Self settling at night

[Redkite11]

I have a 15 week old baby boy and he will tend to have an initial sleep of 4-5 hours and then wake every two hours. I'm pretty sure that he is not hungry in most of his wakes. I am currently sleeping in the nursery next to his cot. On a couple of occasions, I have just waited and he goes back to sleep in a few mins. However, if there is a prolonged cry, should I keep waiting? Is sleeping next to him but not comforting him an aggravation? When I do comfort him, it clearly stimulates him and it's rare I can get him back to sleep without feeding him. I thought that cry-it-out methods should be done when you are not in the same room (although I do not plan to leave him for more than 10 mins). Any thoughts?

Some experts say you shouldn't leave babies to self-soothe at this age as they're just too young. We waited to self-soothe until DD was about five months old. As long as she wasn't in any distress or needed a nappy change, we left her. The first night, she cried for about 20 minutes, then next night around 10 minutes. After around five nights we'd put her down and she'd go to sleep without crying. Best thing we've ever done! Of course, now she's 15 months and has been going through sleep regression, so we're having to do it all over again. Argh!

Aww he's only 15 weeks :( he just wants his mummy. You're not creating any bad habits, just cuddle him or feed him back to sleep straight away. Far too young to let him cry even if it's for 10 minutes. "The beyond sleep training project" on Facebook has some really brilliant advice, it helped me so much!

Just feed him, he needs comfort when he’s crying. You will not make a rod for your back, or whatever else anyone trots out.

I fed Dd to sleep for 2 years. She’s now 3.5, goes to bed at 7:30-6:30 with zero wake ups unless ill.

Is baby BF or FF OP? I would say at 15 weeks that it’s likely they are hungry (especially if they are BF) so I would just feed them if it’s a distressed cry.

The other thing you could try is sleeping in the same room but having the crib where baby can’t easily see you. We used to find our DD sometimes would wake up and would cry for attention rather than self settling because she could see us. In our case this stopped once she was in her own room and now she is great at self settling.

At 15 DS was still needing feeding every 2 hours day/night so it is possible baby is hungry

Just comfort them. Cuddle them. There really is no harm