Cot for naps - Feeling what's the point?

[Nocalmwaters]

Hi all. Longtime lurker, made an account to ask this. Ftm (obviously, I wouldn't have time to fuss like this if I had more than one).

My Dd is 4.5 months and for a month or so she's only been sleeping on me for naps. I either hold her and feed her or wear her in the carrier.

This week I started trying to put her in the cot for her first nap of the day. It generally goes like this: I feed her or bounce her to sleep. I put her down, her eyes open. I pick her up. Rinse and repeat for as long as I can be bothered to try or until she has had enough sleep while being held that she wakes up properly.

I managed 5 mins of sleep in the cot yesterday, out of an hour of trying. Monday, Tuesday and today absolutely nothing at all. As soon as she's down her eyes are open, and we know from trying to get her down at night that means she will not sleep.

So, I just wondered from others experiences, is it even worth trying? She could have a good hour if she slept on me and it would be less stress for both of us.. I'm not doing anything else at the moment I could just sit with her sleeping and feeding, I would just like to be.. free of her for 20 minutes. Anyone with other helpful experiences to share?

Never bothered as didn’t want her to only sleep there. We were here there and everywhere and I watched friends never able to do anything/go anywhere as they had to be at home at nap time. Made sure mine would sleep anywhere. She still does 10 years later!

DS still has some naps on us at 15 months. Others are in the car, in his pram. Wherever really but never in his cot. He still sleeps well in his cot at night.

Have you tried putting her down awake? I started doing this around 4 months as my little girl did this and I just wanted her to sleep independently of me and so I could have a break! It took a few days and there were a few tears which we obviously comforted her when she did but after 5/6 days she began napping really well. Everyone has different opinions etc but this really worked for us and she's been a great sleeper once she learnt to self settle. You'll get there! I remember those days :)

We used a sleepyhead on the couch beside us and it seemed to work well. Obviously it needs to be used supervised but it worked a treat for us and we just flung it in the car if we were going anywhere and he'd sleep in there quite happily wherever he was.

I'm due another in May and full intend on doing the same, my two older boys might have something to say about it though lol!

It kind of depends on what else you want to get done. If you're happy pottering around with the baby in the sling or sitting holding her crack on. You don't have to do cot naps. As she gets heavier that might change but you can work on the sleep then. 4 months is a tough time to try to change things as they do lots of developing at that age - look up the 4 month regression. If you're really keen to use the cot there are lots of different techniques, usually starting with them falling asleep in the cot. I found it depended on my baby - one could, others took many months more. The ones they struggled I'd wait for 5-10 mins before putting them down so deeply asleep but they probably won't stay down for more than another 20-30 mins. Essentially as she gets bigger she will learn to consolidate sleep more but I'd you can't be bothered with cot naps don't worry! Do what works for you currently and you'll be happy.

I'm an awful parent. My baby was put down in the cot for naps literally from day 1 home from the hospital.

OP I've just started doing cot naps as were in the process of moving 6m DD into her own room. I have noticed that ever since encouraging her to sleep in her own cot with white noise and blackout blinds she finds it slightly harder to sleep elsewhere (ie pram or my parents house) ALTHOUGH it's hard to say whether this is due to other reasons like:

• learning to roll both ways so faffing about when being put down
• teething
• weaning

We also used Pick up Put down after reaching nap breaking point of rocking her for 30 mins for her to only have a 30 min nap.

I do like her sleeping in her cot as we don't go to tons of houses usually and I wouldn't have her out late at someone else's other than my parents most likely, and even more so during these covid times she's not going to be elsewhere

@TomHardyAndMe out of interest how did you get your little one to sleep anywhere/everywhere?!

I would just love the opportunity to get some stuff done in daylight hours, and have a little baby-free time when I'm not already half-asleep. But yeah, not cracked it here either. Though she also only sleeps 30 mins on me or in the sling/pram so if I can crack putting her down, it's not like she'll be missing out on lovely long naps even if she does only manage one sleep cycle.

