young! I started the method when my first was just over a year and regretted it. I stopped. It’s horrible and I didn’t even entertain the idea with my second. Children need comfort and they will let you know in their own time when they are ready to go to sleep on their own.

I have had to feed/rock both of mine to sleep every night for ages. I would just feed him/hold him and then put him down asleep to be honest.

The whole drowsy but awake business nearly drove me mad with my first. All the books said he’d drop off with shushing and patting etc. What he actually did was wake up and scream and I had to start the whole blimmin process all over again. I didn’t even bother with it second time around!

Whatever you do he won’t be 15 and needing you to hold him to go to sleep so I’d just do whatever you can to get the most sleep/time to yourself and not worry about it too much.

Yeah to be honest, I think the "drowsy but awake" thing really messes with people (me included!)

At that age, I'd just accept that he needs a cuddle/rock to sleep. Then can slowly ease off so you're putting him down when he's like, 90% asleep and so on.

@Livingoffcoffee

I grew to hate the words “drowsy but awake”!! Such a stupid phrase!

It was my mum who eventually said to throw the books away and just do what I needed to do for us all to manage (neither I nor my DSis were very good sleepers...)

@Sunshinegirl82 I think I actually started a thread on here at the time begging people to explain to me what it actually meant, thinking I was just not doing it right. And enough people replied saying it was bull that I finally realised it.

DS didn't sleep for more than 3hrs at a time until he was 11mo and we did the Ferber method. But I realise now that there was nothing else I could've done until then and I did what he needed.

My baby was also a terrible sleeper for 8 months. I would feed him to sleep then slide him into next to me crib asleep. I just went to bed at the same time as him and was knackered for 8 months. I tried pick up put down method as I was so tired when he was 5.5 months old and it didn't work. He was too big for the next to me when he was nearly 8 months so I was going to try ferber method. Put him down to sleep in his own cot for the first time and he just fell asleep without crying and has done every night since, and doesn't wake in the night. I honestly didn't think that was possible but I just think he was ready. He was too young when I tried at 5.5 months I think. It is horrible to be so tired but I think i would wait until he is 6 months then try.