One thing I read suggested that it's much harder to put them down asleep and have them stay asleep in the daytime for some reason, so it does sound like putting down awake might have to be the way forward for us - just need to summon the resolve...

DS2 is now 8 months and like a PP above he’s napped in the cot from day one, bless him - I have a demanding firstborn!! So, don’t feel guilty of wanting to be free of her for a bit... I’m a big believer of do what works for you! I’ve found that leaving them to fuss for a bit on their own sometimes helps them get used to it. And by this I don’t mean cry it out - I, personally, cannot bear the thought of a baby crying themselves to sleep - but more so I put him down, leave him on his own whilst I potter in the next room and listen... sometimes he’s genuinely upset in which case I go back in and cuddle/rock again. Sometimes he’s just fussing and trying to get comfy... so I leave him. I’ve found that you sometimes just have to give them chance to have a go at doing it on their own - to see whether they can/want to or not. Also, ensuring the optimum - tired but not overtired - really helps!! Good luck OP

Neither of my DC have napped in their cot. They slept on me, in the sling, car or pram. Both were happy with the pram in the house so I could still get stuff done. The attempts to nap in the cot however resulted generally in no nap at all.

OP, we only started getting our DD to nap in her cot from about 8 months. By then she we tended to appreciate the break as she was crawling and slept less, at 4 months I wasn't so bothered. Her naps have just gradually got longer. So basically, do what suits you.

TomHardyAndMe out of interest how did you get your little one to sleep anywhere/everywhere?!

Possibly a bit of that is genetics. And certainly not planned but:

I drive quite a noisy sports car and would drive to work with the radio on every day - so she was used to noise. There was a certain song in the charts that would get played on pretty much every commute. I noticed that if I played it whilst holding her/rocking her/driving in the car with her/walking in the pram she would fall asleep instantly (and it’s a dance track - nothing gentle!). Guess it reminded her of being in the womb. As did thumb sucking, which she did almost from birth.

And then a few tricks my dad taught me: rock the pram/pushchair over a bump - door threshold if indoors, bumpy pavement slab, against your hip if the floor is smooth; face them slightly towards the sun (makes them close her eyes).

These still worked at 4 when I needed her to take a nap at DLP and there was too much going on. Faced her away from distractions, music on a loop in the hood, laid her back and rocked her on a wooden walkway. Out like a light.

I did what I called “project nap” mainly to psych myself up, around 6 weeks which basically involved getting her to fall asleep in the cot without me picking up or feeding her. So shushing, patting etc. would leave the room if she was calm and come back 30 seconds into a proper cry. I made sure to focus my only goal on her falling asleep in the cot, so even if she woke up after 5 mins, I was trying to help her learn the falling to sleep bit, which helped a lot with my not getting frustrated. It took a concerted effort for about a week (at least three naps a day etc) and a few times we did have to give up and then DH would take her off in the pram or something. But she slept independently after that and fairly quickly started napping for longer periods.

Point of cot naps: from 6 to 18 months she napped twice a day for an hour and a half and I had three glorious hours of relaxing to myself. I know some people don’t like to be tied to home... but we still got out every day at least once, I just had a predictable schedule and loads of free time.

I would not get stressed about this. I advise you to look at yourself with someone else's eyes when something is worrying you . In this case you could consider whether cot naps would be possible if you were doing nursery and school runs with other children,, out of the house for 8.10 with all three to drop DC1 at school , on to nursery , home to give baby breakfast, back to pick up DC2 home for lunch , brief play/ tidy/ fall asleep, back out to pick up DC1 , park, home for tea etc etc.Those DC aren't suffering from on the hoof naps so stressing about it is not necessary. I must admit that my horror baby was brilliant with proper naps and sleep from 6 or 7 months which was nice for them and me so I understand your motivation but parenthood brings loads of stresses so my advice would be not to make unnecessary worries.